Jim Kastama has lived with the train noise in Puyallup for more than 60 years.
Now, he’s leading the charge to get rid of it.
Railroad tracks carrying freight and passenger trains run through the middle of the city.
Growing up in Puyallup, Kastama is used to hearing train horns during the day and in the middle of the night, sometimes for prolonged periods, as they go through town.
He jokes that the blaring is like a lullaby to him at this point and says it’s almost comical how belligerent the horns are sometimes.
He thinks the city can do better.
The City Council unanimously voted Sept. 24 to pay PH Consulting $91,100 to study the problem and possible solutions.
One option would beef up fences and other security measures at the seven crossings in town to establish a railroad quiet zone with the Federal Railroad Administration , where trains wouldn’t need to use their horns except in emergencies.
Another option would limit the noise, instead of eliminating it, by installing directional horns at the crossings for trains to use that would target the noise to the railroad corridor and better shield the surrounding community.
Public Works director Ken Davies told the council those devices, called wayside horns, sound at 96 decibels, “much lower” than the 110 decibels of a standard train horn.
If the council proceeds with either option, an optimistic timeline, the mayor told The News Tribune, would have the work done in two to three years from now. It’s possible the city would focus on the crossings in the heart of downtown first, he said.
Among the unknowns: How the city would hold railroads accountable in a potential quiet zone.
“I think it’ll be a good problem to have,” Kastama said.
Complaints from residents
Kastama lives about half a mile from the tracks, near the Puyallup River, and he thinks the topography there somewhat protects his home from train noise.
He said he doesn’t know how those who live closer to the tracks can stand it.
“If I lived next to the railroad tracks and I had to deal with that, I don’t know if I could,” he said. “... If it was me, if someone could do something about this, it would be just a godsend.”
The way he sees it, the blaring horns affect sleep, quality of life and the well-being of residents.
Puyallup resident and longshoreman Mark Williams told The News Tribune he understands the necessity of the tracks. He’s also one of those most affected by the train horns. He and his wife have lived in the Stewart Crossing neighborhood for about six years.
“It feels like an earthquake when the train comes past,” he said.
Kastama thinks the train traffic has increased in recent years. It costs less to transport goods by train than by road these days, he said.
“We’re so used to the train noise, we really forget” how obtrusive it can be, he said. “Even though we’re used to it, I think it can be better.”
It was about five years ago that he started hearing concerns from constituents, he said.
In the past year or so, he said two commercial developers looking to build residential units downtown have asked him about the train noise, too.
It might not be the top issue on their list, “but it’s up there,” he said.
Developers know train noise can affect the profitability and marketability of residential projects, he said.
Kastama told The News Tribune earlier this year that downtown development is one of his top priorities.
What will it cost to eliminate train noise in Puyallup?
The study will identify the potential cost of cutting train noise in Puyallup, but rough numbers city staff assembled in 2021 suggested the work could take about $5 million.
Kastama hopes the study would help the city secure grants, in particular federal infrastructure funding.
“When you go after grants, they’re going to say: ‘Have you studied this?’” Kastama told The News Tribune.
Council member Lauren Adler said at the Sept. 24 meeting that there are many, many federal grants the city could consider for the project, that she hopes the city is “very close to hiring a federal lobbyist” and that she believes Puyallup “has left a lot of money on the table” without one.
She also said she hopes the city would discuss contracts for additional grant writers if that’s something that needs to be considered for the train-noise project.
Council member Dean Johnson said at the meeting that he wants the city to pursue federal funding, state funding, funding from the BNSF Railway, and especially funding from Sound Transit.
Asked about the measures the city is considering and whether Sound Transit ever allocates funding to cities for such projects, spokesperson David Jackson told The News Tribune via email Wednesday: “BNSF operates Sounder service through Puyallup as well as their own trains. They are best suited to comment on this issue.”
Johnson said he takes the Sounder Train to and from Seattle, and that Puyallup’s railroad tracks seem to go through the heart of the city’s residential neighborhoods more so than other cities on the route.
“I’m trying to not say what could be considered a cuss word — but it wouldn’t be — but blast it, it’s my understanding that Sound Transit has raised $142 billion from the taxpayers of our region to fund mass transit, of which I for the most part agree with. But they can’t tell me that there’s not allocations for ... some wayside horns.”
BNSF spokesperson Kendall Sloan told The News Tribune via email Wednesday: “The BNSF Public Projects team works with communities, road authorities and the FRA on Quiet Zones. Only the FRA can grant a Quiet Zone. The process starts with community leaders.”
Sloan pointed out that closing a crossing is another way to reduce noise from train horns and that BNSF works with communities to do that.
“When most communities built roads across rail lines, they had the option of building an overpass or underpass over, or under, the track,” Sloan wrote. “Most chose the less expensive option, which was to build the road at grade level with the tracks.”
Pursuing an option like overpasses is up to the cities, Sloan said.
“Building new infrastructure such as roadways or overpasses is fundamentally a local discussion, between residents and the road authority,” Sloan wrote. “With that said, BNSF stands ready to work with the local community if they bring forward a workable solution. Every day, the railroad works with multiple governments throughout the region to advance similar projects.”
Johnson said he liked the proposed railroad quiet zone map.
“It really shows how the impact of noise throughout our city is pretty significant,” he said at the council meeting. “You’ve got one, two, three, four, five, six, seven stops. I mean, they’re just hitting that horn all the way down the pike.”
He said he’s concerned about noise pollution, and that the quiet zone would bring residents some relief by giving them the ambiance of the trains without the earth-shattering horns.
Johnson quipped that he liked Kastama’s joke about whether conductors who are especially heavy with the horn through town might have a vendetta against an ex-spouse who lives near the tracks.
Asked about how changing one of the most prominent sounds in Puyallup will impact the character of the city, Kastama told The News Tribune he does think there’s a certain romance to trains.
But he doesn’t expect he’ll hear from residents that they miss the horns if the city gets rid of the noise.
“I think I’ll have people thank me,” he said.
A train going through once a night is one thing, he said, but he thinks the frequency they run today has killed the allure.
“That romance is gone,” he said, chuckling. “We’ll find other things to be romantic about.”
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