DARBY, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) — State and local officials will be able to improve safety conditions at the spot where a freight train and a SEPTA trolley collided in December.
U.S. Sen. Bob Casey announced on Monday $1 million in federal community project funding to upgrade safety conditions at the intersection of Sixth and Main streets.
Car traffic, pedestrians, SEPTA routes 11 and 13 trolleys, and a CSX freight train all converge at that location. SEPTA Chief Operating Officer Scott Sauer says it is unique in the nation.
“This is the only rail crossing where an active rail transit line — a trolley line — crosses an active freight line on mainline track,” Sauer told KYW Newsradio.
Community members and local officials have complained about safety at Sixth and Main. U.S. Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon called it “a notoriously bad intersection” when she toured it last summer.
Four months later, on the morning of Dec. 9, a trolley and a freight train collided there, injuring six people.
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“In just a few minutes, we watched pedestrians, including children, struggling to cross the roadways,” Scanlon said on Monday. “Vehicles jostled by, moving plates on the street. Trolleys narrowly squeezing by cars. It was chaotic, to say the least.”
At Monday’s news conference at the rail crossing, Casey said federal money would go directly to Delaware County to pay for new crossing gates and traffic signals.
“This $1 million to make this rail crossing safer, to prevent injuries and — God help us — even death, will be the kind of investment this region and this community has a right to expect,” Casey said.
“In addition to providing direct dollars for this project, it’ll also help us improve sidewalks and roadways and pedestrian crossings,” Casey said.
Hundreds of funding applications were submitted, Casey said, and about 80 were approved. “This is a very competitive process,” he said.
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Delaware County Councilwoman Christine Reuther said direct federal funding was about the only way the borough, the county, PennDOT and SEPTA could afford a comprehensive upgrade at the intersection.
“It’s tough, because all of the players who have safety concerns — none of them had enough money to cover this project by itself,” she said.
Reuther said she expected construction to begin soon, but she did not have an exact date.