Key considerations for automated enforcement of non-compliance with road rules at railway level crossings: The Laverton case in Victoria, Australia

Abstract

In Australia, most railway level crossings in high-traffic road environments are actively protected. Despite this, crashes at these crossings account for two thirds of the costs of crashes at all level crossings. Such crashes typically arise from non-compliance with road rules. Current protections and interventions have mainly focused on reducing driver errors through increased level crossing awareness. The rail industry is now exploring the use of automated enforcement at level crossings to reduce non-compliance. However, very little research has evaluated the potential benefits of such an approach, or provided a sound scientific evidence-base for its utility within Australia. The aim of this research is to create a scientific evidence-base reflecting the size of the problem at such crossings, and to understand whether the current automated enforcement policies used on the road can be viably adapted for level crossings. A level crossing in a suburb called Laverton close to Melbourne was selected as a study site based on reported congestion issues and high rates of non-compliance to road rules. Monitoring equipment (cameras and radar) was installed for two months to obtain a baseline dataset of non-compliance with a two-day observation study conducted at the site prior to the installation in order to evaluate the reliability of these data. Over 700 separate road user non-compliance events were recorded with the equipment – such as entering the level crossing while flashing lights were activated, and stopping on the level crossing, highlighting that non-compliance at active level crossings can be commonplace. The equipment was found to be effective at detecting some non-compliance events but not very effective at detecting others, such as occurrences of vehciles stopping on the crossing. Further studies need to be conducted to determine whether such technology could modify driver behaviour at such level crossing, and reduce rates of non-compliance.