Ensure the safety and quality of life for residents impacted by the UP West Rail Expansion
Dear Union Pacific,
The UP-West and Metra Third Rail Expansion Project creates a danger to families that live near the tracks, and those in the surrounding community. As such, the River Forest Rail Traffic Pollution Protection Group requires that a solid 8-foot tall barrier be built to address trespassing and noise concerns.
For more than a year, the tracks have been unsecured by any type of fencing, and an access road – that was not in the original project documentation and now will be permanent - was created along Edgewood Street and Central Avenue in River Forest. This combination of no barrier and easy access to the tracks has resulted in rampant trespassing. Children and adults are seen daily traversing the access road to move along or play along these very busy tracks. We watch freight trains nearly run over children and teens crossing in front of the trains. We also experience people fleeing from police along the tracks, and have heard gunshots along the tracks.
In addition to poor safety controls, the Third Rail Expansion Project is precipitating a poorer quality of life for residents beside the tracks. The Federal Rail Administration calls noise over 75 dB an “unlivable level of noise”, but that is what we, and all of our neighbors along the Union Pacific West line, live with. The background noise in our area, including road and air traffic is at 52 dB, with rail noise resulting in 78 dB of noise: louder than a lawn mower, 110 times a day. With over 50 freight trains and 60 Metra trains daily, we experience frequent sleep disruptions, can’t carry on a conversation outside and suffer structural damage to our homes from the significant vibrations due solely to an ever-increasing number of trains. Some of the neighbors live within 25 feet of the existing tracks and the third rail will bring trains even closer. This is all in violation of the guidelines in the Federal Transit Administration’s Transit Noise and Vibration Impact Assessment (2006, 2018), and the National Environmental Protection Act, with which the project should be in compliance.
Union Pacific has heard our concerns and ignored them as they annually increase the noise and danger in our area. Union Pacific is violating the National Environmental Protection Act, and attempting to avoid responsibility for the unlivable level of noise and danger that it is creating with the Third Rail Expansion Project.
That is why we require an 8-foot-tall barrier, made out of concrete, brick or acoustic fencing, stretching from the Vale Interlocking to the Des Plaines River Bridge, to protect our neighborhood. This barrier needs to be situated along the rail bed and be tall enough to prevent climbing and rise over the wheels of passing trains.
Please stop endangering the health and lives of your neighbors near the tracks. Your plans included no environmental protections for our area, and we find this unacceptable. Please resume your good neighbor status by complying with federal regulations and general safety standards, and build the barrier we require.
Respectfully, your neighbors,
The River Forest Rail Traffic Pollution Protection Group