Say No to At-Grade Light Rail

At-Grade surface rail is dangerous and kills people

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CTrain traffic stalled after truck strikes train, 2 other vehicles, crashes into building

Police said a pickup truck was driving eastbound on 36 Avenue S.E. at about 11:30 a.m. at the same time a CTrain was crossing.

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TTC to install gate after car found in streetcar tunnel again - 680 NEWS

For the second time in the span of a week, a vehicle was driven into the Queens Quay streetcar tunnel early Saturday morning.

Every time someone advocates for “cheaper” light rail or street cars instead of subways, show them how frequently people drive their cars into streetcar and light rail right-of-ways.

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Car collides with light rail train in South Seattle

SEATTLE - A driver is hospitalized after a crash involving a Sound Transit light rail train in South Seattle Friday night.It happened around 6:00 p.m. on Martin Luther King Jr. Way S. near S. Myrtle Street.Aerial video from Air 4 showed a mangled car on th

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Driver dies when car crashes into Portland light-rail train

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - Aug 7 2017 Authorities say one person was killed when a car crashed into a MAX train in east Portland.

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Amid Flurry of Light Rail Accidents with Cars, Metro to Reconsider Shared Lanes

Houstonians who drive downtown frequently are all too familiar with the awkward dance with Metro rail trains that happens every so often, like the kind you do with mall walkers to avoid colliding with them: You need to get into the right lane to turn right, but there's a Metro...

The Houston light rail system is the most dangerous light rail system in North America.

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Light rail hits vehicle in Five Points

June 30, 2017 Fire crews are working to extricate a person from a vehicle that was involved in a collision with a light rail train Friday morning near Park Avenue and Welton Street.

That is the remains of a Toyota Prius BTW.

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Light-Rail Service Resumes in San Jose

Jun 23rd, Light-rail service between the Karina and Bonaventura stations in North San Jose was briefly disrupted Friday after an incident involving a pedestrian in the crosswalk, according to Santa Clara Valley...

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12 suffer minor injuries after car collides with light rail train, police say

Jun 23rd, It's not clear what caused the crash.

Mayhaps the fact that it’s not grade separated.

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Apparently Surrey’s LRT pushers, haven’t learned from Edmonton’s poor LRT design about not crossing roads in two directions, and decided to cross three.

The correct solution here would be to grade separate the 101 and 102 Ave crossings to avoid creating a bottle neck where people will be stuck in traffic perpetually

[nolightrail]

Gregory Ashford Lewis was hit by a Union Pacific freight train and Amtrak train on Tuesday night, officials said.

It takes a lot of bad luck to be hit by two trains.

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Woman hit and killed by CTrain at Whitehorn LRT Station was using cellphone: Calgary police

May 16, 2017 7:35 am Calgary police say a woman in her 60s who was hit and killed by a CTrain at the Whitehorn LRT Station on Tuesday was on her cellphone at the time. For the second time in three months, a distracted pedestrian has been struck and killed at the Whitehorn LRT Station. Tony Tighe has the warnings and safety improvements being considered.

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Jersey City fire truck struck light rail train: preliminary investigation

May 5, 2017 A Jersey City fire truck appears to have crashed into the Hudson Bergen Light Rail train in the collision in which four firefighters were injured yesterday.

Keep in mind that a firetruck is a lot heavier than a car. In this case the Firetruck was likely destroyed (the captain had to be extracted, which suggests the cab was crushed) , and the train was derailed.

The eighth photo in the roll shows how much damage was done to the train

Usually if a light rail vehicle hits a car, the car is crushed and usually by being run into poles holding the catenary wires. From the damage seen from the photos, it looks like the firetruck cab took the brunt of the damage.

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Man fatally struck by light rail train in Jersey City, NJ Transit says

April 21, 2017, Light rail traffic is currently suspended between Danforth Avenue and Liberty State Park.

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Light rail train crashes with car near Cougar Village 2 - The Daily Cougar

April 17, 2017, On Monday afternoon, a Houston METRORail train collided with a silver SUV on Wheeler avenue outside CV2. The train was heading south on the purple line toward MacGregor Park.

Reminder that Houston still has one of the most dangerous light rail systems in North America.

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April 17, 2017 , A woman was hit by a slow moving light-rail train Monday morning while she walked across the tracks in Sodo at the South Holgate Street crossing. She appeared to ignore the red lights and gates, while attempting to walk east, according to Sound Transit spokesman Geoff Patrick, who said he happened to be nearby, when the collision occurred shortly before 9 a.m.

[nolightrail]

Some light rail stops to see more security

Mar 09, 2017 Light riders can expect to see beefed up security at some light rail stations in the Valley.

I don’t usually mention non-rail-vehicle incidents/issues because they tend to not be reflective of light rail systems on the whole, and also apply to all forms of transit.

However in this case I want to draw attention to the fact that there were 149 arrests during the three months that they increased security.

Light rail systems do not typically have fare gates, and one of the reasons for pushing for light rail is “being cheap to build at-grade stops”, not stations. So this comes with the consequence of requiring more transit security than an otherwise grade-separated system with fare gates.

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San Jose: Pedestrian hit by light-rail train off Bascom

SAN JOSE — March 10, 2017 A light-rail train hit a man near South Bascom Avenue and Stokes Street on Friday morning, officials said. The collision was reported about 10:45 a.m. after a pedestrian was report…