Emergency vehicles and gates

silverharp

I live in sandymount and we have just had some fliers in from the council about an incident that happened, it was a house fire where the firetrucks were held at Sperpentine gates for 5/6 minutes , something like 4 trains passed before the gates went back up. Apparently the controllers couldn't open the gates or stop the trains on short notice. If true I find this bizarre. Can the signals not be changed immediately, or the drivers not be contacted?
the workaround seems to be that Donnybrook fire station will send 2 tenders, 1 to bypass the gates, but that sounds messy to me.

corktina

not that easy to stop a train once despatched and probably it would be impossible to open the gates once the train is "in section" anyway....

Random

Better communication is what's needed here between Emergency services, gate controllers, and the guys who manage the train system.

Chris_533976

Yeah, opening the gates and closing them quickly would be better... emergency vehicles could take more of a 'risk' than the public could.

Random

Chris_533976 wrote: »

Yeah, opening the gates and closing them quickly would be better... emergency vehicles could take more of a 'risk' than the public could.

I don't agree with just chancing it though. I would not like to see a fire engine get stuck on the track and get struck by a train. That would not be pretty for those on the train.

We should tunnel under or build over and get rid of all railing crossings in built up areas I reckon.

corktina

Chris_533976 wrote: »

Yeah, opening the gates and closing them quickly would be better... emergency vehicles could take more of a 'risk' than the public could.

you need to understand that crossing gates are interlocked with signals and therefore cannot be opened once the green light is given for a train which may still be some distance from the crossing. There are track circuits which detect the presence of a train and these too are interlocked with the signals.These are fail-safe devices to prevent the crossing being open when there is a train signalled.I'm not a signalling expert, so maybe someone can explain better, but it isnt just a simple matter of opening a gate or stopping the train

Ham'nd'egger

corktina wrote: »

you need to understand that crossing gates are interlocked with signals and therefore cannot be opened once the green light is given for a train which may still be some distance from the crossing. There are track circuits which detect the presence of a train and these too are interlocked with the signals.These are fail-safe devices to prevent the crossing being open when there is a train signalled.I'm not a signalling expert, so maybe someone can explain better, but it isnt just a simple matter of opening a gate or stopping the train

That is pretty much how it works, Corky. In practice, CAWS (Continuous Automatic Warning System) can forewarn a driver of an impending signal change prior to passing a signal so a stop could be activated earlier if need be. Signals "protect" level crossings; trains are only be allowed to proceed if the crossing is safe to do so though in essence the times of them closing are determined by the approaching train. All the level crossings are monitored by CCTV so trains can be halted if need be; this would only be in case of blockages, faulty gates etc.

Realistically the time involved in the Emergency Services notifying their base, their base notifying Irish Rail, Irish Rail assessing that it is safe to halt trains, changing the signals to red, allowing for braking time to halt trains (waiting for them to pass a crossing if need be) and then opening the crossing makes the whole exercise far more cumbersome than it appears.

corktina

exactly....I guess what COULD be done would be for the Fire Service to have a system on their Despatch Computer (or whatever system they use) to automatically contact IE control when an Appliance is routed via a level crossing...(A Bat-Phone might do the trick, Holy Smoke Batman...:D)

Do those gates REALLY take 5/6 minutes? or does it just SEEM that long?

silverharp

some good points , just to mention though that the serpentine gates are between sandymount avenue and lansdowne station so there is only a few hundred metres between the stations, it would seem "easy" enough to hold the trains at these points

Ham'nd'egger

silverharp wrote: »

some good points , just to mention though that the serpentine gates are between sandymount avenue and lansdowne station so there is only a few hundred metres between the stations, it would seem "easy" enough to hold the trains at these points

The distance between crossings wouldn't come into it other than to say that Serpentine Avenue and Sandymount Avenue are covered under one signal and are in effect one crossing; open one and you open two so to speak. You still need to allow to ensure all is in order, stop the trains and then open and close so the times saved would be minimal. It's one of these things, it looks easy until you do it.

One relevant variant here to throw in here is that when one rings 999, you are by no means going to despatch rescue tenders from your nearest fire station. In this case, it could have reasonably be sent from Tara Street subject to availability of crews and tenders or even further afield on the wrong day.

Tarabuses

silverharp wrote: »

I live in sandymount and we have just had some fliers in from the council about an incident that happened, it was a house fire where the firetrucks were held at Sperpentine gates for 5/6 minutes , something like 4 trains passed before the gates went back up. Apparently the controllers couldn't open the gates or stop the trains on short notice. If true I find this bizarre. Can the signals not be changed immediately, or the drivers not be contacted?
the workaround seems to be that Donnybrook fire station will send 2 tenders, 1 to bypass the gates, but that sounds messy to me.

I've never experienced 4 trains passing through a crossing in succession. I thought that there was a requirement for the gates to open after one train passes in each direction?

murphaph

Level crossings in this country cause undue delay compared to elsewhere. The gates just come down too early in many instances (not talking about gates adjacent to stations) and stay down for 3 or 4 trains with long gaps between. I've experienced level crossings abroad and seen them come down mere seconds before the train. People tend to respect these and irish motorists/pedestrians are generally very respectful of our existing tortuous level crossings and one rarely sees people driving 'wrong side' as the gates come down-a not uncommon sight elsewhere so I believe shorter dwell times could be achieved with an acceptably small reduction in safety margins.

corktina

indeed automatic crossings in the UK and elsewhere are "approach controlled" and descend seconds before a train doing 100 mph arrives. There are strict guidelines as to where they can be used and they are very dangerous if misused....I dont think they wiould be suitable in a built up area for instance.These crossings are controlled by the approach of the train alone although they may well be remote CCTV monitored from a considerable distance.I believe given the Irish drivers attitudes to road laws and traffic lights etc, there would be a huge risk of a major train crash if used in most locations here.

(Check out Hixon Rail Disaster on Google)

paulm17781

I was at a big station in Sweden once (name escapes me). I was sitting on the train for a few minutes waiting and noticed a level crossing near by. When the gates went down, the train passed almost instantly and then back up as soon as it was gone. This was absolute minimum disruption and got me wondering why the DART gates can not be like this. Surely there is scope to have these close for a shorter amount of time.

L1011

Because people in Ireland would still try to gun the lights and get through before the gates closed = smashy smashy. Yet another road annoyance caused by the fact that, in general, we're terrible drivers here.

murphaph

MYOB wrote: »

Because people in Ireland would still try to gun the lights and get through before the gates closed = smashy smashy. Yet another road annoyance caused by the fact that, in general, we're terrible drivers here.

We are terrible drivers but people generally don't gun the lights at gated level crossings for some reason. I cross Coolmine gates everyday and have never seen anyone go wrong-side to escape them even knowing as many locals do that they can stay down for an inordinate amount of time some evenings!

I think one of the reasons our level crossings 'must' come down so early is that all our crossings are full barrier, i.e. there is no escape for a vehicle caught between the gates. In situations where the barriers come down just before the train I believe you MUST use half barriers and allow a free escape path for vehicles. I think these half barriers are currently illegal in the RoI.

PRND

Having taken the train from Lansdowne for a number of years, it appears that the gates come down as a Northbound train is pulling into Sandymount. The train has to stop, take on and let off passengers, drive to Lansdowne, stop, pick up and drop off and only then does it pass the level crossing.

I don't understand why DARTs have to have the same procedure as the diesel trains. Could they not put the barriers down once the DART notes into the station and not provide a green or amber signal until the barriers are down?

corktina

As i understnad it these stations are very close so its all about stopping distance I suspect...trains cant stop on a sixpence and there has to be a safety overlap.....Oh and the signalling system cant tell a Dart from a space shuttle...:)

PRND

Well the DART most likely is going to stop at Lansdowne. Even if it doesn't; it goes into the station, stops, open the barrier, the light goes green or amber, train moves off. Doesn't need stopping distance. With an amber between the two stations it won't need much stopping distance.

corktina

but the signalling doesnt know its a dart..it could be doing 80 mph and not stopping....and you need a safety zone ahead of the signal to allow for overruns///and if another crossing is in that safety zone, it needs to be shut.

Railway operation and signalling is totally diffeerent from controlling road traffic.

Prof_V

murphaph wrote: »

I think one of the reasons our level crossings 'must' come down so early is that all our crossings are full barrier, i.e. there is no escape for a vehicle caught between the gates. In situations where the barriers come down just before the train I believe you MUST use half barriers and allow a free escape path for vehicles. I think these half barriers are currently illegal in the RoI.

No, but they're frowned on in urban areas (because pedestrians could easily walk round the gates and there's no protection against traffic backing up onto the crossing) and they appear to be banned above 80 mph line speed. I'm not sure any new ones are being put in any more (new automatic crossings, even in urban areas, all seem to be full barrier nowadays, though I'm sure someone can correct me on this). However, there are a fair number of half barriers around the place (and a few open crossings with lights but no barrier).