(05-16-2019, 09:02 AM)robdrimmie Wrote:(05-16-2019, 08:57 AM)KevinT Wrote: Another thing I've noticed are the 'no left / no right / train' signs are way too conservative, particularly the ones out of the Graybar driveways on Hayward. For northbound trains they don't clear until the train has made it quite some distance down Courtland, leaving a driver blocked for 30 seconds or more after the train has passed. I haven't sat around to watch but I'd be surprised if their employees haven't already developed bad habits, and I fear "the boy who cried wolf" effect is going to cause an accident there one day.
Agreed. Yesterday at Water and Charles after a train went by I counted 24 seconds (not with a watch, so not exact) that the `no right / train` sign was lit. It didn't turn off until all the lights at the intersection changed to allow traffic on water to move again.
The signals for the on-street sections are triggered by 'inductive loops' in the pavement, just like left turn lanes are for cars. (That's why the bus parked on the tracks at Charles kept triggering the train cycles at Ontario.) There's a loop on each side to allow trains to reverse run in emergencies, and I suspect it's not until the train has cleared the second loop that the signs go dark. To me that's a design deficiency, as soon as the second loop is triggered the sign could go dark, but there's probably some arcane "what if?" based regulation that governed the way it was done.
I keep hoping the vehicle location system that's used for schedule adherence and automatic train protection will be overlayed into it somehow to make it more precise (and also prevent false trips from cars, bikes, and buses), but the closer we get to launch without a change to the status quo the more I think it's just not going to happen.
Edit to add: We also have to recognize that what appears to be an arcane "what if?" based regulation may have been written in blood. Failure of imagination during the design phase has been responsible for innumerable injuries and deaths.
...K