THE FUTURE OF COMMUNITY DESIGN

NJ Transit: Why Do Pedestrians Keep Getting Hit by Trains?

Seven pedestrians were hit by trains at rail crossings and eight were hit while walking along rail tracks in New Jersey in 2020; five died.

Transit officials are working to understand what’s causing the incidents.

March 19, 2021 • Payton Guion, nj.com

(TNS) — Steven Mangold was walking on a chilly, overcast morning last month near the 11th Avenue rail crossing in Neptune Township. ... Then a NJ Transit train came rolling along. ... Mangold — a 54-year-old father of two from Rockland County, New York, who also kept an address in Ocean Grove according to his obituary — was hit and killed. He is among at least three pedestrians killed already this year by NJ Transit trains, continuing a troubling trend in New Jersey and across the country. All three deaths occurred under murky circumstances.

Seven pedestrians were hit by trains at rail crossings in the state in 2020 and three died, according to data from the Federal Railroad Administration. Only five states had more pedestrians hit last year. Another eight people were hit in New Jersey while walking along the tracks — trespassers in industry parlance. Two of those people died. Officials are at a loss to explain the rising incidents.

It seems easy enough: If a train is coming, don’t walk across the tracks. But the problem is more complicated than that, and it’s growing. Between 2015 and 2019, the number of incidents involving pedestrians hit by trains at crossings in the United States jumped 25 percent to 189, FRA data shows. The number of pedestrians killed in those incidents increased 71 percent. ... Only about 20 percent of the incidents were considered suicides or attempted suicides, according to the FRA.

NJ Transit isn’t the only agency struggling with increased pedestrian casualties at crossings. Rail safety experts and transit agencies across the country have been perplexed as they’ve watched a spike of pedestrians hit and killed at railroad crossings. In fact, pedestrians account for more than one-third of all deaths at railroad crossings in the United States. ... “I think pedestrians at crossings are a big deal,” said Ian Savage, a rail safety expert at Northwestern University. “I think we’ve worked out how to stop cars from getting hit (by trains). We’re at a little bit of a loss at how to deal with pedestrians.”

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