[MovedGoalPosts]

We do not know yet why the car was stationary on the crossing. But it seems there is a reliable witness, an off duty police officer, who accordgin to ITV news at least, was trying to use the level crossing phone to warn signal staff there was a problem. However there was never going to be enough time. Rail signals are effectively automated as far as automated corssings go. Once the barrier is down the light goes green, and the train continues.

The oddity of this particular collision is that the train derailed. That appears very unusual looking at statisitics. It appears road vehicle versus train on corossigs is happens many times a year, but only the vehicle occupants die as trains usually stay on the tracks. As the ITV report I saw said, yet again this is a road accident that has involved trains.

Ultimately the only way that we are to prevent level crossing incidents is to remove them. But is the country prepared to accept and fund the cost of doing so? We would have to remove each and every crossing as to say one part of the network is a higher risk than others would be impossible, as the vehicle being stuck could happen anywhere any time. In most cases as there is no alternate viable route so building bridges or underpasses would be necesary, but especially in built up areas the space to do so may not be physically available. I don't think there is an easy answer.

Yes we wish for safe railways, but the "surprise" and newsworthy nature of the rail accident is a bit odd to me. The railways, per head of person carried per mile, per casualty beats death and injury statistics on the roads. Yet we have an outcry on rail travel accidents, because of the "novelty" of it (and perhaps that serious accidents cause mass causualty), but largely take for granted road incidents.