A similar, slightly more coherent letter to the editor was published a week or two ago in the Coeur d'Alene (Idaho) Press from a resident of nearby Post Falls (where I also live). Writer griped about the loud honking day and night from passing UP trains, and opined that some crews seemed to honk louder and longer in the wee hours of the night just to tick people off. There are six grade crossings in close succession just in the mile or so of track immediately behind my house, and developers have built some of the homes right up to the right of way, and right next to some of those crossings. I feel sorry for the folks who looked at and signed on any of those homes without realizing what they'd be living next to. As for the honking, Bruce Butler is right. With the reputation some of these Post Falls crossings have for collisions (crossbucks-and-stop-signs-only at many of them), no engineer is going to risk his/her job by skipping a single horn sequence. A few manage to keep it short and sweet in the late night hours, but not all. Interestingly, that letter writer got beat down by quite a few online responses which urged him to move back to wherever they came from and let commerce keep doing its thing.