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[Anonymous]

I have a question that may sound flat dumb. But bear with me...

I was in a small town that had a main line crossing on my way home one day. There was a 5 unit lashup leading a 86 car Double stack and at about 30 mph took a while to clear the crossing.

During the wait at about the 70th car I hear the brakes come on and the entire train glided to a halt with the very last car just 24 feet from the crossing itself. Not quite far enough to raise the gates so we stayed put. (I thought to myself... great parking; it did clear the roadway)

Eventaully the engineer took it out of town. My question is does he care about the rear of the train being on the crossing or just past? What happens if he stopped short and left 2 cars hanging over this towns only crossing?

[DSchmitt]

Unlike the "good old days" when trains had cabooses there is no one on the rear of the train to let the engineer know where the rear actually is. However, the crew should have a pretty good idea where the rear is, because they should know the railroad and the length of their train. The train had to stop for some reason (most likely at a signal). The operating rules may not have allowed the train to go any further forward.

The length of time a grade crossing can be blocked is goverened by law. The RR can be fined if they go over the time limit.

[Anonymous]

Most trains use either a spotter (the conductor standing near the crossing) or in the case of some rear remote cameras (which i bet was the situation) to handle such situations. the combination of knowing the line and watching for certain markers in the rear remote camera, the Engineer could opull off a semelessly perfect stop just past the crossing.

[BentnoseWillie]

Most locomotives have a trip odometer just like the one in your car, but calibrated in feet, for this purpose. Zero it when you go by the crossing circuit, and stop when you reach the length of your train past the circuit.

Ba-da-bing! Your tail end is by the circuit, and the crossing is clear.