Back a dozen years or so ago, the city of Montgomery negotiated an agreement with the railroad companies not to blow their horns as they rush though downtown, waking guests in the downtown hotels.
As I recall, the trains were making that racket because there was a single crossing downtown where people could cross the tracks at Coosa Street to go to the Riverfront Amphitheater....so the train engineers were instructed to blast their very loud horns as they approached it. While that was fine in the middle of the day, it startled tourists staying in the hotels wide awake at O'Dark O'Clock.
The city agreed to block that crossing with signs directing pedestrians to use the tunnel leading under the tracks a block or so away on Commerce Street...UNLESS there was a police car stationed at the tracks to facilitate any track crossing.
This photo of that crossing shows signage directing pedestrians to the tunnel. But as the photo below shows, the gate is not completely closed. allowing people to easily squeeze through.
I do not know for sure if that is the reason for the RR horn that I heard this Sunday morning at 4:15AM, but one way or the other, If I heard it here in the Garden District, visitors certainly did in the hotels near the tunnel.
I tried once before to follow up on this story, but didn't follow through. Now I will.
UPDATE: The city is asking the appropriate people to look into it and reply. I'll pass it on ASAP.
No comments:
Post a Comment