Safety aspects of control devices at railway level crossings.

This paper was presented at session 32 - safety. For some years now, priorities for the installation of control devices at railway level crossings in Queensland have been determined using a rating system based on what is known as the Ohio method. This system is based on accident probability, train speed, angle of crossing and sight distance. In 1976, a report prepared for the then road safety and standards authority dealing with railway crossing safety was published. It was based on south Australian data collected at some 1700 crossings over a six-year period. Data contained in that report have been manipulated to enable the preparation of accident cost versus exposure curves for a number of different control situations. Some interesting conclusions, leading in some cases to warrants for rail-crossing control, have been drawn. These are the subject of the present paper. In particular, important differences between crossings in urban and rural areas were noted; the Queensland rating system makes no such distinction. The use of flashing lights to control low volume crossings may, in some cases, be disadvantageous. Flashing lights in lieu of 'stop' signs may be automatically warranted when stop control becomes needed. Angle of skew, previously considered important, may actually be relatively unimportant. The number of the covering abstract of the conference is IRRD no. 239340.