PARENTS
OF TEEN KILLED BY TRAIN WANT HURON CO. TO STUDY CROSSINGS
Sandusky Register
1/5/2000
By: Carol Harper-Staff Writer
Norwalk-Parents
of a 16-year-old boy killed in a 1995 car-train accident
asked Huron County Commissioners to set up a volunteer committee
to study railroad crossing upgrades.
Dennis and Vicky
Moore, Canal Fulton, set up the Angels on Track Foundation
with $5.3 million in punitive damages they were awarded by
a jury in a civil lawsuit after the death of their son, Ryan
Moore, according to a story in the Canton Repository.
The accident was
March 25, 1995, in Stark County. The crossing is on a tree-lined
road at the bottom of a 15-degree hill and was only marked
with crossbucks, no gates, lights, bells or stop signs, Mrs.
Moore said. Ryan's brother and two friends were seriously
injured. The other three teenagers in the car were killed
instantly, according to news reports.
The
state determined the crossing was dangerous before the
accident, the Moores said. "I feel (crossing upgrades are) not a priority
for (state officials) unless somebody gets killed,"
Mrs. Moore said, "And then it's too late."
So the Moores set
up the foundation and now travel to different counties. They
ask local officials to set up committees to do the background
work-such as traffic counts and documentation of the crossings
with digital photographs-and prioritize the need for upgrades
at each crossing in the county, Mrs. Moore said.
Wayne, Stark, and
Delaware counties already set up committees with 6-8 members
and have meetings, which are always public, Mrs. Moore said.
She said it takes one year to gather information and apply
for grants.
With detailed information
in hand, the country can petition state and federal sources
for financial help with crossing improvements, she said.
"My husband
and I didn't think about crossings the way we do now, but
it took the deaths of one of our sons and two of this friends," Mrs.
Moore said. "We're trying to turn his death into something
positive. We don't enjoy doing this-I'm going to cry as soon
as I leave here. It's very emotional."
The railroads should
be held accountable Mrs. Moore said.
"They feel
it's our responsibility to protect ourselves from their trains
and their crossings, and that's wrong,"
Mrs. Moore said. "They should take responsibility for
their trains."
Ten to 15 crossings
per year are upgraded with crossing gates and lights in a
state program administered by the Public Utilities Commission,
said Rob Marvin, chief of the PUCO Railroad Division.
Gates and lights
cost $90,000-$200,000, with an average of $150,000, Marvin
said. State and local money pays for 90 percent of the upgrade.
Marvin said the
amount of funding that comes from the railroad was established
by the Supreme Court.
"In the old
days before the commission began ordering grade crossing
upgrades, anyone could file a complaint about a dangerous
crossing, he said. "They would hold ahearing in the
area. On no occasion did they find a crossing to be not dangerous.
The state shared the cost and ordered the railroad to pay
a percentage."
Then the Supreme
Court made the ruling based on archaic laws that the railroad
could only be ordered to pay 10 percent of the cost, Marvin
said.
"We don't do
that anymore,"
he said. "The locality couldn't come up with their share,
so nothing got done."
PUCO negotiates
agreements with the railroads on crossing improvements. Also,
80-100 grade crossing upgrades in the state per year are
paid for through federal highway dollars, Marvin said.
The Angels on Track
Foundation matches local funds for crossing upgrades up to
one-third of the total cost of the project, Mrs. Moore said.
"We limited
the amount so that the state won't quit, "Mrs. Moore
said. "We don't want them to back out of their commitment."
Huron County Commission
Vice President Amy Hookway said if another industry announced
an expansion, they might come to the government for tax incentives,
but the company would pay for the expansion of its plant
with its own money. Crossing gates and lights and grade separations
should be paid for mostly through railroad dollars, she said.
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