Study Details

Study Title: Evaluation of Effectiveness of Stop-Sign Treatment at Highway-Railroad Grade Crossings

Authors: Millegan et al.

Publication Date:JAN, 2009

Abstract: The safety benefit of stop-sign treatment employed at passive highway-rail crossings has been a subject of research for many years. The objective of this study is to assess the effectiveness of the stop-sign treatment on crossing safety. Using the Federal Railroad Administration database, the research focused a 26 years of vehicle-train accident history in the United States from 1980 through 2005. A before-and-after and cross-sectional statistical analysis was conducted for 7,394 public highway-railroad grade crossings that were upgraded from crossbuck-only to stop signs without involvement in other TCDs or automatic countermeasures. The study found that accident rates based on annual accident frequency per 1000 crossing were significantly higher during the period when crossings were controlled by crossbucks-only than when they were controlled by stop signs. Further, this study developed Negative Binomial accident prediction models respectively for paved and unpaved highway-rail grade-crossings that include effect for stop-sign treatment. Based on specific attributes of the current crossbuck-only-controlled crossings, decision markers and traffic engineers can use the models to examine the accident risks at crossings and assess the potential effectiveness of stop-sign treatment. indicating that safety on higher volume roads may be negatively affected by truck lane restrictions.

Study Citation: Millegan, H., X. Yan, S.Richards, and L. Han, "Evaluation of Effectiveness of Stop-Sign Treatment at Highway-Railroad Grade Crossings." TRB 88th Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers CD-ROM. Washington, D.C., (2009).


CMFs Associated With This Study

Category: Intersection traffic control

Countermeasure: Install stop sign at highway-rail crossing

CMF CRF(%)QualityCrash TypeCrash SeverityRoadway TypeArea Type
0.6832text textNot specifiedAllNot SpecifiedNot specified
CMF EquationCRF Equation4 StarsNot specifiedAllNot SpecifiedNot specified
CMF EquationCRF Equation4 StarsNot specifiedAllNot SpecifiedNot specified