Dear Editor:
Re: Plans on track for train silence, The Record, July 16.
I was very pleased to learn that the train whistles are apparently going to be silenced as per your article in the 2014 July 16 issue.
We live almost across the street from the crossing that provides access to the Sapperton Landing Regional Park, at Cumberland and East Columbia Street. As you know, this access is closed to vehicular traffic anywhere from 8 till 10 p.m. according to the time of year. This being summer, and the days being longer, they are closed at 10 p.m. I still cannot comprehend why the train operators lean on their whistles at midnight, when the access gate at Columbia is closed!
The whistles continue all night, and now that it is summer, they seem particularly loud as we have been obliged to open our windows!
Has anybody ever thought about reducing the sound the whistle makes which must be very high decibels; and have a quieter sounding whistle that is at least 75 per cent quieter than the loud blasts from the trumpeting air horns currently affixed on these lumbering locomotives?
I swear that some train engineers have used some of the very loud air-horns to act as air brakes. Let’s hope they will soon disappear and all we will hear is the rumble of the engines!
Larry White, New Westminster
