Ref: Review of the Railway Safety Act

Wade K Mullin

NBPLB Chairman

June 28, 2007

Panel Members

Ref: review of the Railway Safety Act

Dear Sirs,

On behalf of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference Provincial Legislative Board of New Brunswick I would like to present the following for your consideration.

Maintenance of Dynamic Brakes on locomotives:

The use of Dynamic Braking is crucial to safe train operations, they provide a back up to the air brakes and if available reduce the need to use air brakes to control train speeds, which in turn reduces the wheel wear and damage causes by overheating the wheels. Dynamic braking is substantially more fuel efficient for controlling train speeds and thus more environmentally friendly. The CN Locomotive Engineer Operating Manual (Form 8960) states that "dynamic braking must be fully utilized as the initial braking force".

The problem we have is with the maintenance of dynamic brakes. Currently at CN we have 1248 locomotives of which 910 are equipped with dynamic brakes. On an average day we have 50 locomotives with dynamic brake failures. During the winter months the number of locomotives with dynamic brake problems will increase to approximately 90.

At CN, failure of the dynamic brake is not reason enough to remove the locomotive from service for repairs. We see the same locomotive operating for weeks with the dynamic brakes cutout.

We would recommend that if a locomotive has a failure with dynamic brakes that the locomotive be placed in bad order status and only permitted to operate to the first location where repairs can be done.

This needs to be addressed through the Railway Locomotive Inspection and Safety Rules dated January 19, 2006 (TC O-0-55).

Work Environment:

The main switching yard in Moncton is Gordon Yard, this facility was built in a swampy area and we have a serious mosquito problem. Through the Health and Safety committee we have been successful in having screen windows applied on our low horsepower locomotives. This was done to protect our employees from the threat of West Nile Virus.

Our biggest concern now is the temperature in the locomotive cabs, we requested that fans be installed to help circulate the air but were refused. On hot humid evenings when we have to keep the doors closed and only have air from the side windows the cabs get very hot. Of course we're working shift work and adding the uncomfortable working environment with fatigue is a dangerous recipe. We would like to see something put in place to control the temperatures in the locomotive cabs; this is our workplace for 8-10 hours. At the very least have fans installed but for a long term solution mandate the railway company's to provide air conditioned cabs.

This problem exists in all parts of Canada and to be successful in limiting workplace fatigue we need government regulations for allowable temperatures in the working cab of locomotives.

Thank you for your time and attention to these issues.

Yours truly,

Wade Mullin

New Brunswick Provincial Legislative Board Chairman.

Teamsters Canada Rail Conference