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[quote user="Falcon48"] Are you really serious about this "robotic vehicle"?  If so, you need to think this one through a whole lot better.  [/quote] Gee, I only said it was interesting.  I don’t see any technological barrier to the idea, but there will be the devil in the details, no doubt.  The problem will be getting all of that complexity to solve enough problems to make it worth the cost.   <o:p></o:p> I don’t see much benefit in the grade crossing protection component except that it could enhance the protection of passive crossings.  But I have ideas for locomotive-borne crossing signals that could accomplish that at far less lost.  But either way, for the most part, the issue is not a need to warn the driver.  The issue is that frequently, drivers strongly want to beat the train because they worry about a big delay.  So they take risks.       <o:p></o:p> A lot of the inventor’s objective here is to extend the vision of the engineer so he can spot trouble earlier.  But there are ways to accomplish that without preceding the train with a physical vehicle.  For that matter, it won’t be long before they take the engineer off of the locomotive and have him watching ahead and running the locomotive from the safety of the terminal office.  It is dangerous to have personnel riding the point of a train.  And for seeing danger far ahead, the engineer will be able to zoom ahead through the computer and lineside optical sensors to look for broken rails, trees on the track, etc.  There will be no need for a robotic vehicle to take the view point ahead.     <o:p></o:p> After all, the FRA is looking at ways to couple and uncouple cars by remote control because they say that it too dangerous to have a man on the ground performing those functions near the couplers.  So they are way outside of the box too.
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