A Lower Cost Grade Crossing Protection System

[Erik_Mag]

SD70Dude

You could fence off the road and build grade separated wildlife crossings.

There's a wildlife overpass crossing US-101 between Augora and Thousand Oaks. I'd also shudder at how much it would cost on a national basis, though I would think the installations would most likely be where "wilderness" areas existed on both sides of a major highway.

[BaltACD]

Erik_Mag

 

SD70Dude

You could fence off the road and build grade separated wildlife crossings.

There's a wildlife overpass crossing US-101 between Augora and Thousand Oaks. I'd also shudder at how much it would cost on a national basis, though I would think the installations would most likely be where "wilderness" areas existed on both sides of a major highway.

Wildlife is everywhere and while you can build structures for them to cross highways and railroads - you have difficulties in 'instructing' them to use those structures; at least without  serious fencing.

Went to the hardware store yesterday afternoon - 'startled' a doe and two fawns less than a mile from my house.

Have several videos of deer that have been browsing around my driveway and back yard - the back yard is enclosed in your everyday chain link fence.

[tree68]

BaltACD

Have several videos of deer that have been browsing around my driveway and back yard - the back yard is enclosed in your everyday chain link fence.

Story in a book wiritten by a local author:

Two fellows were bragging about their hunting dogs.  One claimed his could follow a year's old track.  Of course, the reply was, "show me."

So the first fellow gives his dog the command to seek out a track.  Soon the dog yelps and sets off on a run across a field.  About half way across the field, the dog suddenly jumps straight up in the air, then resumes tracking.

"See, told you!," says the dog's owner.

"What does that prove?"

"Some years ago there was a six foot page wire fence there..."

A local farm here raises deer - their fences are plenty tall.

[charlie hebdo]

As semi- and fully autonomous vehicles become more prevalent, IT and AI folks should be able to make crossings safer through the vehicle.

[Overmod]

charlie hebdo

As semi- and fully autonomous vehicles become more prevalent, IT and AI folks should be able to make crossings safer through the vehicle.

Although it should be clearly recognized that even a level 4 vehicle without external sensor fusion or inputs might suffer precisely this sort of accident in this way.

Perhaps sensitive microphone arrays would provide earlier directional warning of 'train noise', but no arrangement of cameras would have picked up motion 'through the trees' with sufficient lead time.  Nor could the systems providing vehicle control give a response time faster than the laws of physics permit.

A simple tie-in with PTC information or cheap roadside cameras with better sightlines solves this... when everything is working perfectly.  I would note that the original Carnegie-Mellon approach of tying into GIS to optimize energy consumption and navigation lends itself to relatively secure grade-crossing alerts that won't compromise business intelligence (or necessarily facilitate expedient harvesting) but this goes away if onboard-stored GIS is in use.  I suspect there was limited high-speed wireless data access in that accident location, and while it might be practical to implement some kind of femtocell coverage at these sorts of crossing, I suspect it could not be cheap and might be difficult to make robust or theft/vandalproof.

Of course a properly-designed level-4-autonomous vehicle would take better note of signage and, if properly programmed, recognize the crossing from 'tercom' and use properly conservative action to negotiate it... and realize whether its vehicle will high-center or stall in the effective foul zone.

[charlie hebdo]

You are right. An electronic signal from PTC loco to appropriate vehicle systems would be more effective than blowing its horn, which is an archaic, 19th c. method.  

Safety is more important than "business intelligence" which is often an oxymoron, much the same as PSR.

[BaltACD]

charlie hebdo

You are right. An electronic signal from PTC loco to appropriate vehicle systems would be more effective than blowing its horn, which is an archaic, 19th c. method.  

Safety is more important than "business intelligence" which is often an oxymoron, much the same as PSR.

So - blowing the horn will activate what ever electronic counter measures become STANDARDIZED, just like blowing the horn activates the ditch lights and the bell.

Now how high and wide and what should be the strength of the electronic counter measures 'beam' be?  

[SD60MAC9500]

 

BaltACD

 

Went to the hardware store yesterday afternoon - 'startled' a doe and two fawns less than a mile from my house.

Have several videos of deer that have been browsing around my driveway and back yard - the back yard is enclosed in your everyday chain link fence.

 

 

Deer have no problem clearing a 6' fence. A backyard chain link fence would be a breeze to clear for deer. 

I hit a small doe years back on I-75 up in Mt Morris, MI. It must been about 7' in the the air when it landed in front of me. After leaping over the center barrier which is about 48" in height. Ended up blasting it at 70. $8000 worth of damage to the front end of my vehicle.. Thank goodness for insurance.. 

 

 

 

[charlie hebdo]

As to grade crossings:

When the CHI-STL UP/Amtrak line was upgraded to higher speed (up to 110 mph), by the end of 2017, they made major safety upgrades at 203 grade crossings by installing four-quadrant gates and loop detectors to detect vehicles on the tracks when trains are approaching. In addition, 39 crossings were permanently closed.

[Euclid]

Regarding my point on the preceding page as follows in blue:

 

“So, it follows that every active grade crossing today makes every passive grade crossing more dangerous than it would be if all crossings were passive.  This is because drivers have become habituated to relying on the maximum protection of the flashing lights, bells, and gates of active crossings, which lowers their wariness accordingly.  Then with that habitual state of lowered wariness, they apply that to passive crossings.  Primarily they forget the need to look for trains.”

 

It is true that eliminating all crossing active protection would eliminate this disparity, but it is not a practical solution because it would reduce current protection provided by active crossings. 

 

It would make the passive crossing less dangerous but make the active crossings more dangerous.  I would expect the net result would be that the increase of danger of active crossings would far outweigh the decrease in danger of passive crossings.  One reason would be that active protection is already provided for the most dangerous crossings in terms of train and vehicle traffic counts plus other external factors.  

 

I am just stating the principle of unintended consequences.  My overall point is related to the popular idea of improving passive crossings by adding active protection, and the idea of reducing the cost of the added protection in order to afford the upgrades.  The same unintended consequence would apply to that upgrade to passive crossings—UNLESS—they are upgraded to at least the same protection performance as today’s active crossings. 

 

This adds a lot of challenge to the desire to reduce the cost of the passive crossing upgrades.  In fact, if this cost were reduced, such new lower cost features would also be applied to current active crossings as part of their ongoing maintenance and eventual preplacement. 

 

There are two ways to reduce the cost:

1)   Come up with an improved design that somehow reduces the cost.

 

2)   Compromise the provision of warning and reliability.  Under that compromise model, the theory would be, “Better to have some safety improvement than none at all.” 

 

But this goes back to what I was saying about drivers lowering their guard and making up for it by relying on the automatic safety device.  Let’s say you convert passive crossings to active crossing by installing an active protection that is not as effective as the active protection on true active crossings.  In that case, people will rely on that limited protection just as much as they rely on the full active protections of the fully equipped active crossings.  So people will become less wary at passive crossings, and collisions may actually increase there as a result. 

 

So if you come up with a reduced cost passive protection just to add an increment of safety to passive crossings, you might actually make passive crossings more dangerous than they are now before adding the limited improvement.  That would be the unintended consequence that I mention. 

 

For this reason, I believe that any safety improvement added to passive crossings must bring them up to the same level of protection and reliability as is the case with today’s existing active crossings.  So the only way this can be accomplished at a lower cost than today’s active protection is if the cost reduction comes from a design improvement that reduces manufacturing cost. 

 

Such an improvement of passive crossing safety cannot come, for instance, from adding a small wind turbine that is illuminated with solar/battery powered LEDs just to help get a drivers attention to focus on the fact that they are approaching a crossing.  That would be an example of adding protection less than the fully active protection.  The cost-reduced active protection must be at least as effective in terms of providing protection as today’s active crossing systems. 

 

All of this gets to one point about the Minnesota experiment to add a lower cost active protection to passive crossings.  I don’t recall that they ever clarified whether the new active system they designed provided at least the same safety and reliability as today’s standard active protection technology.  The report claims they have cut the cost of the full active protection system by 90%, and that will make it affordable to convert many if not all passive crossings to this new, safer protection system. 

 

I would bet that this new, low cost system is not as reliable and safe as today’s typical fully active protection crossing.  I suspect they are justifying this on the basis of, “Better to have some safety improvement than none at all.” 

 

If it does provide the same safety and reliability, then it would also be applied to replace current active crossing protection systems with this new system to achieve the same cost reduction as would be the case with passive crossings.  Does anybody know whether this point was clarified about the new Minnesota system? 

 

This is a key question. 

[tree68]

Euclid

2)   Compromise the provision of warning and reliability.  Under that compromise model, the theory would be, “Better to have some safety improvement than none at all.” 

 

Otherwise known as "payday for lawyers."

[Euclid]

tree68

 

 

Euclid

2)   Compromise the provision of warning and reliability.  Under that compromise model, the theory would be, “Better to have some safety improvement than none at all.” 

 

 

 

 

Otherwise known as "payday for lawyers."

 

It would certainly do that.  It would also make the crossing actually more dangerous for injury and death.  Many drivers probably make no distinction between passive crossings and active crossings like railroad people do.  To the average person, if no train is coming, both types of crossings are likely to look about the same.  They see no difference between lights not displayed and lights not existing.  Likewise, an open gate is no gate. 

The reason I mention this is that I have seen various proposals for devices to make passive crossings more conspicuous.  None of them replicate the full protection of a crossing with an active protection system.  They all are claimed to be an improvement because even though they don’t offer full active protection, they falsely conclude: “It is better to have some safety improvement rather than being just a passive crossing.”

Aside from the actual increase in danger that might result from this short sighted thinking, there is also the problem of failing to meet all of the safety and reliability standards that are likely to be required for grade crossing protection equipment. 

I suspect that this type of equipment is heavily regulated, and the regulations simply would not allow a new system that in any way compromises the existing standards.  I also suspect that the Minnesota passive crossing, low cost upgrade to active protection did not go forward for the same reason.  I think it is unlikely that they could have taken 90% of the cost out of contemporary active crossing protection and still have retained the same level of protection and reliability.   

[charlie hebdo]

I suspect you are just guessing.

[Overmod]

He and I are going to have a fundamental disagreement on this subject.

My response to this involved development of crossing design that would be distinctly different from current gated crossings, but still recognized as railroad crossings requiring additional diligence and safe lookout when approached.  Think of it as an improved way to announce 'stop, look, and listen' that comes to be as recognizable to the public as crossbucks were many years ago.

We don't generally acknowledge this today, but Holley Rudd specifically intended his design of crossing signal to serve as an 'unmistakable and iconic' railroad-crossing alert, by contrast with various kinds of mechanical-signalman wigwags.  It succeeded remarkably well in this role, and continues to be a significant element in gated crossings.

I am interested in hearing where the estimated cost to implement effective drop gates and perimeter framing and fencing to prevent 'going around' is going to be found.  A case might be made for 'special assessments' for landowners with private roads, but they will rightly scream at many thousands of dollars, plus maintenance assessment yearly, for the 'privilege' of being kept safe from themselves.

I continue to think that a low-cost addition of active signaling to additional approach signage is a reasonable approach to protection.  Most laws currently mandate stopping (and looking and listening) at ungated or unlighted crossings already -- I see no reason why more clearly indicating where and when to stop, when not to negotiate a crossing, when there is limited sight distance, and when trains are present or approaching requires a greater standard of care than what is in the law.

We're already at the nanny-state point where some are advocating for those hydraulic rising bollards to be installed, stopping people from running gates.  What's next might be devices to disable ignition (I've actually seen nitwits propose this!) or drones to tail violators until they can be caught and fined.

The question becomes more difficult when, as Ron indicates, 'safety' means preventing vehicles from actually fouling the crossing.  At every crossing.  All the time.  The British already do this -- their standards required full fencing and gating of all 'private' railway ROW from nearly two centuries ago.  We could relatively easily install heavy cattle gates across all private crossings, kept locked with a key requiring a permit to use (and various safeguards a la switch locks to spread the annoyance beyond the rail world).  But even with the police coming out and unlocking/relocking the gates (which is the least illogical way to manage nanny security) there will still be accidents, and until all road crossings are grade-separated underpasses with no ability for vehicles to damage the railroad bridge structure, accidents can still be expected.  Even the thought of doing this every couple of miles, with clearance for ag equipment, and pumps and whatnot to keep them unflooded, is not particularly sensible either.

In short, there isn't a real reason why 'better' needs to be considered mortal enemy of 'best' -- as long as distinctive signage for passive crossings is different from full gate-protected ones.

[charlie hebdo]

It's about time (frankly, long since past) that a thorough census of all crossings and then categorizing by type and traffic flow, both toad and rail. My personal belief is a lot of crossings are an archaic remnant of horse and buggy days,where in rural areas family farms were 100-200 acres max.  Times change. Many crossings should be closed.

[BaltACD]

charlie hebdo

It's about time (frankly, long since past) that a thorough census of all crossings and then categorizing by type and traffic flow, both toad and rail. My personal belief is a lot of crossings are an archaic remnant of horse and buggy days,where in rural areas family farms were 100-200 acres max.  Times change. Many crossings should be closed.

The FRA database and identification of road crossings has all the information you desire.

https://railroads.dot.gov/safety-data/crossing-and-inventory-data/crossing-inventory-lookup

 

Asking the data base for the information you desire is another question entirely.

[SD70Dude]

Overmod

We're already at the nanny-state point where some are advocating for those hydraulic rising bollards to be installed, stopping people from running gates.  What's next might be devices to disable ignition (I've actually seen nitwits propose this!) or drones to tail violators until they can be caught and fined.

Yes, because those would never screw up and get stuck in the raised position, especially not in our winters.  And imagine if the ignition disabler messed up by a few feet and started shutting down engines as the vehicles entered the crossing.......

I could see the drone idea becoming a thing, but why continue after the vehicle once you've got pictures of the license plate and perhaps the driver's face as well?

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

I've seen bollards used on movable bridges where an opening over the edge exists when the bridge is raised.  They are relatively rare and safety cables that are lowered into place are more common.

[tree68]

SD70Dude

I could see the drone idea becoming a thing, but why continue after the vehicle once you've got pictures of the license plate and perhaps the driver's face as well?

There are already the railroad crossing equivalent of red light cameras in use.

I recall one reported incident where the first violator caught was a patrol car...

 

[BaltACD]

CSSHEGEWISCH

I've seen bollards used on movable bridges where an opening over the edge exists when the bridge is raised.  They are relatively rare and safety cables that are lowered into place are more common.

Some movable bridges use the counterwieght that helps in the movement of the bridge as the device to keep trains from 'falling' into the abyss.

https://planeandtrainwrecks.com/Document?db=DOT-RAILROAD&query=(select+4+(byhits+(general+(anyof+Cleveland))))

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

That situation occurs with vertical lift bridges on railroads.  I'm not sure how successful that would be.  I've seen pictures in TRAINS some years back where a PC freight train in Cleveland overran the signal and the locomotives were sheared at the frame when they hit the counterweight.  The frame of the lead locomotive just missed the boat in the channel. 

I've not seen the counterweights lowered to street level on vehicular vertical lift bridges.

[charlie hebdo]

Overmod

We're already at the nanny-state point 

Perhaps those who use this rightist term forgot that the fundamental point of a state and a Western government (as opposed to anarchy) is order, safety.and a sense of predictable continuity.

[mudchicken]

(1) The FRA and FHWA sponsored a model law in 2007 that addressed line of sight and vision distance issues.  The states failed to adopt any of it. It is still out there if you know where to find it.  https://railroads.dot.gov/.../files/fra_net/1259/BackgroundOverviewModelLaw.pdf

(2) Opening and closing/ modifying of crossings is a state responsibility (not federal). Each state has a memorandum/ letter agreement with the states over this.

(3) The approaches are the county/city/state agencies responsibility.  None of them appears to even know there is an engineering standard (long published) that exists in the AREMA and AASHTO manuals (published jointly) ... The road agencies continually ignore it. (Engineers acting badly ... just caused a big derailment in Dennison IA on UP)

(4) Who is this crossing assessment team gonna be? (If it's gonna be like the QZ teams, don't even start.  A cluster of the highest order would result.) The locals will insist Uncle Sugar will pay for it , never mind the fact that local negligence created most of the deficiencies.

(5) Closing crossings? Good luck with that. (employment for questionable lawyers hoping to find similarly unqualified judges?)

(6) Slowing down the trains? NOPE Not gonna happen. Especially the knee jerk stuff.

(7)If a crossing protection system goes into general use, then it must be properly vetted and tested. Brand-new/ outta da box is a prescription for failure - a fools errand (RTD Denver discovered this - what sounded good on paper did not translate into success..and the actual railroaders involved in the project warned that the system would fail just like it did (RTD would not listen) - With all the band-aids since, the system still fails and has reliability issues)

[Overmod]

https://railroads.dot.gov/.../files/fra_net/1259/BackgroundOverviewModelLaw.pdf

Link returns only "permission denied" on my systems

[BaltACD]

This link may work

https://railroads.dot.gov/legislation-regulations/legislation/model-state-legislation

[charlie hebdo]

So, after the 7 barriers to progress are noted, let's do nothing.

Nichts.

Nada.

[Overmod]

Since it's been pointed out that the states are responsible for enacting crossing legislation to facilitate any of this... how many states have used the FRA 'model language' for one of the intended purposes?  What state laws of any kind are currently in consideration, or pending?

THAT is where the change will start.

[charlie hebdo]

Sensibly and in accord with the Constitution's commerce clause, uniform regulation of railroad crossings should become s federal function.

[tree68]

charlie hebdo

Sensibly and in accord with the Constitution's commerce clause, uniform regulation of railroad crossings should become s federal function.

I would opine that regulation of crossings already is.  It's the funding that's the issue.

[BaltACD]

charlie hebdo

Sensibly and in accord with the Constitution's commerce clause, uniform regulation of railroad crossings should become s federal function.

Railroads track structure can be viewed as Interstate.  Streets and Roads within a State are Intrastate.  It is up to the states to design and pay for the crossing of their Intrastates with the Interstate railroads.