To: President Donald Trump, The Virginia State House, The Virginia State Senate, Governor Ralph Northam, The United States House of Representatives, and The United States Senate
Make Train Tracks Safer.
Using fencing in residential areas will help to stop pedestrian deaths due to train accidents. There has been a larger than needed amount of deaths on train tracks when people attempt to cross them to get to other areas in residential areas. After moving a road to a different area the tracks are never secured, and this is causing more people to cross the tracks as the residential areas are backing up to the tracks. One person on the train tracks is too many, and this needs to be corrected. Hundreds die each year due to the fact that train tracks are so open, especially in an area where there are so many people living. Children are using them to cross to get to other areas and commuters are using them to get to the train stations to catch the train. These needless deaths need to stop. Last year in just 6 months there were 4 deaths on the same tracks within a mile of each other. This can not go on; train companies need to be responsible for making things safer for everyone. One death on a track is one too many.
Why is this important?
My daughter was one of the people killed when she as everyone in the community was crossing the tracks to go to work. She had seen many do this, and you could still see the old road way that was never closed properly. She had been riding the train for over 5 years and knew the schedule of the trains. The train company knew that there was a problem there with people crossing, yet they did nothing to stop this. There is no permanent fence in the area, and there is even a gate leading from the platform to the tracks.