Rail Crossings in Decatur: Can They Be Safer?

Though Decatur is only four square miles, it has three grade crossings on the CSX railroad line that splits the town.

The crossing at North McDonough Street has been the site of two auto-train collisions in 15 months. Luckily, nobody was killed in either wreck.

• (in Marta's words) on the tracks. The driver and four passengers escaped before impact. Marta said the driver, Donna McMullen, 61, evacuated the four passengers before impact.

• On the afternoon of Feb. 17, 2012, a train rammed a Lexus that stopped on the track. One child was hurt, but the nature of his injuries was not known. The 76-year-old driver and a juvenile passenger were not hurt.

It doesn't sound like the train employees were at fault in either incident, but the collisions raise the question: Can these train crossings be made safer?

Dozens or hundreds of cars and pedestrians cross daily at these crossings. Traffic is especially heavy at the North McDonough crossing because of three nearby schools: Decatur High, Renfroe Middle and Agnes Scott College.

Patch asked Decatur City Manager if the city government had ever considered new safety measures. She replied by email,

The City Commission considered enacting a “Quiet Zone” along the CSX railroad tracks which would have required safety-related upgrades to the intersections so that the trains would not have to sound the horn.  However there was significant community opposition to implementation of the “Quiet Zone” so it was not pursued.  Regardless, those upgrades would not have been able to prevent today’s accident because the bus basically malfunctioned while on the tracks.

The City has received transportation enhancement grants to re-design and construct improvements to both the McDonough/College/Howard intersection and the Candler/College/Howard intersection.  The improvements have been designed and we are going through the approval process with CSX and GADOT to move forward but that is very slow so it will likely be several years before we can begin construction. 

What do you think? Can something be done to make the train crossings safer. Answer in the comments box below.