MTA wants 2 engineers on trains

“You don’t wait for the perfect and not use the good,” MTA board member Richard Katz said at a brief news conference after the vote.

Federal investigators looking into the Chatsworth crash said that had the more advanced positive train control system been installed on just one of the trains, the collision would not have happened.

But Metrolink Chief Executive David Solow told the MTA board Thursday that a number of factors would complicate the use of positive train control in Southern California, the most significant being the crowded field of players that use the railway system.

To be truly effective, any positive-train-control system would have to communicate with several major transit entities, including Amtrak and Union-Pacific, that use Metrolink’s single-track rail lines, Solow said.

National Transportation Safety Board members have long pushed for the system to be an industry standard nationwide.

“We are very anxious to push the railroads to make Southern California a priority, more so than it has in the past,” Solow said.

Union-Pacific executives testified Tuesday in support of increased safety controls in front of a congressional panel.

Spokeswoman Donna Kush said Union-Pacific was still evaluating MTA’s master plan, but said the freight company was “very committed” to pursuing positive train control.

It’s unclear how far the Metrolink board of directors — which includes voting representatives from Riverside, Ventura, Orange and San Bernardino counties — will take the MTA’s master plan when it meets today.

Metrolink’s chief spokesman could not be reached for comment Thursday.

 JASON WELLS covers City Hall. He may be reached at (818) 637-3235 or by e-mail at jason.wells@latimes.com.