OTTAWA — Twice every school day, Robin Daborn turns on the flashing red lights of his big yellow bus and stops on Highway 306 south of Regina to check for traffic on an invisible set of railway tracks, the National Post reports.
The children on his bus — all 11 of them — are puzzled. Fellow motorists do not understand. Mr. Daborn is sheepish, but he is not imagining tracks: He is simply following the law and obeying the railway-crossing signs that remain on the unbroken stretch of highway due to a bureaucratic quirk.
“You do feel kinda foolish — stopping for tracks that aren’t even there. The kids ask why, and people coming up behind you wonder what the heck you’re doing. I worry sometimes about someone coming up who is not watching. But it’s the law,” Mr. Daborn said from his home in Gray, Sask., yesterday.
In October, the Canadian National Railway gave permission to the Saskatchewan Department of Highways to pave over the tracks across the highway near Estlin, some 22 kilometres south of Regina. CN has discontinued use of the tracks on the branch line as the railway considers options for putting the line back in service, selling it or some day abandoning it. The highways department even painted white and yellow lines on the new asphalt.
The crossing signs must remain up because the railway must be able to satisfy regulators at Transport Canada that no trains will cross the highway any time soon. All bus drivers and some truck drivers must stop at uncontrolled crossings to look for train traffic.
“We are in the process of satisfying the regulators at Estlin. I can’t give you a timeline for when it will be done,” said Jim Feeny, a spokesman for CN.
Most of the other 29 crossings on the rail line are either under asphalt or gravel, highways officials say. Some of the crossings have been covered for a decade.
Mr. Feeny said CN is holding on to the tracks for business reasons. They could be put back in service, despite the covered portions, he said.
In the meantime, Mr. Daborn, 46, has telephoned his insurance company, the provincial highways department and the railway to find out if he should stop or go. The signals are confusing.
Mirle Andrusiak, a highways manager of signs for the region, told Mr. Daborn to ignore the sign and drive. “Realistically, no, he shouldn’t be stopping. In all cases when they pave over it, they [the signs] should be taken down because it doesn’t exist anymore,” Mr. Andrusiak told the Regina Leader-Post on Monday.
Yesterday, a senior highway official said Mr. Andrusiak was mistaken and that all traffic signals should be obeyed.
Mr. Feeny was adamant that Mr. Daborn should stop.
“The signs must be obeyed. A motorist is not going to know if a rail line is in service or not. Trains can operate seven days a week, 24 hours a day. In some parts of rural Saskatchewan a crossing might not see a train for a month, but there may be one there,” he said. “I just don’t think it’s safe for anyone to make assumptions.”
Mr. Daborn scoffs at both suggestions.
“How does a train drive over pavement? And if I keep driving and someone reports me, then what happens? For now I think I’ll just keep stopping. It’s not a big thing, it just seems silly,” he said, adding he hopes the signs come down soon.