Train horns are once again splitting the night along US-85 in Douglas County, Colorado, after federal regulators suspended a quiet zone that had kept seven railroad crossings silent for more than a decade. Residents near Sedalia, Castle Pines and Castle Rock say the horns now sound during the day and blast as often as eight times overnight, jolting them awake and reviving a noise problem many thought was settled for good.
The Federal Railroad Administration temporarily suspended the Douglas County quiet zone, which had stretched across seven crossings between Atrium Drive and Promenade Parkway in Castle Rock and Manhart Street in Sedalia, according to CBS Colorado. The outlet reports that the agency identified several conditions requiring correction before the zone can be reinstated, though county officials say they currently have no timeline for the area to return to quiet-zone status or for resolving the underlying railway issues.
For residents like Ranee Wilson, the change arrived without any warning. Wilson told the station the suspension happened without notice and called the disruption extreme, saying she experienced a train horn blast from inside her own home. She argued that residents should have been informed before the quiet zone was lifted, and noted that horns have sounded at 1:30 a.m., among other times overnight.
A Decade-Long Fight for Quiet
The US-85 quiet zone was not easy to win the first time. Castle Pines resident Don Somsky, now 86, headed the effort starting in 2009, working to bring together residents, the county and the village board to push for silent crossings, per the same CBS Colorado account. In 2010, that organizing effort delivered petitions signed by roughly 1,300 residents to Douglas County Commissioners and then-U.S. Senators Michael Bennet and Mark Udall, according to The Castle Pines Connection.
Why the Horns Are Legally Required to Return
Quiet zones don’t mean trains stay silent under all circumstances. Even within an approved quiet zone, federal safety rules require engineers to sound locomotive horns during emergencies, when trespassers, pedestrians or animals are near the tracks, or when signal systems malfunction, according to the City of Arvada. Once the FRA suspends a zone entirely, however, Union Pacific and BNSF must sound horns at all seven crossings, a requirement train crews are legally bound to follow…