I Guess The Technology Had Already Been Funded

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US News & World Report reported yesterday that the section of the railway track where the Amtrak train crashed did have a computer system that allows speeding trains to be slowed remotely. Unfortunately, the system was not turned on at the time.

The article reports:

“The PTC was installed in the section of track where the Philadelphia accident occurred, but for whatever reason had not been turned on, the PTC in that section,” Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa., tells U.S. News, referring to “positive train control.” 

His account was corroborated by Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md.

“The tracks had PTC, the train had PTC,” Harris says.

 Both congressmen are members of the House Appropriations Committee, which contacted Amtrak for more information about the crash.

“According to Amtrak, PTC was installed in the section of track where the Philly accident occurred,” a committee source writes in an email to U.S. News. “There have been delays in ‘turning it on’ associated with FCC dealings and getting the bandwidth to upgrade the radios from 900 MHz to something higher (for more reliability).”

Amtrak’s application for the bandwidth needed to use the positive train control system was approved in “early March,” an FCC official says.

Because speed has been cited as a major cause of this tragic crash, this is critical information. Somehow, this has not been widely mentioned in the discussion.