29 June 2006
Peace and Quiet Costs $300,000 in Leduc
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Canadian Pacific locomotives glow under nearby streetlights as they
idle beside the elevator in Leduc. CPR has agreed to silence train whistles at crossings in the city.
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Leduc Alberta - Upgrades to train crossings: $280,000.
Additional liability insurance: $20,000.
Silence in Leduc: priceless, some say.
It's taken nearly 15 years, but Friday at midnight the trains on Leduc's main north-south line will no longer blow their
whistles as they pass through the community.
It's welcome news to Clarence Wastle, who lives about 200 metres from the tracks. He said the whistles wake him up several times each
night.
"It's worse than the alarm clock, because you can't press snooze and you can't throw the thing across the room," Wastle said.
"I'm looking forward to the peace and quiet."
An average of 15 trains a day rumble along the eight kilometres of track that run through the heart of Leduc.
They sound their whistles at each of the city's six crossings - five for vehicles and one for pedestrians.
Because three of the crossings are so close together, it ended up sounding like one long, drawn-out whistle that could last
for minutes at a time, Leduc Mayor Greg Krischke said.
He said it was often impossible for light sleepers to snooze through the night.
"There were some train engineers that felt if they were up, then everyone else should be up, too," Krischke said.
Silencing the whistles was the most talked about issue in the city, he said.
Because of safety concerns, Canadian Pacific Railway required that many of the city's crossings be improved before the whistles could
be silenced.
Leduc spent $280,000 improving a pair of crossings, while the CPR and Transport Canada paid for improvements to a pedestrian crossing.
The city also has to chip in $20,000 a year to top up CPR's insurance coverage. Krischke said it will be worth the money, even if the
silence isn't absolute.
Trains on the Leduc's secondary east-west line will still blow their horns, but these trains only run a couple times a
day, and never during the night, Krischke said.
If there is a safety concern, such as an animal on the tracks, train engineers will still sound their horns.
Next on the city's agenda could be reducing the 50 to 80 km/h speeds the trains are travelling as they pass through the Leduc. But since
it took 15 years to silence the whistle, Krischke wasn't sure how long it could take to slow down the freight trains.
For now, he said he's just looking forward to a peaceful night's sleep.
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