A sign at the Jefferson Street railroad crossing put up by the Louisville & Indiana Railroad informs people that trains will be getting faster. Elissa Maudlin | Daily Journal
Trains traveling in Franklin will be moving faster in a few weeks.
In weekly 5 mph increments starting in approximately three weeks, trains crossing in Franklin will reach a maximum of 49 mph instead of 35 mph through the crossing, said John Goldman, president of Louisville & Indiana Railroad.
The community was notified of the change from a sign that was put in front of the tracks near Iozzo’s on Jefferson within the last few months, and the city of Franklin posted on social media that the trains would speed up starting March 10.
The speed adjustment will get the Franklin crossing up to speed with other locations on the network and is a leftover change from previous track upgrades, Goldman said.
From approximately 2015 through 2020, Louisville & Indiana Railroad upgraded infrastructure that brought the network “up to speed into modern times,” he said. This included increasing speeds in many track locations to a maximum of 49 mph. However, he said Franklin was one of the locations that did not increase speed at that time.
“Since then, we have upgraded all the crossings to have gates and lights and we now have four crossings with pedestrian gates as well. So now it makes sense to increase that speed there to [the] track speed for the rest of our railroad,” he said.
The purpose of the track upgrades was to handle faster, heavier trains.
“The industry standard is 286,000 pounds per car. Before the upgrade, we were relegated to 263,000 pounds,” Goldman said, “and so a lot of times we were being cut out of routes because of our ability to handle less than the industry standard.”
Goldman previously told the Daily Journal in 2017 that the plan was for crews to install new, continuous trails that could handle heavier trains at an increased speed as part of a multi-million dollar project by CSX. The plan to run more, longer and faster trains was approved by the Federal Surface Transportation Board two years prior.
At the time, Franklin Mayor Steve Barnett questioned officials with a concern about too many crossings in the city being under construction at the same time and local officials raised concerns about the plan to run more and faster trains.
Franklin, Greenwood, Whiteland and the county teamed up to ask for grant funding for a $5.78 million project to upgrade 21 railroad crossings along the Louisville & Indiana Railroad line. The plan was for each crossing to have crossing arms to make sure motorists were warned of approaching trains.
Although the sign currently up near the track by Iozzo’s on Jefferson states that trains would also be longer and more frequent, Goldman said the only change right now is speed. The sign was re-used from when they initially increased the speed across the entire railroad, and he said part of the railroad’s work submission to the Surface Transportation Board was that they were going to have faster, heavier and more frequent trains, so that was required to be on the signage at that time.
Goldman added that there could be more trains in the future but it won’t be like several years ago when it was more of an immediate change. Although the number of trains ebbs and flows, he said “there’s not a plan to open the flood gates and all of a sudden there’s going to be a significant number of more trains.” They will also be around the same length, he said.
Right now, the entire main line from Louisville to Indianapolis with a few exceptions has trains running at a maximum of 49 mph, he said. Louisville & Indiana Railroad is working on those exceptions also.
Goldman said the biggest thing community members need to focus on is the change in speed and he encourages people to stay safe with the tracks.
“Just like they do now, you have to think: if you see tracks, think trains,” he said.
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