Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

Island detection only on this spur:

So correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm no expert...

But shouldn't they have SLOWLY crept up to the crossing until the lights activated... and then sped up? That's usually what I see happen in a circumstance such as that. Had there been a collision, especially since someone was videoing the whole thing... I could see a huge lawsuit and I think the railroad would lose.

I seen a few switching crossings that activates the signals like a couple yards from the crossing, but they nether have a flag/signal man at the crossing and/or the train goes very slow while approaching the crossing and then speed up when it's crossing the crossing.

This crossing, is pretty much a bad crossing, I didn't see any flag/signal man or the train didn't got very slow, maybe if the signals were activated around the "0:09-0:10" mark, then that would give enough reaction time to stop for the train.
The lights are pretty much useless if someone was approaching the crossing when a train goes through, since it won't activate till the train is at the crossing.

cabman701 wrote:So correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm no expert...

But shouldn't they have SLOWLY crept up to the crossing until the lights activated... and then sped up? That's usually what I see happen in a circumstance such as that. Had there been a collision, especially since someone was videoing the whole thing... I could see a huge lawsuit and I think the railroad would lose.

CSX does that in Tullahoma TN all the time.
Problem there is you got some busy streets.
Also for train crews wheel slip issues are big which is why they lay on the horn or look to make sure its clear before flying through the crossing like that.
Another thing is these crossings are not Island only the're is a track circuit, but because of bad ballasted track, bond wire and rusty rail signals really mess up. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... bGUQ#t=35s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... 4JGg#t=30s