Bridget Doyle, TribLocal reporter
A grant from the Illinois Commerce Commission is helping Hinsdale Police strictly enforce railroad safety for the village in September.
Hinsdale has five grade crossings for the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railway line, and Deputy Police Chief Mark Wodka said its busiest crossing at Garfield Avenue has an average daily traffic count of about 15,000 vehicles.
“The grant allows us to hire back officers dedicated solely to enforce rail crossing violations without having to respond to service calls,” Wodka said. “Hinsdale sees anywhere between 140 and 160 trains a day — these officers will be enforcing both vehicular and pedestrian violations.”
Wodka said fines for disobeying the train signal start at $250, but increases to $500 for repeat offenders.
“Trains run on tracks, tracks that don’t move,” Wodka said. “When you obey rail signals, the train won’t hit you.”
Although the tracks have flashing lights, bells and mechanical arms that lower as a train approaches, Hinsdale has seen accidents in the past. The last fatal collision with a vehicle was in June 2005 at the Stough Street crossing. Before that, a fatal pedestrian collision took place in November 2003 at the same crossing.
The $7,489 ICC grant was awarded in March and must be spent by Dec. 31 of this year. The goals of the ICC’s Public Education and Enforcement Research Study program are to promote railroad safety through education and enforcement and reduce the number of train-vehicle collisions.
Without the grant money to pay for extra on-duty officers, Wodka said Hinsdale Police cannot spend as much time as they’d like monitoring the busy tracks.
Hinsdale Police issued 67 rail signal violation tickets in 2009, 22 in 2008 and 52 in 2007.
Wodka urges Hinsdale residents to obey the warning bells and lights — as they mean stop, not run.
bdoyle@tribune.com
@JBirch – As you can see, the people of HInsdale don’t like it when someone points out the blindingly obvious.
While there are some VERY dumb Hinsdale residents, a lot more are just . . . self-absorbed. They drive their SUVs around with a half-caf mocha latte in one hand and their cell phone in the other hand, oblivious to all around them.
There is a lot of wealth in Hinsdale. Some of those wealthy ones even earned the money themselves.
People – The trains were there long before you, and that’s the only reason Hinsdale EXISTS. How long does it take to figure this out? The RR’s didn’t force you to live there, so quit whining.
Why spend money on this? Set up a red-light camera and send the ticket.
Also, if a pedestrian gets struck trying to beat the train, too bad. Darwinism at its best!
@JBirch…seems as though you know everything about Hinsdale! You’re so smart! Obviously smarter than anyone that lives here. Also, what does wealth have to do with anything fool? Our PD is very necessary…usually arresting people not from Hinsdale for shoplifting and DUI. If we could only keep the riff raff out, it would be great.
Here is what I learned from this story:
1. The police department in HInsdale is largely unnecessary if this is the kind of thing they have as a priority.
2. The people in Hinsdale are not as wealthy as we were lead to believe.
3. Hinsdale residents are dumb as a rock and don’t know that: Trains run on tracks, tracks that dont move, Wodka said. When you obey rail signals, the train wont hit you. DUH