Remember when Regional Transportation District A Line trains blew their horns for years as they sped between downtown and the airport?
Well, as many Denverites in Cole, Clayton and other nearby neighborhoods have probably noticed in recent weeks, the horns came back.
“The community has been pretty quiet, fairly patient, I think,” RTD board member Michael Guzman, who represents the area, said at a board meeting Tuesday night. “But after two weeks of train horn sounding, they're starting to get agitated — rightfully so.”
Be agitated no more, dear A Line-adjacent readers. RTD spokeswoman Tara Broghammer says issues with crossing gates at York Street that necessitated the horns were fixed this week. And Denverite confirmed with our own ears Wednesday afternoon that the horns have fallen silent.
Why were the A Line horns sounding?
The problem started on Nov. 20 when a semi truck hit the gate, Broghammer said. The contractor that built and operates the A Line fixed the gate and other issues that were causing problems with the “positive train control” system that controls crossing gates.
“There also appeared to be other unforeseen issues that [the contractor] needed to resolve after they repaired the gate mechanism,” Broghammer wrote in an email. “We are pending further information as to the root cause.”
A flashback to the noisy days...
RTD’s A and G Lines blared their horns for years before and after those lines opened in the mid- to late-2010s because the agency was using cutting-edge, and unproven, signaling technology. They were trying to meet the federal government’s new-at-the-timel positive train control standards for commuter rail lines.
RTD and its contractors have gotten a better handle on that system since then. But when it goes down — or when there’s construction, or a trespasser on the tracks, or some other disruption, train operators must blast a long-long-short-long pattern with their horns for every grade crossing.
“It's always with the intent of safety in mind,” Dave Jensen, RTD’s assistant general manager for rail operations, told the agency’s board Wednesday.
A separate positive train control problem necessitated horns on the G Line to Arvada and Wheat Ridge in recent weeks too, Jensen said, but that has also been resolved.
