To the Editor:
I have lived all my life - 70-plus years - in Cloquet. The last 40-plus years my husband, Gene, and I have lived a quarter of a block from the railroad tracks and as close to the USG and Dunlap Island crossing (I think that is one of the crossings they blow the loudest). I don’t believe we have lost a night’s sleep from the train whistle (we don’t wear ear plugs and hear OK).
We just couldn’t believe that a person moves into a neighborhood and proceeds to try and change what has been a Cloquet tradition for years before we were even born. They used to have the crossing guard arms that would go up and down and you would hear the “ding, ding, ding” as they were doing so. They also had the red lights on them and the train still blew the whistle. But, needless to say, people would walk or drive around them if they thought they could beat the train. If our city officers even think about spending the $1.5 million on crossing guards when there are so many other places to use this money, they should be replaced. There would be money to repair streets, help the kids get a skate park, and many other things.
The train whistle was one of our grandkids’ highlights when coming to visit us. They would hear the whistle, stop what they were doing, call out “the train, the train,” and run to the dining room window to look out and see the train and to see what color the engine was and who would guess the right color.
Since the whistle issue has come up, we have made ourselves be aware and listen to count the times they blow. So far the most we have counted was 10 and that took only about a minute and they were way down the track.
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Cloquet without a train whistle?
Carol and Gene Risdon, Cloquet
