(The following story by Sharon Leff appeared on the Red Bank Hub website on July 16.)
RED BANK, N.J. — After issuing 67 tickets to pedestrians for illegal crossings at the Red Bank Train Station in 2007, NJ Transit officials are aiming to lower the number of violations and to keep customers safe, spokesman Joe Dee said.
NJ Transit police officers handed out fliers at the Red Bank Train Station and talked with passengers about the importance of careful crossing, following safety improvements made at 33 rail stations at the end of last year.
Officers were present June 26 for about three hours during the peak morning travel time to reinforce safety regulations about crossing the train tracks, Dee said.
A ticket for pedestrians who cross illegally is $54, plus court costs; a ticket for a vehicle that goes around the gates while they are down ranges from $50 to $200.
“[The fliers were] to reinforce the message to pay attention and obey the rules,” Dee said. “And sometimes when an officer’s there, handing you a flier, it’s just a good reminder. And I can tell you, we picked stations where there had been a high number of pedestrian-crossing violations, and [Red Bank] was one of them.”
Dee said some passengers stopped to talk with police about proper behavior regarding trains, and fliers were also left on the seats of the trains, so when riders boarded, they would find the available information.
“The whole idea is to remind people that those gates are operating for their safety,” Dee said.
Officers also spoke to passengers at the Walnut Street station in Montclair, which had a high number of pedestriancrossing violations.
There have been several fatalities at the Red Bank train station, the most recent on Dec. 31, when a 20-year-old Middletown man was struck and killed by a train near the station. A North Jersey Coastline (NJCL) train heading to Long Branch hit and killed Joseph Hardwood at about 11:30 p.m. Dec. 31, just west of the station, according to an NJ Transit spokesman, who added that the engineer of the train observed a person lying on the tracks ahead and immediately applied the emergency brakes and sounded the horn but was unable to stop the train in time.
A similar incident occurred in September 2007, when an unidentified adult male was hit and killed by an NJCL train bound for Penn Station in New York.
Dee said the police presence and the fliers were not in response to an unusual number of injuries or deaths, but rather “where we’ve ticketed people and where they’re taking risks.”
In 2007, NJ Transit completed a Customer Safety Fencing Program that cost about $3 million. The fencing is meant to guide departing commuters as they leave the platform.
“We will track some of this, and definitely our police department will remain vigilant and keep up their enforcement efforts throughout the system,” Dee said.