Rail Crossing Danger

* Re “Rail Crossings on Private Land Debated,” Nov. 9.

This article states that “of the 23 Ventura County rail collisions involving vehicles or pedestrians between 1994 and 1998, only one was on a private road.” There have been three that I can recall off the top of my head since 1996. One was just west of Moorpark at a private crossing where the northbound Coast Starlight hit a truck that caught fire and scorched the locomotive. The other one was a private crossing at the east end of the passenger station that gives access to the farm on the south side of the track. A freight train hit a pickup truck with a man and woman inside. The women died of her injuries at the hospital.

Private crossings are very dangerous if you don’t stop, look and listen for the trains. There are 17 passenger trains a day during the week between Moorpark and Los Angeles. That doesn’t include the freight trains.

SCOTT L. McKEOWN

Moorpark