Railway crossings worry Thunder Bay bus drivers

With so many rail crossings over busy Thunder Bay streets, thehead of the bus drivers' union in Thunder Bay saidsafety is always a concern.

As a veteran driver for Thunder Bay Transit, SheilaKivistosaidshe was horrified by Wednesday's accident involving a transit bus and a train in Ottawa. The accident highlights whyshe always takes extra care when approaching railwaytracks.

I am very careful around rail crossings especially because they are on main arteries here in Thunder Bay, she said.

[Look] at Memorial and Fort William Road ... I certainly don't take that lightly. Another area is in Westfort, in and around where they do a lot of shunting."

In Ontario, school buses are required to stop at all rail crossings regardless of whether they have automatic warning devices.

That's not the case for transit buses.Kivisto said she's not sure why, but perhaps it should be re-evaluated.

Kivisto added it's important to find out exactly what happened in Wednesdays bus crash in Ottawa.

When approaching railways crossings, Kivisto said many Thunder Bay Transit drivers are aware that there could possibly be a train coming.My worst fear is that those lights aren't working, so I'm looking to see that there isn't a train coming."