Texas Tops The List For Auto-Train Collisions

Tuesday morning, the Austin Police Department conducted an unusual sting — one designed to catch drivers who disregard traffic signals at rail road crossings.

Sadly, Texas is at the top of the list for train wrecks, and the problem is increasing in Austin as the commuter trains move into downtown.  Last year there were 16 vehicle/train collisions and 10 pedestrian/train collisions. 

In the undercover sting, Police Chief Art Acevedo noted that two of the bigger problems were drivers trying to beat trains and pedestrians walking on tracks (often with music playing on headphones and blocking out sounds).

While many train collisions are caused by faulty motorists or pedestrians, a number of train wrecks are caused by the railroad companies.  These can be caused by improper maintenance, improper railroad equipment, unsafe railroard conditions, bad decisions by engineers, and more.  I can speak to this personally as my dad was once hit by a train when the crossing arms and signals weren’t working.  Thankfully, he was not seriously hurt in the incident.

You can watch a story from Fox 7 about the APD sting below.

APD Conducts Train Sting : MyFoxAUSTIN.com