level crossings

NaughtiusMaximus

agrinnall wrote: »

Six trains an hour seems too many to make a level crossing viable, I'd have thought the crossing should be closed to road traffic and an alternative developed - possibly a tunnel or a bridge, possibly a different route altogether. Of course, the cost may make that prohibitive, but if there are safety issues don't surprised if it gets closed anyway and you have to find your own alternative.

There are plenty of crossings on much busier lines than that. One near me has 12 trains per hour passing through it.

agrinnall

NaughtiusMaximus wrote: »

There are plenty of crossings on much busier lines than that. One near me has 12 trains per hour passing through it.

But for how long is the crossing closed each time? With the OP's new information that in their case it can be closed for 27 out of 60 minutes that seems to me to be of limited use as a route for road traffic.

p00hsticks

rubble2 wrote: »

Thanks for all the replies.

I had a bit of spare time this morning so I took a walk down to the level crossing to investigate further.

There are actually nine trains scheduled in each sixty minute period during the day. I timed the gate closure time from when the lights start to flash to when the barrier is raised again, for a train approaching from my left (passes over level crossing and then stops at station) the total 'down' time was two and a half minutes. For a train approaching from my right (stops at station then passes over crossing) the down time was three and a half minutes (the barriers closed a full two minutes before the train actually arrived at the station)

So, in total over a one hour period the road is closed for approx 27 minutes. I personally think that this situation needs looking at with a view to reducing the disruption to road users.

I think I need to raise this with the rail and or local authorities and see if any solution is viable.

Did you also count how many cars were using the road ?

27 minutes every hour sounds a lot, but all this really means is that the probability is that more than half the cars using the road will go straight though as the crossing will be open, and the rest will have to wait a few minutes. It might be worth counting how many cars arrive and have to queue while the crossing is closed. or asking if some sort of survey can be done to find out how cars use the road and how many times a day


And how many of the cars are actually picking up or dropping people off at the station ?

NaughtiusMaximus

agrinnall wrote: »

But for how long is the crossing closed each time? With the OP's new information that in their case it can be closed for 27 out of 60 minutes that seems to me to be of limited use as a route for road traffic.

Based on the few times I've driven across I'd say the gates are down more often than they're up.

PasturesNew

rubble2 wrote: »

So, in total over a one hour period the road is closed for approx 27 minutes. I personally think that this situation needs looking at with a view to reducing the disruption to road users.

The railway was there first... no cars.

It was a track and the occasional old bloke with a pony/cart...

It doesn't matter how long it's shut each hour - the fact is that the most you'll be inconvenienced by on any journey is the longest time, 3.5 minutes. Can you not simply leave your house 4 minutes earlier "in case"?

YBR

agrinnall wrote: »

Six trains an hour seems too many to make a level crossing viable, I'd have thought the crossing should be closed to road traffic and an alternative developed - possibly a tunnel or a bridge, possibly a different route altogether. Of course, the cost may make that prohibitive, but if there are safety issues don't surprised if it gets closed anyway and you have to find your own alternative.

When NR assess Level Crossings (for risk and ultimately closure) they don't just look at the number of trains (6ph is not huge) but the speed of trains; also the number of cars, pedestrians and other road users, and if there are road junctions likely to queue back over the crossing. They consider if pedestrians are likely to include a high proportion of elderly/disabled users and whether there is a history of mis-use (particularly half-barrier crossings, but I assume OP's local is full barriers?)

As the crossing is already there, it's not a question of is the crossing "viable". It can be hugely expensive to close a Level Crossing even if there is no need to build a diversion or bridge. Having said that, NR closed over 600 from 2009 to 2012 and still going. It's more a question of how your crossing is to the top Risk. The Riskiest will be priority for closure or upgraded.

Pennywise

PasturesNew wrote: »

It doesn't matter how long it's shut each hour - the fact is that the most you'll be inconvenienced by on any journey is the longest time, 3.5 minutes. Can you not simply leave your house 4 minutes earlier "in case"?

Where does 3.5 minutes come from? Is that an offiical limit?

p00hsticks

Pennywise wrote: »

Where does 3.5 minutes come from? Is that an offiical limit?

No, it's what the OP measured as the time (post #9)

Aretnap

agrinnall wrote: »

But for how long is the crossing closed each time? With the OP's new information that in their case it can be closed for 27 out of 60 minutes that seems to me to be of limited use as a route for road traffic.

That's stretching the point rather. A normal set of traffic lights is red (in one direction) for 30 minutes per hour, maybe more depending on how they are set up. That doesn't make every road with traffic lights useless.

YBR

Please don't equate road traffic lights and railway signals, and Level Crossing wig-wags are railway principles more than road.
The red/yellow/green (sometimes 2 yellows) signals of the railway were developed from mechanical signalling (1800s I think) and is used to keep trains apart. They can be any way round as all train drivers have colour vision.