Call to rip out the dangerous rail crossings

A rail engineer who helped design halfbarrier level crossings said today they should be ripped out and replaced with full gates.

He was speaking in the wake of the Ufton Nervet level-crossing tragedy this month in which seven people died.

There are thousands of similar crossings throughout the UK. Drivers frequently flout the rules and "zig-zag" between the barrier arms to beat the train.

Simon Hall, who helped compile the level-crossing standards 23 years ago, says half-barriers must now be replaced because of the huge increase in train speeds.

But he added that it was virtually always the case that road vehicles were at fault. He writes in Rail magazine: "I suggest that the circumstances of all automatic half-barrier crossings on lines where the crossing speed is over 75mph should be examined.

"Where the crossing is regularly used by passenger trains travelling faster than that, consideration should be given to their replacement with full barrier crossings of the CCTV type or locally monitored.

"The railway industry owes a moral duty to its train drivers and should reduce their exposure to death and injury, and worry, at automatic halfbarrier crossings." At Ufton Nervet in Berkshire, train driver Stanley Martin, 54, was among the six on board who died when a car was struck at 100mph by the First Great Western Paddington to Plymouth service.

British Transpor t Police believe car driver Brian Drysdale, 48, who was parked on the crossing, intended suicide, although investigations are continuing.

No blame is attached to Mr Martin, nor was there any failure of railway equipment.

The Health and Safety Executive states that last year there were 24 incidents at level crossings, an increase of eight on the previous 12 months and the highest since 1998.