A series of tragic accidents at railway crossings in Poland has sparked a heated public debate about safety levels and the behavior of road users at these critical locations. Increasingly, the view is emerging that one of the most effective solutions may be the deployment of railway crossing monitoring systems designed to encourage drivers to exercise greater caution when crossing the tracks.
In September alone, nine collisions were recorded at railway level crossings, resulting in two fatalities, damage to rolling stock and railway infrastructure, and multi-hour disruptions on several routes. Direct losses incurred by PKP PLK exceeded PLN 3.5 million, while the total economic impact was likely significantly higher once operators’ losses, delays, replacement transport, and traffic reorganization are taken into account.
Measures implemented to date, including higher fines introduced in 2022, have not resulted in a clear reduction in the number of incidents. In practice, what matters most is not the severity of the penalty, but the certainty that it will be enforced – a point increasingly highlighted by both industry experts and the media.
NeuroCar is one of only two companies whose solutions successfully passed CANARD testing as part of a public procurement procedure for systems designed to automatically detect vehicles entering railway level crossings against a red signal. NeuroCar systems have been in operation for many years and are integrated with GITD’s Central Automated Road Traffic Enforcement System.
The latest solution, the “Track Incident Detection” system, combines the following functions:
