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Freight Trains: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

LastWeekTonight · 7M views · 2023-12-11 · 27:40

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Overview

John Oliver's Last Week Tonight segment on freight trains and railroads, covering how profit-driven practices undermine safety. It touches on longer trains and shrinking crews.

On Hacker News

Cited as a solid overview of the railroad safety problem, including the push toward longer trains and single-person crews.

Recommended by 1 HN people across 1 months · HN mentions 2023–2024

Topics

Media, journalism & propagandaTransit, cities & urban planningLabor, work & inequality
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freight trainsrailroadsjohn oliversafetylabor

What people said

hnlmorg · 2024-08 · Recommendation

Why do you find it so hard to believe that this isn’t just a result of greed? It’s not like those who are bleeding that infra dry are consumers of the service itself. And couple that with a complete lack of regulation, it means they can continue to bleed the service with literally no consequences for their actions. This show covers the railroad problem pretty well: [VIDEO] …but I think it’s fair to say the rot introduced by profit at all costs goes waaaay beyond this specific infra. You could apply similar complaints for plenty of other industries too, such as Boeing.

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ChrisMarshallNY · 2024-01 · Reference

John Oliver did a segment on trains[0]. He noted that rail companies are actively trying to lengthen trains, and reduce the staff to 1. [0] [VIDEO]

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VikingCoder · 2023-12 · Reference

I think you do not appreciate that some people have jobs that don't give them adequate support to be awesome. I just watched the most recent Last Week Tonight, where they went in depth on Freight Trains [1]. Specifically they talked about 3 mile long trains that currently only have two operators - one conductor and one engineer - and the industry is trying to cut it down to one. That's just an analogy for software development. But I've definitely seen people be over-worked and under-supported. [1]: [VIDEO]

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Sources

Video by LastWeekTonight, played through YouTube.

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