Are remote-controlled trains a good idea?
(The following article by Brian Barker was posted on Portland, Oregon television station KATUs website on April 6.) VANCOUVER, Wash. – A train derailment in Vancouver Wednesday morning is raising concerns about whether remote-controlled trains are safe. Jet Ranger 2 flew over the derailment Wednesday morning and from the air, you could see several cars had run off the tracks, including the type of car that typically carries chemicals. Other than the mess left behind, the incident was a minor one – it happened in a train yard, did not impact the main railroad lines, nothing spilled and no one was injured. However, the derailment does raise concerns about trains like it that are operated by remote control. One of the big concerns is that if the person operating the remote control is at one end of the train, they cannot tell what’s going on at the other end. “If it’s remote-controlled, you don’t have that sense of feeling that there is a problem,” said Joe Hilsinger, a railroad enthusiast
