Railroad crossing accidents

[caravanman]

I have found myself driving the wrong side on occasion in the USA, thankfully I realised soon enough!
It is funny that folk find our roundabouts tricky, I have exactly the same problem about the 4 way USA box junctions, our brains just are so used to certain procedures over the years, I guess!

 

[TrackWalker]

Practice on this....

 

[Cal]

Practice on this....

Oh my, that’s cool, but not great for drivers!
I personally love odd crossings like that though

 

[jiml]

Gosh, I have enough trouble with driving on the wrong side of the road and lack of roundabouts over there, don't confuse me even more!

Roundabouts are the Devil's handiwork. They're becoming more prevalent here due to their cheapness vs. a proper intersection. Their use is not covered in driver training and the dual-lane ones are accidents in waiting.

 

[TrackWalker]

When roundabouts first started appearing locally the first one was almost always built close to the nearest high school.

 

[Bob Dylan]

I can switch sides so long as the steering wheel is at the correct orientation to remind me which rules to follow. I've also driven in countries where they seem to shove five lanes of traffic into 1½ lanes of pavement, but the UK's multi-lane highway style roundabouts are genuinely difficult for me. I never grew up with anything like that and find the process rather tedious with several turnoffs passing in rapid succession at high speed. It's probably a more efficient design but I'm just not wired for that sort of layout and really have to think about it when I encounter one.

Have you driven in Mexico City with the Gloriettas( Multi Lane Traffic Circles) and the Topes?( Speed Bumps to slow the Grand Prix Drivers! )

Sort of like Chevy Chase in London in "European Vacation" at Twice the Speed!

 

[AmtrakBlue]

Check out this one where traffic goes from "American" to "European" and back to "American" (driving on right, then left and then back to right)

https://www.google.com/maps/place/D...d0a5fae529e1221!8m2!3d39.5778901!4d-75.588815

 

[Duane Witte]

Check out this one where traffic goes from "American" to "European" and back to "American" (driving on right, then left and then back to right)

https://www.google.com/maps/place/D...d0a5fae529e1221!8m2!3d39.5778901!4d-75.588815
View attachment 21387

They're doing that quite a bit here in Missouri when they rebuild interchanges

 

[joelkfla]

Check out this one where traffic goes from "American" to "European" and back to "American" (driving on right, then left and then back to right)

https://www.google.com/maps/place/D...d0a5fae529e1221!8m2!3d39.5778901!4d-75.588815
View attachment 21387

The idea is that cars making left turns don't have to cross traffic. You still have two traffic signals, same as a conventional diamond interchange, but each has only 2 intervals, so it's supposed to greatly increase capacity.

It looks weird, but it's really hard to turn onto the wrong side of the road.

 

[AmtrakBlue]

The idea is that cars making left turns don't have to cross traffic. You still have two traffic signals, same as a conventional diamond interchange, but each has only 2 intervals, so it's supposed to greatly increase capacity.

It looks weird, but it's really hard to turn onto the wrong side of the road.

I’ve been thru it a couple of times. I’m sure you can get used to it, but it is weird at first.

 

[greatwestern]

I can switch sides so long as the steering wheel is at the correct orientation to remind me which rules to follow. I've also driven in countries where they seem to shove five lanes of traffic into 1½ lanes of pavement, but the UK's multi-lane highway style roundabouts are genuinely difficult for me. I never grew up with anything like that and find the process rather tedious with several turnoffs passing in rapid succession at high speed. It's probably a more efficient design but I'm just not wired for that sort of layout and really have to think about it when I encounter one.

Being a Brit, one of the major problems I have when driving in the USA or Canada is doing right turns against a red - scares the hell out of me. No problems with roundabouts - but this one in Swindon is a bit of a challenge !!

 

[railiner]

Egads! I think I would prefer good ole 'spaghetti bowl' multi-grade separated flyover interchanges...

 

[jiml]

Egads! I think I would prefer good ole 'spaghetti bowl' multi-grade separated flyover interchanges...

Since we've ventured into Italian food, I suspect every major city has a "spaghetti junction". This is certainly what this first one in west Toronto was nicknamed over a generation ago, and it has long since been supplanted by several of the second type.

 

[Bob Dylan]

Houston has an infamous one called "The Spaghetti Bowl" and the other Major Texas Cities are emulating them including Austin, which Specializes in badly designed "Flyovers",2 Lanes turning into One ways @ intersections, No Left turns allowed and Poor Signage and Lighting on our Major Roads!

Since most Traffic Engineers are Texas Aggies ( Texas A&M) we call them College Stations Revenge against the University of Texas!

 

[cocojacoby]

Oh my, that’s cool, but not great for drivers!
I personally love odd crossings like that though

Then this is for you. It even has semi street running coming off of it:

 

[Dakota 400]

Roundabouts are the Devil's handiwork. They're becoming more prevalent here due to their cheapness vs. a proper intersection. Their use is not covered in driver training and the dual-lane ones are accidents in waiting.

Near where I live, two secondary roads that intersect and are heavily used at certain times of the day (going to work and coming home from work times) are due to have a roundabout built when funding is available. The reasons are two folk: First, to reduce the long lines of cars waiting to get through the intersection by "increasing the rate of traffic flow". Second, to reduce the number of accidents at that intersection.

I'll predict that the number of accidents will increase significantly once this thing is built. Maybe after people have used it for some time, the accident rate will decline. But, I am not going to bet on it.

 

[me_little_me]

The idea is that cars making left turns don't have to cross traffic. You still have two traffic signals, same as a conventional diamond interchange, but each has only 2 intervals, so it's supposed to greatly increase capacity.

It looks weird, but it's really hard to turn onto the wrong side of the road.

They are called Diverging Diamonds and, IMHO, are one of the best ideas devised for that situation. Drivers only have one traffic light to go through instead of all sorts of left-turn lights and the tons of delays.

 

[Ziv]

We had something similar in Arlington VA on Washington Blvd. It is a regular cross walk but there is an amber warning light to get drivers to pay attention to pedestrians. The pedestrian hits the button, the light goes on and hopefully the drivers slow and stop. Within a month of it being installed a pedestrian hit the button and walked into the traffic of Washington Blvd without looking to see if the cars were stopping. One did but the other driver didn't see the pedestrian and hit them at 30 mph.

My state and city has further complicated things with something called a Hawk Signal. These are put in at crosswalks located in the middle of a long block. They are traditional traffic lights but are tied to the walk buttons for pedestrians. They are dark completely when not in use, when you press the button for the walk light they turn on yellow, then go to solid red when the walk light comes on. So far so good, as red means stop. However after a few seconds the lights go to flashing red, this now means proceed if there are no pedestrians in the crosswalk, but stay stopped if there are pedestrians crossing. This was so confusing that they had to put up signs on the poles to tell motorists what the new rules were.

We have three of these in town now and more are coming. One Assistant Police Chief called it the most confusing system he had seen, because the only other place we have flashing red traffic lights are railroad crossings and school busses and they both mean stop. Here they may or may not mean stop. So while these are not specifically railroad related, I can see them causing confusion at crossings.

 

[trainman74]

Being a Brit, one of the major problems I have when driving in the USA or Canada is doing right turns against a red - scares the hell out of me.

You're never required to make a right turn on red (although you may occasionally hear a horn honking from behind you).

 

[SarahZ]

And then there’s the infamous “Michigan Left”:

 

[Cal]

And then there’s the infamous “Michigan Left”:
View attachment 21397

What the-

 

[SarahZ]

What the-

It's really not so bad once you've done it a couple times. It prevents left turn congestion at busy intersections. You mostly see them in the larger cities.

This is what the signs look like, indicating the path you need to take. I couldn't figure out why this one looked so familiar, and then I realized I go through this intersection on the way to/from work every day.

 

[jiml]

And then there’s the infamous “Michigan Left”:
View attachment 21397

I have driven in Michigan a lot over the years, and you nailed it.

 

[jiml]

You're never required to make a right turn on red (although you may occasionally hear a horn honking from behind you).

Right turns on red are still prohibited in Montreal, although now permitted in the rest of Quebec. Here in southern Ontario there have also been issues of people turning right getting tickets from red light cameras, so caution (and honking) has become more common.

 

[SarahZ]

Many people (in my experience) don't know that you can also turn left on red, provided you are turning onto a one-way street.