BRYAN, Texas — Over the past several years, the city of Bryan has been working with the Federal Railroad Administration on a plan to convert the downtown area into an official "quiet zone"
Quiet zones will stop trains from blowing their horns at each of the 24 crossings in downtown Bryan.
Rachel Gaddis is a Civil Engineer for the city of Bryan. She is working firsthand on the Quiet Zone project.
"We are in phase 1 of the establishment of the railroad quiet zone. What we are doing is installing medians, additional signage and striping necessary for the federal railroad association and union pacific to accept the quiet zone," Gaddis said.
The idea for quiet zones first came up during a city council meeting a couple of years ago. After that, a task force was created to get a better understanding of the situation. Then union pacific came in to make their own recommendation for the project.
Rumors about the project have been in and around Bryan for a while now but downtown residents like Rachael Altman are just excited to see the project come to fruition
"I was really excited to hear rumors about a quiet zone because it's kind of difficult when your outside having lunch or maybe even on the phone inside the building," Altman said. "Typically, it's 'Hey, hang on a train is coming. Hold on, wait, wait, wait, ok'."
By silencing the train horn, Bryan will become a more desirable place. Not only to live but to work, eat and play. The drawbacks to quiet zones are an increased wait time and increased traffic.
"I think it's going to be a great uptick for Bryan. I'm super excited about it, it's just an extra star for Bryan," Altman said.
Currently, in the first phase, the city is working on the tracks that run roughly North and South. Later, they will complete phases two and three by March 2022.
Once the improvements to all three phases of the downtown quiet zone are completed and approved by the F-R-A, trains will no longer sound at these crossings.
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