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Actually, if I split a few hairs, I can see the point made by the FRA that because they are hard to see at night, freight trains could be a hazard to motorists at grade crossings.When it comes to a driver being able to see a train blocking the crossing, a moving train is far easier to spot than a stopped train.  The cars in a train are huge, and they create a huge, moving display as they pass in a vehicle's headlights.  The cars may be visually drab colored, but the motion attracts a driver's attention.  However, a stopped train sneaks up on you like a bunch of sheds in the fog.  If it is parked across a crossing at night, with no flashers, and no stop sign, all there is to protect the crossing is a crossbuck, which means that a motorist must yield to trains.  But drivers cannot yield to something they cannot see.  Perhaps the public needs to be informed to be on the lookout for a stopped train having the right of way at a crossing, in addition to the admonition to look for approaching trains.  When they approach this type of crossing, motorists are supposed to make an effort to look both ways.  They are taught to expect trouble from each direction.  But the more they look both ways, the less they look straight ahead.If a driver looks for the big hazard of a collision course with an approaching train, he or she might somewhat overlook the possibility of the second hazard, i.e.: that a train is silently parked like an iron fence across the road. So I agree with the FRA warning and its implication that railroads are at least partly at fault when a driver runs into a parked train at night at a crossing marked only with crossbucks or a crossbucks plus yield signs, if that crossing is also un-illuminated by roadside lighting.  Under these circumstances, all a driver has to protect him or her is their own wariness to be on the lookout for road hazards.  Granted, the law requires this vigilance on the part of drivers, but if a motorist runs into an obstruction that is hard to see, the law tends to at least partly blame the obstruction. It is true that the crossbucks and signage at a grade crossing is reflectorized, but the visibility of these items only tells a driver that a grade crossing is there.  So the reflectorized warning of the signage is irrelevant if a driver does not see a train and therefore perceives the crossing to be clear.
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