I have recently acquired an exact scale Crossing Gate Signal and need to know the clearances or measurements for placement on my railroad at the crossing. I am trying to be exactly prototypical in my installation. I realize that the crossing gate should be no closer than 12’ minimum to the center of the closest rail. I also know that the painted white stop bar on the road is located 8’ from the crossing gate. My question is this: On a two-lane road with a painted center strip how far away do you place the signal from the edge of the road? or What is minimum distance between the road and the column of the gate at the question mark on the attached picture? Thank you for your help. Mr X
Good question. From a quick look around it appears the minimum is 6' in CT, 7' in other instances, but I would say the actual position may be dictated by the distance from the mechanism to roadway centreline, the angle of the gates to roadway and the available lengths of booms. Have a look at the following site, though it does relate to light rail systems it should stand for heavy rail usage as well. http://mutcd.fhwa.dot.gov/HTM/2003/part10/part10-toc.htm - plenty of interesting reading there.
Thank you Gary. That site was a great help. I wanted to share with other people which diagrams/figures that I found to be the most beneficial. I would probably suggest looking at fig. 10c-05, 10d-03, and 8d-01. So consensus is minimum of 7' from the center of the post to the road side edge. Or if there is a side walk present (which there is not in this case) it is 2' from left edge of the left flashing light. Thanks again, Mr X
Also; The top height of the concrete foundations are to be level with the top of the rail. All signal foundations & attendant appliance foundations are level with the top of the rail. Or, this was the controlled standard yrs ago on the BN for new construction. Personally this is trivial but it sounds like you are wanting to be exact.
That is some good advice as well. I think raising the base and getting them a concrete color would be very beneficial. I hope the pictures attach but I tired to show what the final placement looks like. The dimensions are 7' from the roadway and the closest part of the gate no closer than 12' from the track center. I believe that it will be fairly easy to raise the gates by the four inches for the concrete base (although I have not done that yet.) The "road crew" in charge of construction has not painted the strips on the road yet nor all white lines and R R crossing markings yet. They better get busy! Mr X
when i get out to the truck, ill get in my standards book and tell ya what is our BNSF standard.....i should know this by heart with as many i have put in but in has escaped me....level with the top of the rail is right and from what i remember there is no "exact" standard.....its just an established minimum of i think 10' from the edge of rail and ?' from center of road all depending on the road and gate size.....
From here, your placement of the gates looks fine. What is missing is some yellow paint to mark the centerline "do not pass" zone. You may want to put in a bunch of orange cones if the highway crews aren't finished with the top coat of blacktop.
Mr. X; When you find a good concrete paint color please let me know. I have to do everything on line and concrete tends to be whitish. I don't trust a "concrete" color I can't see in my hand. FWIW: I would pay very close attention to the controlled standards that drasko gives you. Lawyers check everything! Even little plastic ones. You don't want some little plastic distant relative of the little plastic family that got hit at that xing to end up owning your pike (all that hard work for nothing). Plus, just think of the guilt you would have to live with (even if it's imaginary).
signalz I have found an excellent concrete color that I have used in the past. It is called: Aged Concrete by Polly Scale Model Railroad Colors - the only number on it is F414320 (I believe this the model number) It really does look like "aged" concrete. (Not really your typical driveway color but more aged) I think this is the part number from Walthers www.walthers.com is 270-414320. I have also used it on the bases of a fuel, water, and sanding column and it really looks good. The pictures of the platform below truely does not do the color justice. (Some how the pictures look kind of yellow to me) It is extremly cloudy and cold today and I normally open the garage door to provide a little bit more actual sun light in to take layout pictures. These pictures were taken from about 5 inches away with a hand held work light as the light source. The passenger platform is a Faller model and is called "Roofed Platform" 272-2120 hopefully you can compare the colors if you can find a model a picture of this model. P.S. the train schedule on the platform is the actual train schedule from the Erie Lackawanna Railroad. It was shrunk using Word and I got it down to I believe 2 point font and printed with a color printer. Any way I know you probably can not read it at all except with a magnifying glass, but just knowing it is the actual passenger schedule makes me satisfied. Hope this helps! Mr X
Mr. X, set your camera's white balance (I'm assuming you are using a digital camera) to Tungsten when using that hand held work light as your light source. It'll give you a closer representation of the actual color.
Well I think that setting for the camera really worked. Here are some updated pictures of the concrete color that I think are a bit more accurate in there representation of the "true" color. Hope this helps with the paint color. Mr X
I think youv'e got it. That's what i'm going to use on some Kato bridge piers. They come battleship grey.
Progress Report Well it is still a work in progress, but I wanted to share some updated photos of the crossing. The road crew strike is finally over and they got most of the lines painted on the road. Although they took a break for lunch before they got the work completely finished. http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/500/Train_Crossing_028.jpg http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/500/Train_Crossing_027.jpg http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/500/Train_Crossing_021.jpg You can check out more photos of the crossing and some lighting work that I have been doing at my rail images. It is close to being 'prototypical,' but not quite since I do not have enough length for my road.
I found that another really good concrete color is Badger Modelflex acrylic 16-11 Concrete Gray - it's a little more on the tan side.
