Surrey Hills level crossing

["Roderick Smith" <rodsmith@werple.net.au>]

Union Rd level crossing, at Surrey Hills (Melbourne, Victoria, Australia),
is the busiest for rail traffic in the Melbourne metropolitan area.  Road
traffic is doubly fouled by the proximity to Canterbury Rd (a busy arterial
road).  Tonight, Tues.4.8, the booms failed at 17.05, and were still down
at 17.25.  This level crossing should have been eliminated when the third
track was put through, by lowering the rails (which would have eliminated
the Mont Albert Rd level crossing as well - two for the price of one). 
Instead, VR prepared plans for a road overpass, which were abandoned after
resident action.
The level crossing has had some fatalities, including one within recent
years when a car wiggled through the booms when they had been down for some
time.  I saw cars wiggling through tonight, and can well understand the
frustration which caused this.  No trains were passing over several minutes
of the failure.
-- 
Regards
Roderick Smith
Rail News Victoria Editor