Virginia Signs Two-Person Crew Law; Short Lines Seek One-Person Waivers; Shippers Push STB on Rate Transparency

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Virginia Becomes Latest State to Mandate Two-Person Freight Crews

Governor Abigail Spanberger signed HB25 into law, requiring two-person crews on freight trains operating in Virginia and establishing an annual reporting obligation for the state’s Division of Utility and Railroad Safety on probable safety violations referred to FRA. Virginia joins a growing roster of states — including Colorado, Arizona, and several others — that have enacted crew-size legislation in the absence of a durable federal standard. The practical impact is asymmetric: Norfolk Southern and CSX, both of which operate extensive mainline networks through the Commonwealth, absorb the compliance burden directly, while the provision’s interaction with FRA’s federal rule remains an open legal question. The annual violation-reporting requirement adds a layer of state-level oversight that could generate data Congress eventually uses in reauthorization debates. For carriers managing crew deployment across multi-state territories, each new statute compounds scheduling complexity and narrows the operational flexibility that precision-scheduled railroading models depend on. The trajectory is clear — states will continue to fill the vacuum until Washington settles the matter with finality.

Trains Magazine · April 16, 2026

Two Florida Short Lines Petition FRA for One-Person Crew Waivers

Georgia Central Railway and First Coast Railroad each filed petitions with FRA for special approval to operate with one-person train crews, adding to a thin but growing docket of short line waiver requests under the federal crew-size rule’s exemption pathway. The timing is notable: these filings landed the same week Virginia locked in its two-person mandate, illustrating the regulatory fracture in real time. FRA’s waiver process requires petitioners to demonstrate that safety will not be compromised — a standard that demands detailed operational risk assessments, technology mitigation plans, and often territory-specific justifications. For short lines, the economic arithmetic is straightforward: second-crew-member costs on low-density branch operations can consume margins that are already razor-thin. But FRA has granted very few of these petitions to date, and each one draws public comment from labor organizations that treat waivers as precedent-setting. The agency’s handling of these two filings will signal whether the exemption pathway is a genuine operational relief valve or a procedural formality that rarely delivers results.

Federal Register · April 14, 2026

Shipper Coalitions Press STB to Force Disclosure of UP Schedule 5.8 Tariff

The Alliance for Chemical Distribution, American Chemistry Council, American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, and The Fertilizer Institute jointly petitioned the Surface Transportation Board to compel Union Pacific to make its Schedule 5.8 tariff publicly accessible. Schedule 5.8 governs rate and service terms for a significant volume of chemical and fertilizer movements, and shippers have long argued that its restricted availability undermines the competitive rate review process the Board is supposed to facilitate. The petition frames the issue as one of basic regulatory due process: shippers cannot meaningfully challenge rates they cannot see. UP has historically maintained that tariff schedules contain commercially sensitive information, but the coalition’s filing argues that public disclosure is consistent with the common-carrier obligation and prior Board precedent. If the STB orders disclosure, the ripple effect could extend beyond UP — other Class I tariff structures would face similar transparency pressure.

Railway Age · April 16, 2026

Shippers Flag Middle East Conflict as Supply Chain Risk, Ask STB and Class I CEOs to Respond

The Fertilizer Institute and the Alliance for Chemical Distribution filed separate letters with the STB requesting that all six Class I railroad CEOs address how escalating Middle East hostilities could affect domestic rail service, equipment availability, and chemical supply chains. The concern is not abstract — fertilizer and chemical feedstock imports that transit the Suez Canal or originate in Gulf states face rerouting risk, and any surge in West Coast port volumes from diverted traffic would stress intermodal networks that are already navigating tariff-driven front-loading. The letters also implicitly test the Board’s willingness to use its oversight authority proactively, rather than reactively after service deteriorates. For Class I planning departments, the ask is uncomfortable: geopolitical scenario planning is not a competency railroads have traditionally been required to share publicly. But the 2021-2022 service crisis established a precedent where the Board expects carriers to demonstrate contingency readiness, and these filings build on that expectation.

RT&S · April 15, 2026

AAR Week 14: Carloads Gain While Intermodal Softens — A Tariff-Driven Divergence Takes Shape

Total U.S. rail traffic hit 500,040 carloads and intermodal units for the week ending April 11, up 1.7% year-over-year, but the composition tells a more instructive story than the aggregate. Carload traffic — bulk commodities, chemicals, grain, and industrial inputs — posted gains, consistent with pre-tariff inventory building and strong agricultural export demand. Intermodal volumes moved in the opposite direction, declining in a pattern that aligns with container shipping disruptions, softening consumer goods imports, and the ongoing recalibration of trans-Pacific routing. The divergence matters because intermodal has been the growth engine for Class I revenue strategies over the past decade; sustained softness would force a harder look at truck-competitive pricing and terminal utilization. Port of Long Beach’s announcement that it moved the most cargo in North America through Q1 adds context — the freight is arriving, but the inland distribution pattern is shifting. Watch intermodal trends through May for confirmation of whether this is noise or an inflection.

Railway Age · April 15, 2026

Pro-Iranian Actor Claims LACMTA Cyberattack as Transit Threat Surface Expands

A pro-Iranian threat group identifying itself as Ababil of Minab claimed responsibility for a cyberattack on the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, marking one of the most geopolitically explicit intrusions targeting U.S. rail and transit infrastructure. The operational details of the attack — scope, penetration depth, and whether control systems were affected — remain limited in public reporting, but the attribution claim itself is significant. U.S. transit and freight rail systems have been the subject of increasing cyber threat advisories from CISA over the past two years, and the LACMTA incident validates those warnings with an actual event. For freight railroads, the lesson is adjacent: PTC networks, dispatch systems, and wayside detection infrastructure share many of the same IT/OT convergence vulnerabilities that transit agencies face. TSA’s cybersecurity directives for surface transportation, issued initially in 2021 and updated since, require covered entities to maintain incident response plans — but compliance varies widely across the industry, and short lines in particular lack the budgets and staff to maintain robust cyber defenses. This event should accelerate board-level cyber risk conversations across the sector.

RT&S · April 15, 2026

Amtrak Issues Formal RFP for Long-Distance Fleet Replacement

Amtrak released a formal request for proposals for the design and manufacture of its next-generation long-distance passenger equipment, targeting manufacturer selection by late 2027. The RFP follows years of conceptual planning and political negotiation over the scope and funding of the fleet replacement, which covers Superliners and other aging single- and bi-level equipment that has exceeded its economic service life on routes like the Empire Builder, Coast Starlight, and Southwest Chief. The timing intersects with a federal funding environment where the Trump administration has simultaneously released withheld Second Avenue Subway funds under legal pressure and halted station repairs at Rhinecliff — a whiplash pattern that leaves procurement officers uncertain about cash flow reliability. Manufacturers capable of bidding at this scale are few: Siemens, Alstom, CAF, and potentially Stadler represent the realistic field, and domestic content requirements under Buy America will shape plant-siting and supply chain decisions. Alstom’s delivery this week of the first Multilevel III car to NJ Transit demonstrates that production pipelines exist, but scaling from commuter to long-distance rolling stock involves meaningfully different engineering and certification timelines.

Trains Magazine · April 16, 2026

BLET Ratifies First Contract at Utah Central, Establishing Baseline for New Short Line Organizing

Members of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen ratified their inaugural collective bargaining agreement with Utah Central Railroad, establishing seniority rosters, wage increases, grievance and discipline procedures, paid holidays, and vacation provisions. Utah Central’s workforce voted to organize in December 2024, and the relatively swift path to ratification — roughly sixteen months from election to contract — sets a notable benchmark for short line labor relations at a moment when organizing activity is elevated across the sector. The agreement’s significance extends beyond a single property: it provides a template that BLET can reference in campaigns at other recently organized or organizing short lines, and it demonstrates that first-contract negotiations need not devolve into protracted disputes. For short line holding companies watching from the sidelines, the message is pragmatic — early engagement with bargaining units tends to produce workable outcomes faster than resistance, and the labor market for qualified operating crews remains tight enough that wage competitiveness is a retention tool as much as a contractual obligation.

Trains Magazine · April 16, 2026

“It takes twenty years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it.”

Warren Buffett  ·  Investor, owner of BNSF Railway parent Berkshire Hathaway