SAN ANTONIO – Tricia Fayadh says she is woken up nearly every night by loud, repetitive train horns that echo throughout her Southwest Side neighborhood.
“It’s just continuous honking,” she said.
In a video she captured and sent to KSAT, she recorded 16 honks in one minute.
She said the train tracks run right across the street from her neighborhood, Villas de Esperanza, and that trains blow their horns almost every night.
“It’s so loud,” neighbor Yvette Rendon said, “it seems like it’s going straight into one ear and out the other.”
Their neighborhood reached out to District 5 Councilmember Teri Castillo’s office.
District 5 said it is “aware of the ongoing noise concerns,” a spokesperson for the office confirmed, and said it submitted a request to “evaluate the feasibility of establishing a Quiet Zone in the area.”
However, a spokesperson with the city’s transportation department said this year’s budget did not “allocate funding for feasibility studies or the creation of new Quiet Zones.”
District 5 said establishing a Quiet Zone is a lengthy and costly process, “taking 2–5 years and starting at approximately $20,000 for a feasibility study alone.”
So, why do the trains honk anyway? A spokesperson with Union Pacific said horns are used “to protect the public and our employees.”
They said federal regulations require horns to be sounded “for 15 to 20 seconds before entering public grade crossings” as well as if people are near the tracks.
Fayadh said her neighborhood isn’t concerned with a honk or two, but they want to know why horns sound continuously.
“We deserve a better quality of life,” Fayadh said.
To read more on Quiet Zones, click here.
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