REGULATING SAFETY CULTURE IN THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY: THE TIME HAS COME FOR BROADER HORIZONS

Railroads have registered impressive safety gains in the last several decades. Collision, derailment, and employee casualty rates are much lower than they were just 20 years ago. Progress on safety in the 1980s was made possible in large part by railroads' return to profitability following deregulation. The railroads consequent ability to invest in infrastructure had a direct impact on safety. However, as infrastructure-related accidents have declined, the percentage of on-the-job injuries caused by human factors has increased. The rise in the percentage of human factors causing accidents has prompted the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) and all industry participants to focus on workplace attitudes and behaviors affecting safety. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has also begun looking at safety culture in the railroad industry. The purpose of this paper is to examine FRA's and NTSB's initiatives in light of the growing body of thought on safety culture outside the rail industry. This paper argues that, in view of the growing body of literature, rail regulators' model of safety culture is unnecessarily narrow. Little effort has been made to probe social phenomena in the background of safety culture. Understanding these phenomena is essential to a complete account of the safety culture.

• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/oclc/1767710
• Corporate Authors:

  University of Denver College of Law

  Editor in Chief, 7039 E 18th Avenue
  Denver, CO  United States  80220
• Authors:
  • Squires, J A
• Publication Date: 2000

Language

• English

Media Info

• Features: References;
• Pagination: p. 93-111
• Serial:
  • Transportation Law Journal
  • Volume: 27
  • Issue Number: 1
  • Publisher: University of Denver College of Law
  • ISSN: 0049-450X
  • Serial URL: https://www.law.du.edu/transportation-law-journal

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Attitudes; Behavior; Deregulation; Human factors in crashes; Industrial accidents; Injuries; Railroad crashes; Railroad equipment industry; Railroad safety; Railroads; Social factors
• Identifier Terms: U.S. Federal Railroad Administration; U.S. National Transportation Safety Board
• Geographic Terms: United States
• Subject Areas: Railroads; Safety and Human Factors; Society; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00791352
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Apr 6 2000 12:00AM