OSSINING – With two more recent crude oil freight train wrecks in recent days in West Virginia and Ontario, it is not a matter of if, but when, that a similar disaster will occur somewhere in New York. That prediction came from environmental group Riverkeeper’s John Lipscomb.
New York is being presented with “an unacceptable risk” in
terms of those tanker cars traveling through the region, he said.
“These exact same trains carrying the exact same product are rolling through all our communities from Buffalo to Albany, down the Champlain Valley, down the Hudson Valley, through communities like Albany and Ravena and Catskills and Saugerties and Kingston and Newburgh and Haverstraw, and in many of these, they roll right through the heart, right next to schools, right next to hospitals,” Lipscomb said.
He said the federal government is dragging its feet regarding implementation of new rules and New York State is “punting” to the feds.
There are preliminary plans to require dangerous DOT-111 tanker cars to be fortified and eventually replaced, but those final federal rules have not been promulgated.
