Traffic violations at a level crossing with half-barriers

Behaviour of road traffic at a road-railway level crossing was recorded on video for 30 days. During the observation period 195 motor vehicles entered the level crossing while the half-barrier device warned of an approaching train. This corresponds to 1.5 percent of the traffic, which approached the level crossing while the alarm was on. The respective numbers for pedestrians and bicycles were 428 violations and 35 percent of the traffic during the alarms. A majority of motor vehicles entering the level crossing during alarm drove across the tracks when the sound and light warning devices were active, but before the gates started to go down, that is less than 9 seconds from the start of the alarm. Most pedestrian and bicycle offenders entered the level crossing when the gates had come all the way down, that is at least 18 seconds after the start of the alarm. The time from entering the crossing to the arrival of the train was more than 20 seconds for all motor vehicles. The shortest time from the crossing to the arrival of the train was 8 seconds for one pedestrian. Recommendations were made for the improvement of safety at such level crossings.