'Trains don't jump tracks to chase motorists'

[Full Service]

(The following commentary, "Trains don't jump tracks to chase motorists," written by R. David Read, appeared Sept. 27, 2006, in the Lafayette, La., Daily Advertiser.)

Back in my younger days, I worked for the railroads and can attest to having witnessed some incredulous acts of stupidity when the public comes in contact with railroad operations.

In about 1955, the SP Railway sent me to work at an interlocking tower in the Fruitvale district of Oakland, Calif. Fruitvale was a tough neighborhood; residents were not exactly paragons of virtue. Fruitvale Avenue crossed, at grade, some 12 railroad tracks, including a double-tracked mainline that carried extensive freight and passenger traffic.

The street was protected by crossing gates, flashing lights and bells; but owing to the frequency of rail traffic, it was all too common for motorists to jog around the gates in a misguided gamble to forfeit their lives in order to avoid having their travel delayed.

One of my duties was to drop the crossing gates as a train approached. Having witnessed all too many near misses, I had taken to throwing the gate activation lever, avert my eyes from the scene and disregard whatever consequences might ensue.

One evening, the sequence of events played out this way: As the gates transversed their arc, a heavy metal rod affixed to the arm was used to stop the downward travel. Hearing the sound of metal grinding on metal, I turned to my vantage point from a second-story window to see what might have transpired. In his haste to beat the gates, a man had driven under the swiftly descending arm and the steel rod had impaled his car, penetrated through the hood, through the air-filter and into the carburetor.

His car had been harpooned.

Leaping from his car, he surveyed his dilemma and commenced shaking his fist in my direction. My actions had probably saved his life, but I wasn't about to risk a confrontation with an irate motorist; I called the railway police.

The officer instructed me to raise the gates. When I proceeded to do as I was told, the gate went up accompanied by the car's hood, air-filter and various carburetor parts. In this case, what could have been a potential tragedy had fortunately evolved into (the auto owner's opinions to the contrary) a merely humorous incident.

[JCagle]

Sometimes I think the world would be better without gates and bells and lights..... let the smartest survive lol.