West suburban residents say freight trains idle, releasing fumes, for hours and even days at a time

RIVER FOREST, Ill. (WLS) -- Residents in west suburban River Forest say idling trains that sit for hours, and sometimes days, creating loud noise and releasing engine fumes are causing them to have concerns for their health.

"When you start smelling it, you start tasting it," said Clay Hulen.

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Residents like Hulen are fuming over Union Pacific-operated trains that they say frequently stop on the tracks by their homes. Residents shared several videos and ABC7's chopper also caught one idling weeks ago.

They are all tired of the noise of the idling trains and the fumes.

"More importantly, is the diesel fumes that are spilling out of the locomotive," says Hulen. "Just recently we had a six-day consecutive idling train."

Residents reached out to UP, which said they would try to find a solution, but the trains kept idling.

"At 1 a.m., 3 a.m., 4 a.m., 5 a.m., and we had one sit for 32 hours straight once," Caitlin Hillyard said. She said the problem got so bad that she and her family recently moved. "We couldn't sleep in our home and we were getting other respiratory symptoms."

"No amount of diesel exhaust pollution is safe. If a train is outside your home for hours and days, you're getting a higher dose of something that's really dangerous to your health," said Brian Urbaszewski, Director of Environmental Health Programs for the Respiratory Health Association in the West Loop

He pointed to several studies showing the health risks, including research from the International Agency for Research on Cancer, which classifies diesel engine exhaust as "carcinogenic to humans."

"A range of dangers, everything from asthma attacks to heart attacks to early death. They include potentially increased risk for Alzheimer's and dementia, as well as things like lung cancer," he said.

And roughly 25% of all of the country's freight trains run through the Chicago area.

"The exhaust goes straight up it blows on the wind and it falls down in nearby communities," Urbaszewski added.

He and Union Pacific said congestion occurs because Chicago is one of the busiest rail hubs in the nation. UP blames some of the idling on recent weather events nationwide saying in part "from time to time, congestion on other parts of the network can impact traffic in Chicago." They added that, "Our goal is always to keep rail cars moving as quickly and safely as possible, as Union Pacific serves a vital part of the supply chain."

"The noise at night, people can't sleep," said resident Joan O'Connor.

She and other residents have called police, who issue tickets for loud and disturbing noise. Under the Freedom of Information Act The I-Team found that River Forest Police issued 73 of those citations to Union Pacific Railroad for their idling trains. Tickets totaled $2,200 since 2022.

"It stopped for a long time," O'Connor said. "The trains were only idling maybe for an hour or two. Now they're idling for days."

There is an Illinois law preventing stationary diesel vehicles from idling for more than 10 minutes, but that law only applies to motor vehicles, not trains. So if you have concerns about diesel emissions in your neighborhood, reach out to your state legislator, or your U.S. congressperson or senator. So far residents say their complaints haven't helped.

"There's no regulatory body that can stop them from doing this," Hillyard said.

The Illinois EPA has not issued any citations to Union Pacific. Illinois law does not govern diesel emissions from idling railroad trains. However, U.S. EPA enforces federal rules that now say that "new and remanufactured trains" are required to have idle-emissions controls.