76 replies to this topic

[Joel N. Weber II]

Petaluma, it may not show up, but your post is the first on the Google search for it.

How bout that, I'm famous!

The first google hit for petalumloco is also on this site, so I think you already were famous.

[Joel N. Weber II]

Railroaders call the NS the "**** Southern" and for good reason. Although they have won the Harriman Award for safety for the past 18 or so years they fire you if you get hurt~ go figure that one out! It's a tough place to work and I'm sure they have elevated a lot of employees blood pressures from what I have witnessed in their rules classes. (If you deliver a train in interchange to them in New Orleans you have to take their rules classes. The trainmaster was such a jerk he must have ace'd his Gestapo test.)

You have to wonder if firing people for getting hurt would discourage them from reporting minor accidents, and if a workforce that doesn't report minor accidents would result in safety statistics that suggest that fewer minor accidents happen.

I'm amazed that unions and or lawyers would let them get away with having that policy.

[RailFanLNK]

"Vatrick G. vee have the same name, vee want you to come to the front of vee train and ask you some questions.......my vecial assitant is named Vadolph, and vee want to confisvate vour vamera." Sounds like the Asst. Conductor on the Carolinian from NYC-DC. I was the ONLY person who was told to not take pictures.

[amtrakwolverine]

UP and NS are the WORST railroads when it comes to railfans

[rogers55]

Found this on a police job search site:

Amtrak - Washington
THE SAFETY OF OUR PASSENGERS, OUR EMPLOYEES, THE PUBLIC AND OUR OPERATING ENVIRONMENT IS OUR HIGHEST PRIORITY Position Title Special Agent CT Surveillance Department Office of Security Strategy and Special Operations Location Washington, DC Posting # 90103121 INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL APPLICANTS SUMMARY OF DUTIES Develops and implements (through complex coordination with Amtrak and non-Amtrak stakeholders) CT, physical security, cyber security, red team, and intelligence operations investigations. Identifies best practices for CT, physical security, cyber security, red team and intelligence operations and investigations and makes recommendations for their implementation. Reports on and informs key leaders about investigation findings and recommendations. Provides accurate and timely oral and written...

Maybe he was legitimate after all.
I probably would have accused him of being a nut case and got arrested.
Still a jerk though.

[ALC_Rail_Writer]

Never doubted he was legit-

I doubted whether he was an idiot.

[amtrakwolverine]

when they ambush you when getting on the train its hard to tell if there real. he had over a hour to confront whoozeonfirst but waits till hes getting on the train.

[AKA]

I would have taken out my cell phone started to call 911. If he stayed ,the real police could work it out from there. Please let us know what Amtrak has to say about this. Can he be ID ed as a real agent by Amtrak? If he is real then Amtrak should have no trouble ID ing him.
I think this guy is some kind of nut case.
One more thing, should he be under a train?

[GG-1]

Never doubted he was legit-

I doubted whether he was an idiot.

From Patrick's Post I never doubed he was an idiot.

I did wonder if he was Legit

Aloha

[Sam Damon]

I had one cop harass me when I was taking pictures of the Barack Obama special running through Wayne, PA. To make it even better I was standing in a septa parking lot and he claimed that I was on Amtrak property. I asked to talk to his on-site supervisor who gave me the same answer that I was on Amtrak property. I got both offercers names and went t 30th street on a septa local that same day and asked to see the Supervisor of all Philadelphia Amtrak Police offercers. She said that the Septa lots were owned by Amtrak which is a whole bunch of BS! But here's where it gets better! I know Radnor townships police chiefs wife. Wayne is in Radnor township. I was able to talk to him about te Septa parking lot incident and both of us went to 30th street with papers that prove the lot is owned by septa. The Amtrak Police stuck with thier story. I wrote a letter to Alex Kummant about my problem. He called me and said that he fired the offecer and the supervisor and gave me a $1000 gift certificate in person when he came up to PHL and had lunch with me and we talked Amtrak for upwards of 3 hours.

To make the story short I got two Amtrak Cops fired!!! That's a big deal!!!

Really? I'll take your words at face value, but I'm a bit skeptical, 'coz I used to work in the newsbiz. President Reagan's words, "Trust, but verify" strike me at this time.

Anyone on this forum have good ideas to verify this story?

[Sam Damon]

Railroaders call the NS the "**** Southern" and for good reason. Although they have won the Harriman Award for safety for the past 18 or so years they fire you if you get hurt~ go figure that one out! It's a tough place to work and I'm sure they have elevated a lot of employees blood pressures from what I have witnessed in their rules classes. (If you deliver a train in interchange to them in New Orleans you have to take their rules classes. The trainmaster was such a jerk he must have ace'd his Gestapo test.)

You have to wonder if firing people for getting hurt would discourage them from reporting minor accidents, and if a workforce that doesn't report minor accidents would result in safety statistics that suggest that fewer minor accidents happen.

I'm amazed that unions and or lawyers would let them get away with having that policy.

Interesting you folks should bring this up. Pardon the digression here.

Seems to me the NS crew that splattered chlorine gas over Graniteville(sp?), SC were company men to the end -- right up until NS threw them under the bus, even if they deserved it. I think in that incident, they thought the company would take them back if they protected NS as best they could.

Back to Amtrak...

I've said it before, I'll say it again. There are only two ways this crap is going to stop. The first way is to organize mobs of photographers to embarass Amtrak into getting rid of this nonsense. The other way is for any self-respecting railroad photography enthusiast to attend a NARP regional meeting, and (verbally) beat up any Amtrak executives on this issue.

I fear this sort of thing is getting out of control.

[ralfp]

Position Title Special Agent CT Surveillance

CAT scans? Those searches are disturbingly thorough.

[amtrakwolverine]

funny we get in trouble for taking pictures but what about video. that should be even worse right. sense it shows the train moving and stopping and more then one car LOL search google for train videos theres millions out there

[ALC_Rail_Writer]

funny we get in trouble for taking pictures but what about video. that should be even worse right. sense it shows the train moving and stopping and more then one car LOL search google for train videos theres millions out there

If they really want to crack down on it, all they need is a YouTube admin...

[amtrakwolverine]

funny we get in trouble for taking pictures but what about video. that should be even worse right. sense it shows the train moving and stopping and more then one car LOL search google for train videos theres millions out there

If they really want to crack down on it, all they need is a YouTube admin...

my point is that they think its suspicious if you want to take pictures of trains if your not building one

[access bob]

Position Title Special Agent CT Surveillance

CAT scans? Those searches are disturbingly thorough.

CT, Counter Terrorism......

Bob

[Joel N. Weber II]

when they ambush you when getting on the train its hard to tell if there real. he had over a hour to confront whoozeonfirst but waits till hes getting on the train.

Did that thread about all things Am mention AmBush as what happens when the Bush administration's ``counter-terrorism'' descends upon Amtrak?

[sky12065]

when they ambush you when getting on the train its hard to tell if there real. he had over a hour to confront whoozeonfirst but waits till hes getting on the train.

Did that thread about all things Am mention AmBush as what happens when the Bush administration's ``counter-terrorism'' descends upon Amtrak?

In addition, I'll bet that it also didn't mention that AmBivalence is what may cause any future administrations to discontine "counter-terrorism" from decending upon Amtrak!

Edited by sky12065, 13 November 2008 - 11:39 AM.

[Joel N. Weber II]

This article about a bridge collapse mentions that the NTSB found a photograph taken a few hours before the collapse helpful. Just something to think about when weighing the risks of letting citizens photograph infrastructure.

(Note that we've had an accidental bridge collapse in the US in the last 10 years, but I don't think we've lost any bridges to terrorist attacks in that time.)

[ALC_Rail_Writer]

when they ambush you when getting on the train its hard to tell if there real. he had over a hour to confront whoozeonfirst but waits till hes getting on the train.

Did that thread about all things Am mention AmBush as what happens when the Bush administration's ``counter-terrorism'' descends upon Amtrak?

In addition, I'll bet that it also didn't mention that AmBivalence is what may cause any future administrations to discontine "counter-terrorism" from decending upon Amtrak!

Revive the thread then! I can't find it...

EDIT: they've been added to 'All Things Am-'

This article about a bridge collapse mentions that the NTSB found a photograph taken a few hours before the collapse helpful. Just something to think about when weighing the risks of letting citizens photograph infrastructure.

(Note that we've had an accidental bridge collapse in the US in the last 10 years, but I don't think we've lost any bridges to terrorist attacks in that time.)

Sad truth is, if anybody wanted to perform an act of terrorism against Amtrak or the RR system in general, it would be easy as pie. It's as simple as getting on board at a small station (like my home of ALC) and carry-on a backpack's worth of C4 with ya. I promise you nobody would say a thing until the train got into either CHI or WAS and then *boom*.

Its silly to think we can prevent it. And all this showmanship with harassing officers is just dumb.

Totally, utterly, in every sense of the word: dumb.

Edited by ALC_Rail_Writer, 13 November 2008 - 03:47 PM.