This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.
If California’s politically influential labor unions get their way, the state’s freight trains would get shorter and potentially safer under a pending legislative proposal.
But some Democratic lawmakers fear the measure could raise the price of goods in high-cost California, running counter to legislative leaders’ pledge to bring down the cost of living. They also worry that the need to run freight trains more frequently could cause delays for struggling passenger trains that rely on the same tracks and are frequently delayed by freight trains.
To top it off, independent experts, including those who work for the Legislature, say the measure almost certainly isn’t legal.
Nonetheless, Norwalk Democratic Sen. Bob Archuleta’s Senate Bill 667 passed its first committee hearing this week without a single Democrat casting a “no” vote.It’s the latest example of a flawed bill advancing through the Legislature due to Democrats’ reluctance to kill their colleagues’ measures in public, particularly when it means bucking the demands of influential organizations such as organized labor.
Archuleta’s bill is a response to the 2023 train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio that forced thousands of residents to evacuate when toxic chemicals spilled and the train’s cars caught fire. Investigators blamed the derailment on an overheated wheel bearing that was not detected early enough by monitoring systems along the track.
The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen is backing the measure, citing recent research showing that shorter trains are less likely to come off their tracks, an assertion railroad companies dispute.
“We have had two recent scientific studies that confirm what railroad workers have known for years,” Ryan Snow, a representative for the union, told the Senate Energy, Utilities and Communications Committee. “Longer trains create greater safety risks.”
Under Archuleta’s proposal, the maximum length of a freight train in California would be capped at 7,500 feet, about 125 60-foot-long rail cars. The train that derailed in East Palestine in 2023 was 151 cars and 9,300 feet long.
The measure also would require railroads to install “wayside detectors” every 10 to 15 miles that search for signs of train equipment failure, such as overheated wheel bearings. Freight trains wouldn’t be allowed to travel more than 10 mph on tracks without the sensors. It also would prohibit trains from blocking rail crossings to ensure that emergency vehicles can pass.
Rail companies would face fines of up to $25,000 per violation.
‘Many states have wanted to regulate train length’
Experts say the proposal has a major problem: It’s illegal under federal law, which gives the U.S. government the final say on regulating railroads.
“Federal and state courts have consistently preempted state statutes aimed at limiting train lengths and blocked crossings despite the absence of federal regulations addressing these issues,” reads the bill’s analysis written by the committee’s staff. “In some cases, the courts have deferred to the federal government’s broad authority over interstate commerce.”
In other words, if the measure were to be signed into law, it almost certainly wouldn’t survive a legal challenge, said Professor Roger Nober, director of the Regulatory Studies Center at George Washington University.
“Many states have wanted to regulate train length or block crossings, and I certainly understand the frustration that would lead the states to want to do that,” he said in an interview. “But that is a federal responsibility. It is pretty clear.”
Other unions supporting the bill include the California Professional Firefighters, the California School Employees Association and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. In total, those three unions have donated at least $9.4 million to legislators since 2015, according to the Digital Democracy database.
They have a staunch ally in Archuleta, who has voted with the unions’ positions on bills more than 90% of the time, according to Digital Democracy.
“We’re here to save lives and keep the trains moving, but do it productively and do it with the dignity of the workers that are here,” he told the committee.
At least two dozen shipping, agricultural, timber and building groups oppose the bill, along with the California Chamber of Commerce. In total, the opponents have given at least $10.2 million to lawmakers since 2015, according to Digital Democracy.
Train industry officials also oppose it. They say the regulations aren’t needed.
Recent advances in computer modeling, including a “learning physics engine that simulates every train on our network” and other technologies have reduced the number of derailments and other safety problems, said David O’Hara, an official at Union Pacific Railroad, at the hearing.
Shortening trains cuts into railroad companies’ bottom lines, Joseph Towers, a rail industry analyst with FTR Transportation Intelligence, told CalMatters.
“Trains get longer because you’re able to pull the same amount of freight with fewer resources,” he said. “You have to have less engines, less crew.”
The measure also comes at a particularly uncertain time for California’s 5,000-mile railway network that hauls more than 5.5 million rail car loads of goods each year and employs several thousand workers.
Towers said President Donald Trump’s tariffs, especially on Chinese imports coming into California ports, could dramatically reduce the amount of freight trains will haul.
“When it comes to train shipping, there’s going to be less freight on rail that can be attributed to those international … imports arriving on the West Coast,” Towers said.
Longer delays for passenger trains
The four Republicans on the committee voted against the measure and all 12 of the committee’s Democrats that were present voted for it.
However, some Democrats who voted said they wanted Archuleta to amend the bill to address concerns about consumer costs, public transportation and its obvious legal problems.
The committee’s chair, Sen. Josh Becker of Menlo Park, said he has “some concerns about the federal preemption issue.”
He also urged Archuleta “to make sure our efforts to improve safety do not result in the kind of good movement (restrictions) and price spikes that we saw happen and hit consumers during the pandemic.”
Sen. Ben Allen, who represents the El Segundo area, was worried after listening to testimony from Stacey Mortensen. She oversees Amtrak and ACE passenger train service in the San Joaquin Valley and the Bay Area on tracks managed primarily for freight haulers.
“Given that we run on a freight rail line, any requirements that are passed on to them have a ripple effect that end up affecting the end user,” she said.
Increasing train ridership is a key part of California’s ambitious strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fight climate change.
Allen said that California’s “subpar” passenger train network already has difficulty attracting riders because of logistical problems caused by freight trains.
“There’s a beautiful train network around the state, and yet it can be such an unpleasant experience when you’re stuck behind freight rail,” he told the committee.
Despite their concerns, both Becker and Allen voted to keep the train bill chugging along to its next stop, the Senate Transportation Committee, where the measure will be heard on Monday.