REDVERS — A train accident that killed a Redvers man near the village of Bellegarde has raised concerns about visibility at railway crossings on the Arcola branch line, the Regina Leader-Post reports.
Barry Blezy, 40, of Redvers was killed in a single-vehicle collision with a train at an uncontrolled railway crossing on Thursday evening. Other area residents had near misses with the same train that night at other uncontrolled crossings.
Lucille Perreaux, who resides south of Redvers, put her car in the ditch to avoid hitting the train at an uncontrolled crossing on the east side of Redvers.
“We were on our way home … and all of a sudden I saw a big black thing, and I said to my husband Andy, ‘Oh my God it’s the train!’ It was snowing really hard and you couldn’t see very well at all. I jammed the brakes on, which I shouldn’t have because I started sliding. Then I went down into the ditch so I wouldn’t hit the train.”
Perreaux said the train was headed west at a slow speed.
“I think every train crossing in Canada should have signal lights. Or the train cars should be very well marked with special reflectors,” she said.
Dwight and Shelley Blerot, who live near Storthoaks, had a similar experience that night.
“The train cars just blended in to the dark background,” she said.
Blerot would like to see signal lights placed at the crossing.
“Highway 8 is a busy highway right there. We shouldn’t have to wait until someone gets killed to put lights in,” she said. “Is that what it takes?”
“My husband had noticed the lights further down the track from the train engine. That was the only way you could tell that the train was there until you got right up to it. If I would have been driving I would have hit it,” Blerot said.
Meanwhile, Carlyle RCMP are investigating the cause of the accident.
Len Cocolicchio, public affairs spokesman for Canadian Pacific, said CP will look into the situation.
When asked about signal lights and crossing arms, Cocolicchio said that CP is not responsible for putting controls at rail crossings.
“That is a decision that the government makes. It is not a decision that we (CP) make,” he says. “It is the federal government transport department and the provincial and municipal governments that decides. They investigate and they determine whether a controlled crossing is something that should be installed. They determine the extent of the control.”