Worst Level Crossings for Traffic

[Thatcham Xing]

Thatcham!

Everyone who lives locally and has to use it has their personal record for how long the barriers can be down continuously - mine is 23 mins.

 

[vlad]

No-one's mentioned Red Cow crossing (the one immediately to the north of Exeter St David's station) yet.

I appreciate that the road crossing the line is fairly minor - but bear in mind that once you've got more than a few vehicles queueing then you'll block the A377.

 

[hermit]

Chichester has already been mentioned, but I'd add Petersfield, which is another one affected by station stops.

 

[High Dyke]

Hubberts Bridge is a contender. South Forty Foot drain, Railway and 'A' Road all in parallel and a busy 'B' Road that bisects all three. Just enough space for a car/small van to squeeze in between the Give Way line at the road junction and the crossing gates.

 

[Geswedey]

Brimsdown and Enfield Lock can be pretty horrendous with 20 + trains per hour in the rush hours

 

[jopsuk]

Brimsdown and Enfield Lock can be pretty horrendous with 20 + trains per hour in the rush hours

Yeah- especially as the barriers have to be down through Down train calls at the stations.

tricky locations to bridge, but a solution really does need to be found if the line is to go to four tracks and get >20 stopping services per hour and 10 or more express.

 

[Tim M]

While not in the UK, I see the same thing in Melbourne Australia, although it is just a suburban train service stopping to take on passengers. The problem here is, when you are on a railway of which also has express trains, and, so as to avoid slowing down the express trains, the wig wags are always set off as though the train is an express service.

The solution must be, to have some kind of a tracking system, of which tracks the movement of trains, and, will know which are express and which are local. That way, you get a delayed trigger when the train is going to stop at that location.

Siemens in the USA supplies a Level Crossing Predictor system that detects train speed to vary the start time of the level crossing sequence, see the link.

To put this into context this division of Siemens used to be known as Safetran Systems Corporation, they supply large numbers of level crossing systems across the USA and elsewhere. They were part of the Westinghouse (U.K.), Westinghouse (Australia) and Dimetronic (Spain) group of signalling suppliers that was bought by Siemens about six years ago. The Aussies were familiar with this kit, and the level crossing boom systems are also used in the U.K.

However I’m not sure that the predictor system is compatible with electrification.

https://w3.usa.siemens.com/mobility...ts/SIE_BRO_GCP5000_GradeCrossingPredictor.pdf

 

[K.o.R]

Bedhampton

Traffic on West Street isn't heavy but it often has time to build up an impressive queue!

Traffic on the other side at least has the option to divert on New Road

 

[Snow1964]

Manor Road at North Sheen station can be fun. Two Kingston loop and two Hounslow loop services each way an hour, two up and two down Reading and two up and two down Windsor services an hour, with additional services at rush hours. Manor Road can get completely blocked at each and, clogging up the junctions at the Black Horse to the south and the Gasworks Bridge on the A316 to the north. I've regularly seen the gates down for three or four trains. To be fair, things have recently been made easier for pedestrians and cyclists with the construction of a footbridge.

I was recently held there whilst 5 trains went through.

Also seen the barriers go up and no more than 3-4 cars get across before warnings for barriers going down again occur. But waits of 3 minutes (or more) for trains to arrive are not uncommon. It doesn’t seem to have any form of control and will go down even if a train is going to sit in Richmond station awaiting time.

I think it was one of the reasons for Heathrow airtrack objections, because barriers already down over 40 mins per hour in peak

 

[Terry Tait]

Brimstone and Enfield Lock require an underpass.

 

[Ianno87]

Brimstone and Enfield Lock require an underpass.

That's it - from now on I'm referring to Brimsdown as "Brimstone".

I could, however imagine underpasses there being tricky due to being in the Lea Valley...unless you're talking about going right down to the level of magma with the underpass?

(Sorry, couldn't resist... )

 

[MadMac]

Siemens in the USA supplies a Level Crossing Predictor system that detects train speed to vary the start time of the level crossing sequence, see the link.

However I’m not sure that the predictor system is compatible with electrification.

https://w3.usa.siemens.com/mobility...ts/SIE_BRO_GCP5000_GradeCrossingPredictor.pdf

It's not. Nobody's solved that one yet, and whoever does will make a fortune.

 

[MadMac]

When Camps Junction (just east of Kirknewton, now closed altogether) became a gate box we put in "Train Approaching" indicators to assist with closing the crossing. The fellow manning the place a few days later told me that if he had followed the indications, he would have had the crossing shut for 54 minutes at one point!