Lawmakers call for railway safety funding

Washington

AS federal investigators examined the charred wreckage of Tuesday's deadly commuter train collision near New York, lawmakers in Washington were calling for new initiatives and money to prevent future tragedies.

US Representative Sean Patrick Maloney, a New York Democrat, said on Wednesday he filed legislation to boost by tenfold to US$100 million the annual federal funding available to states to move road-level rail crossings to safer locations. The US has about 130,000 public rail crossings.