Railroad Yardmaster Protection Act of 2025

The Railroad Yardmaster Protection Act of 2025 amends federal railroad labor and safety law to extend existing duty-hour limits to yardmaster employees. Specifically, it adds yardmasters to the entities covered by the current limits on how long train employees can work, defines who a yardmaster employee is, and makes a conforming change to how the statute is titled. In practice, yardmasters would be subject to the same on-duty time restrictions and required rest periods that apply to train employees, using the same enforcement framework already in place for train crews. The bill does not lay out new numeric hour limits itself; instead, it expands the existing framework by including yardmasters in the same restrictions that apply to train employees. It also provides a precise definition of “yardmaster employee” and updates the statutory table of sections to reflect this broader coverage.