A queue, a gradient and a half-barrier crossing
You are on a secondary road near Kiskunfélegyháza at 11:00, driving a car towing a 1,300 kg trailer loaded with a small sailing dinghy; the combination is about 11 m long. Ahead, the road crosses a single-track railway at a level crossing protected by half-barriers and flashing red lights. The crossing sits on a slight hump, and the road climbs steeply for 60 m after the rails. Beyond the crossing a queue of five cars stands bumper to bumper, the last one only just clearing the rails. You are 40 m from the crossing at 50 km/h; the barrier is up and the lights are dark, but a timetable posted on the post says a passenger train is due. Your trailer has a 1.2 m drawbar and overrun brakes, and the dinghy sits high on the trailer, catching the wind.
1. Do you drive on across the crossing? Justify your decision.
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No. You stop before the crossing and wait. The queue beyond the rails plus a 60 m climb is exactly the trap level crossings are built around: the last car may move away just as you commit, then stop again, and your 11 m combination halts with the trailer sitting on the rails and the car on the hump. You cannot see the train coming from a low driver's seat with a dinghy behind you.
The test to apply before every crossing: can I see clear road beyond the rails for at least the full length of my combination plus a margin - say 20 m of empty space? If not, wait. A timetable showing a train is due is a reason to be more careful, not less.
When you go: commit properly. Select a low gear before the rails, cross at a steady 15–20 km/h without stopping, and keep enough momentum to climb the gradient on the far side. Do not crawl, do not change gear on the rails, and do not follow the car in front closely - leave a gap so that if it stops, you are still clear of the track. A trailer combination occupies a crossing for far longer than a solo car.
2. Your engine dies with the car on the rails and the trailer behind it, and the red lights begin to flash. Give your actions in order.
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1. People first. Everybody out, immediately, on the side away from the second track, and move off at an angle - 45 degrees, away from the line the train will take and away from flying debris. Do not stand between the rails or on the far track. Nobody goes back for bags.
2. Move the vehicle. Try to restart: clutch down, first gear, and if it catches, drive off without hesitation. If it will not fire, use the starter motor in first gear to crank the vehicle off the rails - a starter will move a light combination a metre or two. Otherwise shout for the drivers behind to push; with the handbrake off and the trailer's own brake released, six people can shift it.
3. Warn the train. Call 112, use the railway emergency telephone if there is one, and send someone up the line towards the approaching train waving something red or any bright cloth, far enough back that the driver can stop.
4. The trailer's overrun brake may have engaged on the hump - release the trailer's handbrake and check before anyone tries to push. The rule against reversing at a crossing is not a reason to leave a vehicle standing on the rails: getting it off takes priority over everything except the people.
3. Once you are clear and the train has passed, what must you check before continuing, and where should you stop to do it?
Read the worked answer
Where: not on the crossing and not immediately after it on the narrow climb. Drive on until you can pull wholly off the carriageway with good visibility in both directions, hazard lights on.
What to check - the jolt and the stalled engine are both reasons for a full walk-round:
- The coupling: the head still locked on the ball, the breakaway cable still attached and undamaged.
- The overrun brake and its linkage - a sudden stop on a hump can leave it partly applied, and a dragging trailer brake will overheat a wheel within a few kilometres.
- The jockey wheel and the drawbar for bends.
- All trailer lights, especially the indicators and brake lights, since the electrics may have been strained.
- The dinghy's lashing: a high, wind-catching load will have shifted, and a load that has moved aft has just lightened your nose weight.
- Tyres and wheel bolts for damage from the rails.
Only then continue - and at a speed that suits a combination you have just proved is not quite as sound as it was an hour ago.