News

National Rail Car Consortium Meeting Held in Sacramento, Adding New Courses to the Collection

Posted April 2019

Sacramento Regional Transit (SacRT) hosted the Rail Car Consortium’s sixth meeting between March 26 and 29, 2019. Two new agencies joined the current 16 participating agencies: Sound Transit, Sea-Tac, Washington and Edmonton Transit, Alberta, Canada. Participants were welcomed by Henry Li, General Manager/CEO of SacRT who recognized the importance of a skilled maintenance workforce and the value of the Consortium work, “Most transit agencies have been struggling with hiring, developing and retaining a qualified workforce, especially in the field of rail car maintenance. Lots of these systems have an aging fleet and a graying workforce. SacRT is certainly not immune from these issues. The training workshops, instructional videos and educational materials [produced by the Consortium] have become a vital touchstone for rail transit agencies to train our future technicians.”

At the meeting, Subject Mater Experts (SMEs) worked on completing six courses covering Truck Systems and Communication Systems, and starting development of two new topics: Couplers and Carbody. Members also discussed extending Consortium work beyond 2019 for the development of new courses or modules, such as networking and re-railing; local training and apprenticeship program implementation and customization; review and validation of courseware; and delivery of other value-added services, such as instructional video hosting and a database of simulators and aides for training. Other highlights from the meeting included a tour of SacRT’s Light Rail Maintenance facility and Siemens Mobility’s manufacturing plant in South Sacramento.

For more information on joining the Consortium, contact Xinge Wang.
 
Consortium members can access all courseware via the Transit Training Network at www.transittraining.net .