Notice of Application for Approval of Discontinuance or Modification of a Railroad Signal System or Relief From Requirements

Pursuant to Title 49 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) part 235 and 49 U.S.C. 20502(a), the following railroads have petitioned the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) seeking approval for the discontinuance or modification of the signal system or relief from the requirements of 49 CFR part 236 as detailed below.

Docket Number FRA-2004-18644

Applicant: New Jersey Transit, Mr. William B. Duggan, Vice President and General Manager, Rail Operations, One Penn Plaza East, Newark, New Jersey 07105-2246.

New Jersey Transit (NJT) seeks temporary relief from the requirements of Part 236, Section 236.566, of the Rules, Standard and Instructions, to the extent that NJT be permitted to operate non-equipped, New York Susquehanna and Western (NYS&W) steam locomotive Number 142, in automatic train control territory on NJT's Raritan Valley Line, between milepost 18.2, near Cranford, New Jersey and milepost 52.2, at High Bridge, New Jersey. The relief is requested for Saturday and Sunday, September 18 and 19, 2004, in celebration of the “Dunellen Railroad Days” event for the City of Dunellen, New Jersey, and for Saturday and Sunday, October 2 and 3, 2004, in celebration an event for the City of Westfield, New Jersey.

Applicant's justification for relief: The three NJT lines are equipped with automatic block signals and operate under NORAC Rules 251 and 261, and the steam excursion train movements for each event would be limited to no more than four trips daily, would not exceed 50 mph, and would establish an absolute block ahead of each movement.

Any interested party desiring to protest the granting of an application shall set forth specifically the grounds upon which the protest is made, and contain a concise statement of the interest of the party in the proceeding. Additionally, one copy of the protest shall be furnished to the applicant at the address listed above.

All communications concerning this proceeding should be identified by the docket number and must be submitted to the Docket Clerk, DOT Central Docket Management Facility, Room PL-401 (Plaza Level), 400 7th Street, SW., Washington, DC 20590-0001.

Communications received within 30 days of the date of this notice will be considered by the FRA before final action is taken. Comments received after that date will be considered as far as practicable. All written communications concerning these proceedings are available for examination during regular business hours (9 a.m.-5 p.m.) at the above facility. All documents in the public docket are also available for inspection and copying on the internet at the docket facility's Web site at http://dms.dot.gov.

FRA wishes to inform all potential commenters that anyone is able to search the electronic form of all comments received into any of our dockets by the name of the individual submitting the comment (or signing the comment, if submitted on behalf of an association, business, labor union, etc.). You may review DOT's complete Privacy Act Statement in the Federal Register published on April 11, 2000 (Volume 65, Number 70; Pages 19477-78) or you may visit http://dms.dot.gov .

FRA expects to be able to determine these matters without an oral hearing. However, if a specific request for an oral hearing is accompanied by a showing that the party is unable to adequately present his or her position by written statements, an application may be set for public hearing.