Hi Kearn, I don’t own a house here (I rent) but I’ve been living here for seven years now and this summer is the first time this has been an issue. I have what seems like one of the last affordable apartments in town. Just because I rent and don’t pay a $2.5k a month does that mean I should have to worry about cancer causing fumes blowing through my house? This is a public health issue and I feel pretty tired by the whole “who was here first” argument. It’s an issue and we can all work together to fix it.

Joel, thank you for continuing to keep pressing this issue. I’ll definitely be contacting town officials about this and I hope others will too.

You might write a letter to the editor of Portsmouth Herald, the people at City Hall read the paper and try to fix issues that get published, and one of the reporters might investigate both the increase in trains through the city and the parking issue, parked running trains.

We have lived near the North Pond tracks for 35+ years. Don't like it either move. We are with Kearn there is nothing we can do they have to do their job. They did stop running/parking in our area overnight so at least they changed something but they still have a job to do whatever it may be. Maybe a phone call to the rail company would get you some answers. It may be out of the city's hands.

It was so rude of the railway to build a 175 year old traintrack right next to the condo you just rented when you decided to move to Portsmouth, huh? If you don't like it, you are always welcome to go back wherever you came from. Ridiculous.

This has to do with the city renting office space to train company in new parking garage, the city has rented them an office, not sure if engineer is sleeping in there or using the phone. There is no maintenance facility there, think the engineer parks and goes to supper, maybe uses the office for a nap. A newer train does not have to run to keep brakes on it can be shut off. The older trains have to run to to stay warm and brakes working. The city rented them an office not a hotel room. Call the Portsmouth Herald, there is no Depot there, no round house, no zoning for “overnight” parking a train in that spot. Most of the neighborhood is residential and with more units being built by parking garage it should be zoned residential nit industrial.

You could always move. Or complain.

Trains are protected by the Federal Government...but they are not allowed to pollute the air above EPA limits. And, no, Kearn, the EPA does not monitor the air near the Portsmouth Rail Yard but it should and we've asked our legislatorsand City of Portsmouth to work with the EPA to install a monitoring system for a period of time to measure the air quality but so far nothing has happened. Working/traveling trains will emit diesel fumes and this is understandable but idling for hours (because the operators go out to dinner or hang out in the Pan Am office at the Foundry Garage) and sometimes days at a time is not acceptable. There is also anti-idling technology which can be added to these old trains and there are federal grants to offset the cost of adding these...but the train company, Pan Am, has to apply for the grants and it still costs them money to add them. So, it costs Pan Am nothing to pollute the air we breathe which is what they choose to do. Meanwhile the carcinogenic air impacts the children playing in nearby yards or in the Rock Street playground right next to the Rail Yard and everyone living within several miles of the train tracks as the particulates that are so toxic travel for miles. Even if you can't smell it, you're still breathing this stuff in.

Anyone who is being effected by the noise and fume levels should call PanAm number 800-955-9217 and make them aware, number is for non-emergency safety concerns, on their web page they call this group the railroad police, PanAm personnel.

Thanks, Marjorie. I called the number you provided and spoke with a gentleman about what we have experienced over the recent years and more recently with the huge increase in train traffic as well as shared about our experiences with our numerous calls to Cynthia Scarano, Executive Vice President of Pan Am, -- absolutely no response from her office. Neighbors have also spoken directly to the train operators at the office at Foundry and were essentially told to "live with it and it's only going to get worse". I have little confidence that this call will have a different result from calling the Executive VP of Pan Am, Cynthia Scarano, but we have to try! I'll update here if there is an unlikely response...

I went for a run at lunch time today and ran past the Foundry Garage. There was a train idling and the fumes I breathed in while running made me cough. I get that nobody wants this in their backyard but I can't image there is not science that shows breathing in fumes like this has adverse health outcomes. Look, after so many years the science pointed that smoking cigarettes is harmful. I think Pam Am Railways needs to be responsive that their business is a heavy polluter of the environment and take actions to mitigate impacting residents in Portsmouth and elsewhere.

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Again, it is only the older train engines that lose brakes if shut off, the newer engines will shut down, the older running trains run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, should be replaced, and should be banned from parking in highly populated areas.

You are all ridiculous. There. Block that.

So sorry to see more free speech being censored. Unless profane.