research >>rail crossings
completed
A large proportion of these collisions were caused by drivers deliberately circumventing warning equipment, with devastating consequences. This behavior included ignoring flashing lights or other active warning devices, passing through descending barrier gates, or even driving around stopped traffic and already-lowered gates. Although the end-result of a collision is a relatively rare event, the behavior is widespread.
It has been shown that people’s ability to accurately judge the speed and distance of an oncoming train is quite limited. In general, it is much more difficult to determine the speed of an object approaching the viewer than for an object traveling across the field of vision. Additionally, the Leibowitz hypothesis suggests that drivers underestimate the speed of trains because human vision underestimates the speed of large objects, such as locomotives.
The best solution to rail crossing crashes is to remove the need for the driver to engage in a potentially faulty decision-making process by making it impossible, or at least very difficult, for the driver to bypass lowered gates. There are two low-technology, low-cost, low-maintenance methods that, while not 100% effective, have been deployed in many locations and shown to prevent deaths and injuries while remaining economically feasible. These are long-arm gates and median separators.
TSC Resources
"Driver Behavior at Rail Crossings: Cost-Effective Improvements to Increase Driver Safety at Public At-Grade Rail-Highway Crossings in California" Douglas L. Cooper, David R. Ragland. TSC Research Report. 2007.
"Rail Crossings: A Strategy to Select Countermeasure Improvements for Rail-Highway Crossings in California" Douglas L. Cooper, Kara E. MacLeod, David R. Ragland. TSC Research Report. 2007.