Canadian Railroads > One out of Four

That’s the number of Montreal drivers that actually respect the driving rule that you don’t enter a level crossing if you are not able to get completely across it.

I was at the de Courcelle crossing in the St-Henri part of Montreal this morning when CN 149 (the Montreal-Chicago intermodal train) passed by. This is now a very long train, and it takes quite a few minutes to pass (people waiting near me were remarking on how long it was taking for this train go by).

Now this part of Montreal is a construction and traffic nightmare, as the nearby multi-level Turcot highway interchange is in the midst of a multi-year reconstruction. The main adjacent local street underpass is closed, forcing much of the north-south street traffic onto de Courcelle. Last year, the de Courcelle level crossing was rebuilt with single channeled lanes in each direction. To add context, the east-west streets one block away on either side of the CN crossing are major city streets, with somewhat preferential timing for their traffic lights. There is also a lot of construction at the corner one block north of the CN crossing.

All this to say that when CN 149 comes through at 9:30 on a weekday morning and blocks the de Courcelle crossing for over 10 minutes, the traffic backs up jamming the streets all around.

Well, this morning, 149 had cleared the crossing for no more than one or two minutes (and I think fewer than 10-15 cars and trucks had managed to clear the crossing because of the congestion and traffic lights) when CN 120, the equally-long Toronto-Halifax intermodal came through in the other direction.

Once 120 went by, that's when I started to notice how many people will drive into a level crossing when there is no possibility for them to get across it. Fortunately, no more trains came by during this period, which took multiple traffic light cycles to clear.

The pictures show the two trains.

Ray



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/23/16 04:00 by Ray_Murphy.

---

---

---

The St-Remi underpass is closed?!

Michael

Mberry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The St-Remi underpass is closed?!

Maybe in one direction only. There were "local circulation only" barriers at St Remi and Notre Dame last time I checked, and busses going north on de Courcelle this morning. As I said, there's a lot of construction in that area now, with concrete lane barriers all over the place.

Ray

Ray_Murphy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Mberry Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > The St-Remi underpass is closed?!
>
> Maybe in one direction only. There were "local
> circulation only" barriers at St Remi and Notre
> Dame last time I checked, and busses going north
> on de Courcelle this morning. As I said, there's a
> lot of construction in that area now, with
> concrete lane barriers all over the place.

Checked it this morning - completely closed.

Ray