Mr. CHESSER. No, they do not have.

Mr. ROGERS. They don't have any authority to do anything about this?

Mr. CHESSER. No, they don't, Mr. Rogers.

Mr. ROGERS. I see.

Mr. FRIEDEL. The gentleman's time has expired.

Mr. Watkins.

Mr. WATKINS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chesser, I would like to compliment you on a very fine report. And I noted, listening to you, that you made a statement that you didn't think any change in equipment was necessary, the type of equipment.

Mr. CHESSER. My statement, as I remember, Mr. Watkins, was that it would not be necessary to put any new appurtenances on these cars. That only they be maintained and inspected properly.

Mr. WATKINS. You are not complaining on the design of the equipment that is being used.

Mr. CHESSER. Only in the instance of this one specific instance; particularly of this new car that we just discussed.

Mr. WATKINS. I also noted that perhaps you are nicely doing it, very quietly, making severe criticism on the repair system that the Pennsylvania Railroad system used; not only on the rails, but the maintenance of the equipment, like the railroad cars, and engines in the shop.

Mr. CHESSER. Well, I can give you a very good example of that. Mr. WATKINS. Well, I don't think I can go ahead.

Mr. CHESSER. On passenger equipment on the Pennsylvania Railroad, until we brought this out to particularly the Commission in Pennsylvania, on a passenger train, the pin lifters were worn, and this was on passenger equipment, and instead of repairing the equipment, they used heavy rubber bands to hold the pin lifter in place. Mr. WATKINS. Well, I judge that that example is very good. Is it due to the fact that there is a lack of employees to repair rails? I can remember back when you would see a rail gang working all the time on the tracks. Are the tracks that bad, that you think it caused due to lack of maintenance by employees?

Mr. CHESSER. There is absolutely no question about it, and I think that the next witness, Mr. Crotty, can outline it for you in detail.

Mr. WATKINS. Would that same thought apply to the maintenance. in the shops?

Mr. CHESSER. Yes, sir. We have many instances where some carmen place a bad-order tag on a car which says, "Bad order," and some by instructions where they come along and rip those tags off and run that car.

Mr. WATKINS. I noticed that you represent approximately 25 unions, and I have a lot of respect for this. Is this lack of maintenance due to the shortage of employees?

Mr. CHESSER. In some cases; yes, sir.

Mr. WATKINS. Trained employees, I wanted to say.

Mr. CHESSER. I wouldn't say a shortage of operating trained employees as much as I would, probably without doubt, a shortage of employees for proper inspection.

Mr. WATKINS. Would you say that the railroads, if they made the cuts in your shop and repairs to the rail lines, they have cut too deep in employing people to do this work?

Mr. CHESSER. I don't think there is any question about it. To make a proper inspection. And this is where I think this, when this happens, it is foolish economy, when you can't get a proper inspection, and you run a train, and derail it.

Mr. WATKINS. In other words, to an extent that by taking people out of employment, then you think the railroads should have more men in these shops, and more men on the tracks to do this work?

Mr. CHESSER. I certainly think they should have more men on the tracks to do the work. Their forces are cut down to where it is impossible for the amount of trackmen that they have to keep a track in repair.

Mr. WATKINS. Let me ask you a question.

The unions that you represent, do you have ample trained employees to perform these duties, to offer to the railroads?

Mr. CHESSER. Yes. There are many that are cut off, out of service. Mr. WATKINS. I say, trained employees, now, employees that are capable of going in there and doing the job, making a repair, mechanical repair to a locomotive, or breaking down the undercarriage. Do you have that? Do you have ample men to offer them?

Mr. CHESSER. Yes, sir.

Mr. WATKINS. May I ask another question?

Mr. FRIEDEL. Be brief. The time of the gentleman has expired.

Mr. WATKINS. I didn't think I had been here over 2 minutes, Mr. Chairman.

Would you give me just another minute? I have a nice story I want to tell.

Mr. FRIEDEL. One more minute.

Mr. WATKINS. Do you have an apprentice system on maintenance employees?

Mr. CHESSER. In the shops, you mean?

Mr. WATKINS. I mean in the shops; that's the main place.

Mr. CHESSER. In the shop; yes.

Mr. WATKINS. What percentage of your employees are apprentices? Mr. CHESSER. This I can't answer.

Mr. WATKINS. It is a very important question.

Mr. CHESSER. I think we have gentlemen here that could answer that question.

Mr. WATKINS. Because I feel that as long as there is a real shortage of trained people in this field-not only your field but other fieldsand I would like to know that.

Mr. CHESSER. I will see that you get the answer.

Mr. WATKINS. Oh, well, at your convenience, you can send me a note on it. I would like to have that.

Mr. FRIEDEL. The gentleman's time has expired.

Mr. WATKINS. Now, if the chairman would just give me 1 minute, I think I can tell a story that you would enjoy. [Laughter.]

Mr. BROWN. Mr. Chairman, I think I can point out that yesterday was Mr. Watkins' birthday, and out of generosity, perhaps he could have the time.

Mr. WATKINS. Or you can give the time down there, and maybe one of the gentlemen will yield to me, if you won't give it to me.

Mr. FRIEDEL. The gentleman's time has expired.

A brief question.

Mr. WATKINS. I will just ask one pointed question.

Many accidents do happen, and they just happen, and you can't do anything about it. I want to give you a little story. I don't know whether you ever heard it or not.

The Public Utility Commission was questioning a railroad watchman. He had three questions asked, and I am going to cut it a little short-the first question was, he asked the watchman, "What would you do if two trains were approaching at 80 miles an hour on the same track, running head on to each other?"

The watchman said, “I don't know. I think I would take a lantern, and I wave him over on another track."

He said, "That's fine. And if these same two trains were running 80 miles an hour, head on at each other, and you didn't have a lantern, what would you do?"

And he said, "Mamma mia. I know, I switch him over on another track."

He said, "That's fine. And suppose you don't have any lantern, or you don't have any second track to switch them over on, and the same trains were running 80 miles an hour toward each other, what would you do?"

"Oh," he said, "Mr. Inspector, I tell you, you see that phone over there? I would run over to that phone, and I would call my wife Mary, who lives right up the track, and say, 'You look out the window, because you are going to see the damnedest wreck you ever saw in your life! [Laughter.]

Now perhaps, just the moral of this story, the point of it, don't you think, too, that maybe some more trained, more trained people in responsible positions might cut down on this 7,000 accidents we had in 1967?

Mr. CHESSER. I do. I think it is a very important point.

Mr. WATKINS. Thank you for listening. If you hadn't heard that story.

Mr. CHESSER. I hadn't. That is a good story. I will remember that. Mr. FRIEDEL. The Chair recognizes Mr. Pickle.

Mr. PICKLE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

As I sometimes say when I have a dinner engagement, speaking, it is kind of difficult to follow this act. [Laughter.]

I do have a question I want to ask Mr. Chesser, and I have read his testimony, and compliment you for the testimony you have given us this morning. I don't think you would question that we have got to improve wherever we can in the field of safety.

We have certain safety acts now that are in effect. The gist of this bill, as I see it, goes to the heart of improving the general structure of the railroad; that is, the beds, the trackage, guideways, and things. Now, I personally think that the weakness in a railway system in the United States has been basically roads, railroad beds, the tracks. They have not kept pace. I think that, along with time, is the very reason why we don't have good passenger service, or they don't have more of it.

Now this bill says, though, that you are trying to establish safety standards, and everything, I assume, pertains to safety. But it goes considerably further than just safety. It seems to me that when you say on page 2 that railroad means "any contrivance now known or hereafter invented, used, or designed for operating on or belonging to a track, monorail, tube, and guiderail."

Now I don't think our roadbeds---10 years from now, we won't even recognize them; I hope. Because we have got some demonstration projects, and we are all hopeful will improve the track.

Now I am trying to raise this question. What is your viewpoint? We have got to have new roadbeds, and the list is primarily designed for safety, and I presume that it is designed for the improvement of present safety conditions. If it covers any invention, either now or hereinafter invented, then this gives to the Secretary of Transportation a great deal of authority over any railroad company to say you have got to build brandnew tracks, or tubes, or monorails.

I personally think that probably that is the answer, too, monorail, or tubes, but we have got to have a very great improvement.

Now what is the protection of a railroad company, in the guise of safety, from having to build absolutely brandnew structures, without ever having, anywhere in this legislation, a finding of fact that this should be done, economically feasible, within the realm of possibility and fare?

Mr. CHESSER. Well, part of your question, Mr. Pickle, is legal and I will have to defer to the attorney in the language used in the bill. As to the people that we represent, we are more interested right now in not something that is going to run through a tube. I know now there are a lot of studies being done about this. There is nothing being done about how a train is going to operate, right now, safely, or what we are going to do about the problems that we have got now, like the Northeast Corridor.

So what our main thrust is, that the equipment and the rolling stock, and the track that we now have, we are not interested in a new track. We are more interested right now in the proper maintenance of the track we already have, the proper maintenance of the equipment we already have, without anything new.

Mr. PICKLE. All right. Then you are interested in conditions as exist on present setup on which the railroads operate?

Mr. CHESSER. Yes, sir.

Mr. PICKLE. Rather than what they are going to invent in 5 or 10 years.

Mr. CHESSER. Yes, sir.

Now, it goes one step further there. That something they might invent, we want it to be safe, not like this new drawbar, this extended drawbar car they have put into operation, that we have spent a lot of money on, trying to point out to them that it wasn't designed right. We want it to go far enough that somebody that knows what they are doing can point out to these people that it is not a safe piece of equipment.

Mr. PICKLE. Mr. Chairman, that's all.

Mr. FRIEDEL. Thank you.

Mr. Brotzman.

95-388-68-10

Mr. BROTZMAN. I want to say to you, Mr. Chesser, and to your counsel, that I want to thank you for your candor in trying to answer our questions, which is refreshing. I assure you of that.

I have been trying to measure in my mind the extent of your bill, how far it actually does extend, in a wide variety of areas, and also, to learn a little bit about the present organization of the DOT, in regards to safety matters.

Now, you suggest this, on page 2 of your statement. You say there is no indication that the transfer of safety responsibility from the ICC to the Federal Railroad Administration has yet had any effect at improving railroad safety.

Now, there was a transfer of these basic functions of ICC to the Federal Railroad Administration. Is that correct?

Mr. CHESSER. Yes, sir.

Mr. BROTZMAN. Now in the bill, I find there is an allusion to the "Chairman," meaning the Chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. This is up at the top of page 2.

Mr. CHESSER. In the bill?

Mr. BROTZMAN. Yes. It is defined there, and I think, I haven't been able to find, really, why that is in the bill. Could I ask you this: What is the function of the National Transportation Safety Board in this picture?

Mr. CHESSER. Yes. The National Transportation Safety Board, now, is a separate entity from the Department of Transportation, and the railroad safety.

Mr. BROTZMAN. Now, what do they do as regards safety matters pertaining to the railroad?

Mr. CHESSER. This Board is charged with the investigation of major accidents in air, rail, water, which-their function is

Mr. BROTZMAN. I would interrupt there, is this after the accident occurs?

Mr. CHESSER. Yes, sir.

Mr. BROTZMAN. They have no functions preventative in nature. Is that correct?

Mr. CHESSER. No, sir.

Mr. BROTZMAN. But they do make determinations of fault, do they not, or of culpability?

Mr. BERNSTEIN. Purely who done it, Mr. Brotzman.

Mr. BROTZMAN. Then after that occurs, what happens then? Who picks up the ball, as far as safety? Does that then go to court? Is it a matter that is litigious, or does that particular Board have enforcement powers, or does it then revolve back to the Federal Railroad Admin

istration?

I just want to know how it is working.

Mr. CHESSER. All right. In this, in this accident report that they published here, they made certain specific recommendations, they have no enforcement powers. They did here recommend to the Department of Transportation, the Safety Division, that there was needed legislation to cover certain aspects of safety or further coverage in the area of railroad safety, and also recommended that they consider legislation which has already been introduced by Mr. Moss of this committee, and Senator McGee of the Senate.