19. Department of Transportation · Notable
Drop FRA's proposed two-person train crew size rule
Printed page 636 19. Department of Transportation
“FRA’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on crew size is not based on safety considerations; it is designed to reduce flexibility by making it impossible for railroads to operate with crews of fewer than two in circumstances where there is no operational need for the second crew member.”
What has happened
- Not started
FRA's crew size requirement is still in force. The rulemaking the Quote calls an NPRM became a final rule at 49 CFR part 218 subpart G in April 2024, and FRA's very large 2025-2026 deregulatory program - more than fifty proposed and final rules published on 2025-07-01, 2026-04-28 and 2026-08-31 - does not touch it. The only in-window movement runs through the rule rather than against it: on 2026-04-14 FRA published notice of petitions by First Coast Railroad and Georgia Central Railway for special approval to operate with a one-person crew, which is the case-by-case route the 2024 rule itself created.
Research log
What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence
Research notes
- Negative search: Federal Register full-text, quoted, since 2025-01-20 - “train crew size” 0 documents; “one-person train crew” 2, both the special-approval notices above. No FRA rule or proposed rule in the Corpus amends or rescinds 49 CFR part 218 subpart G.
- Court coverage is incomplete for this item. The CourtListener bulk opinions in the Corpus run to 2026-06-30 and contain no challenge to the crew size rule; anything filed or decided after that date is unknown, not absent, and no Status rests on the silence.
- Action
- withdraw
- Object
- FRA Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on train crew size
- ID
- 1750