Car Accident
Railroad crossing accidents
The term level crossing (also called: railroad crossing or grade crossing) is a crossing on one level (or "at grade") - without recourse to a bridge or tunnel - used to describe the crossing of a railway line by a road, path, or other railroad.
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It also applies when a light rail line with separate right-of-way (or a reserved track tramway) crosses a road; the term "metro" usually means by definition that there are no level crossings (i.e. that the system is grade-separated).
About Rail Crossings
In the United States, and in countries following US practices, a train must have a bright headlight, and a whistle or horn must be sounded as the train approaches the crossing. Some American cities, citing noise pollution abatement, have passed laws prohibiting the sounding of bells and whistles, however their ability to enforce such rules is debatable. In December of 2003, The US Federal Railroad Administration published regulations that would create areas where train horns could be silenced, provided that certain safety measures were put in place. More information can be found at the FRA website at and following the page link under 'Train horn rule.' The regulations were scheduled to go into effect in December 2004.
All crossings in the United States are required to be marked by at least a crossbuck. Most crossings that intersect rural roads have this setup. As traffic on the road crossing or the rail crossing increases, safety features are ramped up accordingly. More densely populated crossings have alternately flashing red lights to warn motorists, and a bell to warn pedestrians. Additional safety is attained through gates that block motorists approach to the tracks when activated. Increasingly, crossings are being fitted with so-called four-quadrant gates, with a gate mechanism on either side of the tracks for each direction of automotive traffic. The exit gates blocking the road leading away from the tracks in this application are equipped with a delay, and begin their descent to their horizontal position several seconds after the entrance gates do, so as to avoid trapping highway vehicles on the crossing. Four-quadrant gates prevent vehicles from driving around lowered gates to try to beat a train.
A track that will run high-speed trains in excess of 120 mph (193 km/h) is being tested in Illinois between Chicago and Saint Louis. Here, due to the high speed of the trains, gates that totally prevent road traffic from reaching the tracks are mandatory on all level crossings, and steel mesh nets are being tested on the busier crossings to further prevent collisions.
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Railroad crossing accidents