Fined for crossing railway crossing too early

[Teflon Turbo]

when the coppers are in blitz mode and they media back them up and the court of puplic opinion swells, you break that kind of law and you are gone for all money.

i just don't mess with that kind of intensity.

[Sourbastard]

Some of the arguments here are pointless.

If it has moving parts, it can fail.
If it has electronics, it can fail.
If it has a human involved, it can fail.
How often it fails is a quality control issue from the manufacturer, a quality assurance issue from the engineer who installs and maintains it, a procedural issue from those who control it.

When there is the possibility of a human override in the case of a system, that introduces human failure as well. If the system is turned off or left off accidentally, thats a system failure from a procedural perspective. The end result is still no less tragic regardless if it is a wetware failure or a hardware/software failure.

No man made system is indefinitely failure proof and any engineer will tell you so.

And yes, I have seen a train roll through a set of dormant unlit lights here in the Barossa SA. It didnt matter to me where the fault lay, it was clearly a system failure.

Does anyone remember the topic?

[Joshvee]

this is just a guess but I think what JG66ME means when he/she says it's fail safe, is that if something goes wrong, the boom gates close. If the gates dont work, they close. If the lights fail or stop flashing, they close. if the bell circuit fails, they close. If the circuit and sensor down the track that detects the approach of a train fails or blows, the gates receive no feedback from them and so they close. If the circuit on the gate that detects all these other circuits fails or receives no feedback from them, the gates close. If the gate motor itself fails the gates fall down and close because thats the way it's engineered. Power holds the gates up.They dont just stay up. So if the power fails, the gates close.
So its safe. There will never be a time when a train comes and the gates stay open.

I think thats what JG66ME means by fail safe.

[auMatt]

They are fail safe to a certain extent, but you have vandals also at work etc etc. The system is designed to go into a safe position if things are not operating as it seems, but I have investigated many incidents where a level crossing has failed to operate for a train.

There can be many reasons for it as mentioned mechanical failure etc.

Point is still, it is unlawful, you do it and get caught, pay the consequences. No different to speeding.