(The following story by Noah Bierman and Martin Finucane appeared on the Boston Globe website on December 23.)
BOSTON — A video of a car taking a glancing blow yesterday from an Abington commuter train dramatized a new MBTA crackdown on drivers who ignore rail crossings.
Jean Dera, 45, of Randolph narrowly escaped injury, police said. The front of his car was torn off by the train at the North Avenue crossing yesterday at 8:14 a.m. A woman who answered the phone at Dera’s residence said he did not want to comment.
“He backed up a few feet, but didn’t back up far enough,” said Sergeant Preston Horton of the MBTA police.
Dera received a $200 ticket. His car bumper and front panels were ripped off.
“He was extremely lucky,” Horton said.
A similar event three weeks ago at the same crossing sparked the T to start a pilot program this month to monitor rail crossings in communities south of Boston several times per week, with the help of local police. Since Dec. 9, 40 drivers have been cited, including several bus drivers and fuel truck drivers, who are required by law to stop at crossings even if the gates are not down.
Rather than stop, the drivers would slow down and do a “Hollywood roll,” or an incomplete stop, he said.
Fuel truck and bus drivers can be fined up to $500, and other drivers up to $200.
Many motorists received warnings, Horton said.
The crackdown is scheduled to run through Dec. 31, with officers in reflective vests at several crossings in Abington, Braintree, and Weymouth.
“People just need to stop. We have lights flashing, we have gates . . . engineers have to [sound] horns,” Horton said. “It’s not something to be playing with.”