Ellen Brody, driver of the SUV

THE EDUCATED LAYMAN writes:

The Valhalla, New York train disaster involving the collision of an MTA train and a Mercedes SUV has been receiving a good deal of media attention. All of it, however, is of the judgmentally neutral variety. I live very close to where this occurred and I’ve written about it from a standpoint that I think many traditionalists share, or may at least appreciate. My two posts on this matter can be found here and here. I write:

This is not the case of a mere accident. To call it that without any further explanation strips this event of its moral implications. We do not know Brody’s exact state of mind in her final moments, but we don’t need to. What we know is sufficient to evaluate these events in a moral context. Brody, for whatever reason, was faced with imminent danger but failed to recognize it. This is not surprising, as most middle class whites have never faced imminent danger. Most of us live our lives completely insulated from all threats, natural and man-made, by the institutions of Western civilization. These luxuries certainly make us comfortable, but we have come to take them for granted. We’ve decayed into a people who are utterly incapable of decisive action at critical moments. White, affluent Ellen Brody fastening her seat belt in her Mercedes SUV, blissfully ignorant of the impending catastrophe staring her in the face, is the personification of that decay.

— Comments —

A reader writes:

I think no one is thinking of any moral implications. They are just thinking about the costs of a “smart” gate to let the train know that it is time to stop, since that would be cheaper than building an overpass.

Paul writes:

The main cause of this tragedy is the public’s acceptance of fast-moving trains through ground-level train crossings.  Certainly there was contributory negligence on the part of the driver and her passengers for remaining in the vehicle thirty seconds after the arms came down on them.  Their impenetrable negligence possibly can be explained by a psychiatrist, who might be able to attribute societal values.

Now, based on experience as an attorney, I expect the lousy train operator has rushed its attorneys to offer whatever compensation is being sought in an effort to keep the bad nature of trains out of the public light.  Was the crossing around a curve?  It appears that it was.  But it is permitted by the public.  Do we not know to keep a safe distance behind a vehicle in case of an emergency?  Of course we do.  How did the engineer not see the vehicle in sufficient time?  Why are trains traveling across railroad crossings so fast that they cannot possibly stop when confronted with a sudden emergency, that is, if the crossing were to have a lame vehicle?  Money and politics.  No excuse.

Trains could be fitted with long-distance cameras when traveling at 55 mph, as most adults have seen them do when heading out of town, but that would be insufficient, obviously.  This m****r was rampaging at 58 mph.  Thirty seconds?  Are you kidding me?  If the train was approaching a blind crossing (and we don’t know for sure that it was blind), it should have been traveling at a speed sufficient to stop, unless the engineer “failed to see what he should have seen,” stock language I have used in many suits (not against railroads).  The train (with its huge private-sector ally, railroad corporations) and its employee unions have bought Congress (via the Constitution’s Commerce Clause) so thoroughly that they get away with what would be criminal negligence for us folk.  If the engineer was paying attention, he could not have applied the brakes for about 2.2 seconds, far too long for a high-speed train.

I am biased.  I think RRs would be a great idea in modern times but only if they were elevated or slowed at every crossing.  Otherwise, they are a menace.  I have approached my local crossing when the arms came down and the train began passing about five seconds later at speed (about 30 mph, well below potential).  Foolishly, I used to ride boxcars for about a quarter mile between fifth and tenth grade.  It was a thrill that I repeated many times.  (If my saintly mother had known, she would have switched my legs raw.)  Had I ridden further, I would have been exposed to someone who would call the police.  I sometimes feel a little weak when I recall how foolish it was—running on loose stone to catch a juggernaut under which one could fall easily.

I did not realize my foolishness until about eleventh-twelfth grade, when I was with some fraternity brothers, and we were crawfishing out-of-town about twenty feet from a track.  Suddenly a cargo train appeared traveling about 55 mph (who knows?).  We were all stunned.  We did not hear it coming (and the newfangled aluminum beers would not have impaired us to that extent).  I thought I was familiar with trains.  I was used to 5-30 mph.  It made me weak at the time.  I discovered the bad nature of trains.

I am back facing the same juggernaut just a few blocks away; it is the same distance away that I used to live.  It is a pain, especially during a war or the Thanksgiving/Christmas season, when they run routinely three times an hour.  But maybe based on my experience, I never stop on the tracks that cross my heavily-traveled road at all hours.  And if the ignoramus in front does stop, I stay a car length back to allow him to back up and to allow me to get the heck out of Dodge should a fast train suddenly appear as I keep the motor running.  At 30 mph approaching from the North, it is a deathly blind crossing.  I rediscovered the bad nature of trains.  Unbelievable what Congress allows.

To help grasp the evilness, consider an average street vehicle traveling at 60 mph will take 120-140 feet to stop (assuming the driver brakes instantly, which is impossible), less than half the safe distance.  So we can only fantasize how long the average cargo train takes to stop.  But the fickle Media is not going to follow this story, which hints at how awful our rail standards are.  If there is any societal factor here, it is attached to our ignorance, our greed, and our politicans’ failure.

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