North Charleston, SC is not the first town to sense that a railroad company is being a bad neighbor. It is a familiar state of affairs: a set of dangerous railroad crossings need repairs and maintenance, while the railroad company who owns the crossings refuses to take action.

Two men driving a Blue Earth County, Minnesota dump truck were struck by a Union Pacific train on Sunday. They lost their lives at the unguarded crossing. Now, the residents of nearby Lake Crystal are left wondering if a guarded railroad crossing might have saved lives. There's good reason to think so, too: 95% of railroad crossing accidents could be prevented by functioning lights and gates. This is especially potent in the case of commercial truck driving: commercial truck drivers should never have to drive over unguarded railroad crossings.

In lightly populated communities, exceptionally deadly railroad crossings are not uncommon. Installing and properly maintaining lights and gates at a railroad crossing costs money and time. In sparsely populated regions, unguarded crossings are frequently left unguarded by the simple (and perhaps slightly backwards) logic that very little traffic does not sufficiently warrant the protective power of equipment.

Few corporations prove themselves to be immune to fuzzy (or even downright silly) logic, especially when such (il)logic results in financial gain. However, the largest freight railroad company in the nation, Union Pacific, is yet again establishing itself as a leader in backwards thinking. Chlorine companies - The Chlorine Institute and the American Chemistry Council - are filing suit against the railroad giant to block a provision established by U.P which makes the suppliers themselves liable for damages incurred during transportation, even those for which the railroad is at fault.