All parents and child caregivers teach their children, “Don’t cross the road or highway without first looking both ways to see if there is no traffic coming your way!”
Why would anyone not do so when intending to cross the railway track? Public transportation has to stop, look and listen at any uncontrolled railway crossing. If you disobey the traffic laws you may kill or be killed. Intoxicated driving, speeding, not stopping at signs or lights, driving on the wrong side of the road are the major causes for most fatal traffic accidents.
If it were illegal to cross railway tracks except at official crossings, and if children were taught to respect trains as much as motor vehicle traffic, railway trains should be no problem to people.
Now, as we all know, not everyone is always law abiding and of sound mind; that is why the Railway Co. and or Transportation Canada will insist on significant fencing on either side of the track before the whistle blowing will be stopped.
Why should the loud and ever more frequent whistle be stopped? Yes, it devalues any property near the train tracks in Fernie, and if you ever had to wait as a crossing, you know it hurts your ears.
The Railway whistle is by far louder in decibels then allowed by Work Safe or Workmen’s Compensation.
We can only be safe, by acting safely!
Heiko Socher
Fernie