@Trinity River Bottoms Boomer posted:Item: Should there be silent ordances in cities where trains are prohibited from sounding 14L when approaching crossings at grade?
It's not clear whether you are questioning whether the existing Quiet Zones are effective, or whether there should even be any Quiet Zones.
In order to establish a Quiet Zone, a local entity, normally a city, must agree to pay the entire cost of installing -- or upgrading to -- enhanced active crossing warning devices. This could be in the form of 4-way or 8-way crossing flashers and gates (to prevent motorists from occupying the crossing by driving around lowered gates) or a raised center island for a distance approaching the crossing (to make it more difficult for motorists to occupy the crossing when gates are lowered).
Texas is a largely rural state with many of the road crossings being county roads, often graded but not paved. Although there are still some of those crossings protected only by crossbuck signs, Texas is ahead of most other states in the number of rural crossings protected by active warning devices usually flashing lights, gates and bell. Almost all Texas paved road crossings on main lines now have active warning devices, as do many, unpaved roads with flashers and gates.
The video did not show anything but a lot of heavy black smoke rising from behind trees, so we can't tell from that, whether this crossing was paved, graded, or next to another road that would make possible a turn directly onto a crossing, or whether it was equipped with active warning devices. Also, we cannot determine whether there was a Quiet Zone in effect there.
When I was still working, we had a crossing collision in Plainview, in which a Class 8 truck and trailer turned off of a paved road paralleling the track, onto a crossbuck-protected, paved, road that crossed the track to access a meat packing plant, and was struck by a train, killing the driver, who did not stop while making the turn. There was no explanation as to why the driver did not yield right of way to the train.
