There’s no escaping the rumble of freight trains in Nick Linden’s office.

He’s one of the owners of Vic B. Linden Sign Advertising Inc. at 122 S. Lincoln St., which shares a wall with the elevated train tracks that carry crude oil through downtown Spokane.

For more than six decades, the commercial sign company and the rail tracks have been neighbors.

“They’re right overhead,” Linden said. “We see a lot of things going by, from airplane fuselages to automotive parts.”

“It’s not that we have our heads in the sand. There are obvious issues with oil trains,” he said. But most of the time, “we’re busy helping our customers.”

More than a mile of elevated train tracks runs through the heart of Spokane, a legacy of the city’s 100-plus years as a rail hub linking the Northern Plains to the West Coast.

The elevated tracks pass by – and sometimes above – restaurants, hotels, banks, hair salons, retailers and automotive shops. The proximity of the tracks to Spokane’s most densely populated area makes the downtown particularly vulnerable in the event of an oil train derailment, said Michael Hildebrand, a hazardous materials and emergency planning consultant for the city of Spokane/Becky Kramer, SR. More here (subscription required).