The Brightline accident video is gruesome. But train-dodging Miami needs to see it | Editorial
If we had any doubt that South Florida has a problem with train accidents, the video erased it.
Shot from the front of a Brightline train and released by the company last week, the footage showed a driver at a closed railroad crossing in Lake Worth racing around another waiting car, past a lowered guard rail and right into the train’s path. It happens so fast: In one horrifying second, it’s over — the car broadsided, the train unable to stop or even slow down.
The driver survived, mercifully. But the problem remains, and it’s acute. In one particularly egregious example, a video posted on Twitter in early February showed more than a dozen cars and trucks going around the lowered barricades at a train crossing in Hialeah. That’s not a Brightline track — it’s one used by Tri-Rail — but the behavior is the same, and it prompted an exasperated tweet from Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava: “We can’t keep doing this, Miami-Dade!”
Why are there so many train accidents involving Brightline, especially since it re-started service after a pandemic hiatus? Drivers trying to beat the train, cars stuck on the tracks, suicides — the numbers keep mounting. An Associated Press calculation found that Brightline had the worst per-mile fatality rate in the nation — 58 deaths since it began operations in 2017, including three in recent weeks — with investigators saying none of the deaths were the railroad’s fault.
We have barricades and flashing lights and fencing and public-awareness campaigns. Still, the tragedies continue. Clearly, we need to find new ways to prevent them.
Bringing the feds into it
Federal rail authorities have noticed. They met Wednesday in Boynton Beach with representatives from Brightline, governments and other train lines, including the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, which operates Tri-Rail, the Sun Sentinel reported. Other meetings , including one in Miami-Dade, are expected.
They’re working on plans they hope will prevent collisions between trains, cars and people. For example, there’s federal grant money — part of the Biden administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal — available for driver- and pedestrian-education programs and to upgrade safety measures. We hope cities, counties and police departments take note.
Federal inspectors also are examining South Florida’s gates and crossings, the Sun Sentinel reported. Next they’ll look at quiet zones, the high-population spots on rail corridors where trains cannot sound their horns at night, making sure municipalities are aware of their own responsibilities for safety.
As Federal Highway Administration Deputy Administrator Stephanie Pollack said in a news release about Wednesday’s meeting, safety is “a shared responsibility” with governments and railroads. Bringing these organizations together under one roof to come up with new solutions for this preventable problem was a good first step.
“It showed that there’s significant interest in solving the issues we’re having in South Florida, and not just talking about it,” Brightline spokesman Ben Porritt told the Editorial Board.
Mass transit needed
We think commuter rails and other forms of mass transit are needed in South Florida to keep up with growth and to remain competitive with other communities. But if we have any hope of stopping these collisions — and we must — it’s going to take a combined strategy and sustained work.
There are innovative efforts already. Among them: Brightline is trying infrared detectors to warn engineers if someone is near the tracks, giving the train a chance to slow down.
And then there is that Lake Worth video. Stark and horrible, it’s not something you’ll forget seeing. More than that, it’s a lesson in how irreversible a split-second decision can be when a locomotive is bearing down.
Brightline released that video because it was necessary to educate people. We’re just sorry it is.
A previous version of this editorial gave an incorrect location for the Brightline accident. It happened Lake Worth. It also gave an incorrect title for Stephanie Pollack. She works for the Federal Highway Administration.
This story was originally published February 25, 2022 at 6:00 AM.