I live in a small town in Michigan where train traffic is not new but certainly has increased drastically. Michigan previously had legislation that allowed law enforcement to ticket trains for blocking crossings for an extensive periods of time. Following law suits, it was ruled that trains are interstate commerce and cannot be ticketed. Since then, CSX & our local train yard have lost all respect. We have multiple streets leading in and out of our town. The issue is that the trains are so long that they block multiple crossings at the same time. On top of that, the trains STOP while blocking the crossing to load/unload cargo. Tell the Supreme Courts to WAKE UP!!!

Our "main artery" road is regularly blocked for over an hour and multiple times daily. They have a switching yard with plenty of room that would allow them to pull in and separate the cars to allow traffic to flow freely while they load/unload; they REFUSE to use it. They have NO REGARD for the citizens of our town. People cannot get to work, school busses cannot pick up or drop off children in a timely manner (they reroute daily based on train traffic). 5 year old Kindergarten children have been on the bus in excess of 90 minutes after school because the bus has to drive to the adjacent town to get around trains. Folks are jumping between train cars on foot just to get across the tracks (such as the person in my cover photo). This is EXTREMELY DANGEROUS. It also shows just how desperate people are to get out of town when we're literally locked in by trains. 

EMS response time is another major concern. They have to reroute regularly based on blocked crossings as well. We pay our taxes, we are law abiding, hard working Americans simply trying to live our lives.

I KNOW this is an ISSUE ACROSS AMERICA. Only our federal law makers can truly make a change. Please band together with me. Sign this petition and tell your Senator/Representative to TAKE ACTION and set limits and consequences for blocking railroad crossings. Make it a FEDERAL LAW. Stop holding American Citizens hostage!!!