Ive seen a number of posts on Facebook reacting to the recent train crash that tragically killed an elderly woman yesterday - calling for the trains to slow down, for Amtrak to do more, and so on. Because the railroad is such an integral part of our community and many of us interact with the 3rd and 5th Street crossings every day, we see up close what many only hear about on the news. But that can skew perspective and make problems seem worse than they are because we remember. In 2013, there were *SEVEN* fatalities in NC due to train collisions. In comparison, there were 1,222 motor vehicle fatalities in 2012 (the most recent year data is available for). When the speed limit was lowered to 55MPH, Jimmy Carter was roundly ridiculed for it and we couldnt WAIT for it to be raised to 65-70MPH and many wish it was 75 because were all doing 80 anyway. Speed kills. But instead, we worked to make cars safer - and the motor vehicle fatality rate has dropped steadily for decades. High Speed rail is a vital part of our economic infrastructure. Freight traffic continues to climb, taking trucks off our highways and passenger service continues to improve as travel times drop. They should go slower is not feasible. If trains have to slow down at every single town and residential area they reach, they can never get above 30MPH because theyre slowing down again before they can fully speed up (which takes forever for freighters) and might as well just go out of business because they cant compete with other modes of transportation. As part of the high speed rail corridor project, Norfolk-Southern has made significant improvements to the grade level crossings in our town and elsewhere. Consider this: Advanced four-way gates were installed to prevent people from pulling around gates to beat the train, a common cause of accidents. These gates try to ensure the tracks are clear before the train comes. They work like this as a train approaches: 1) All traffic is stopped with red lights in ALL directions, EXCEPT for the streets crossing the tracks. With straight AND left turn green arrows (so someone turning left will NOT stop in front of you to let oncoming traffic by), any traffic can clear unless a vehicle suffers a malfunction. Note this isnt how the lights function normally with no train (ie the left turn arrow on 3rd never comes on) so you CAN get trapped by a car turning left that never turns. BUT - when a train comes you WILL get out because the arrow comes on and oncoming traffic is stopped anyway. 2) The gates closest to oncoming traffic begin to lower while the lights remain green to block traffic from crossing the tracks. You can pull around them if youre an idiot - but you will STILL get through, because... 3) The opposite gates lower LATER to give any car ON the tracks time to clear before they drop completely. You cannot pull onto the tracks and get trapped by the 2nd gate. You can only get trapped if you stayed on the tracks once this whole sequence began and didnt move forward once the gates behind you started dropping. Even if trapped (youre distracted and looking at your phone and dont realize or hear the bells), those gates are weak aluminum and you can pull any car right through them. Tragically many elderly dont realize this. 4) Once the gates are down, no cars can get through at all - the tracks are completely blocked. You cannot pull around them. The traffic lights turn red and traffic all along 70 gets green. Ive lived in Mebane 20+ years and there have certainly been fatal accidents, but nowhere near the number two miles away on I-85. In fact there was a horrible accident that shutdown I-85W for hours just last week. But were not calling for the speed limit to be lowered. Most accidents are driver error, not Amtraks or NSs fault. Two elderly people tragically got confused and froze on the tracks in recent years. Im not sure how you fix that. The light is ALWAYS green to go. Nobody is going to stop in front of you. The idiot truck driver who tried to pull a lowboy trailer up 5th St with an earth mover on it should be in jail. There are warning signs on EVERY street near the crossings about low trailer drag (FYI normal trucks will not come CLOSE to bottoming out. Only specialized heavy equipment haulers) Those trailers can bottom out on speed bumps and he KNEW there was no way hed make it, but pulled up anyway and caused a horrific accident, that amazingly resulted in no fatalities and very few serious injuries. Sadly some people have committed suicide by laying on the tracks and two teenagers high on bath salts walked down the tracks and were killed. All could just have easily been killed walking into oncoming traffic on Rt 70 or I-85. The store which sold the illegal bath salts? Raided and no longer in business... My point is that overall, high speed rail is not causing massive amounts of fatalities. *7* people died statewide in 2013 on grade crossings. Millions were spent updating crossings and they continue to be improved. We want to say its a problem because we SEE it up close because our community is built around the railroad and we see it. But in reality - its incredibly safe. And state DOTs continue to upgrade and close crossings as you can see here: sehsr.org/ Dont stop on the tracks. Dont walk on the tracks. This accident was a tragedy, but no more so than any other traffic fatality that happened yesterday in NC. Because statistics showed a handful did. And another handful will happen today. Train accidents are very very rare but they stick in our psyche because of the imagery.
Posted on: Wed, 17 Dec 2014 13:28:08 +0000