X cross

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I watched this video over a year ago and this one more recently; both concern the idea of removing rail level crossings to improve the passenger rail traffic speed which can also raise the frequency.

So in the last day or so I had the idea of creating a company that does this. With the help of Chat GPT4.0 I got some refinements to my ideas and some answers to questions that troubled me about the idea.

The idea of the company is to have a majority of people on a salary, rather than on a per project, as there are hundreds of level crossings that need to be removed which could take 5+ years. Ideally we would get federal and provincial governments to kick in some of the funding, as well as the rail companies and municipalities.

In terms of staff we would have

• a project manager who would treat each level crossing we remove as a separate project, to oversee each one that it sticks to budget and timeline and coordinates between the various teams and liaises with stakeholders (the federal and provincial governments for funding)
• a geotechnical engineer to conduct soil testing and analysis to assess ground stability during excavation
• a structural engineer that specializes in the design of both temporary and permanent structures and ensures compliance with safety standards and load requirements
• an environmental consultant to assess environmental impacts and ensures compliance with environmental regulations, works with geotechnical engineer to plan for drainage systems
• Safety officer to implement and enforce workplace safety standards and conducts safety audits and safety training sessions for all employees both onsite and at the factory
• traffic management coordinator to develop and implement traffic management plans in coordination with the local municipality
• Community engagement specialist to communicate with local residents and businesses to address concerns and keep them informed, to handle public relations and manage complaints
• Rail operations coordinator to work directly with the rail company consultants to schedule rail closures to ensure minimal disruption
• Heavy machine mechanic to keep all of our heavy machinery in good working order and do all required maintenance
• Procurement specialist to manage the sourcing of supply of materials and equipment for both the factory and for on-site needs
• Survey team - conducts initial and ongoing site surveys to guide excavation, structural placement and alignment
• Crane and heavy equipment team to operate the cranes, hydraulic jacks and any heavy equipment
• QA/QC team to inspect completed work to ensure it meets design specs and regulatory standards
• Electric and Utility team to handle the relocation or adjustment of utilities
• Drainage and Erosion control team to install drainage systems and stabilize surrounding terrain to prevent erosion
• HR and Recruitment - to manage hiring, payroll, benefits and employee relations
• IT specialist to maintain digital infrastructure including design software, project management tools, communication systems and anything else
• Legal advisors to handle contracts, permits, regulatory compliance and advise on liability and risk management, to make contractual offers to rural land owners to close permanently any private level crossings
• Insurance specialist to assess and arrange needed insurance for equipment, workers and liability coverage
• Accountant to work out the accounting and reporting for the company
• Rail Signal Specialists to advise on rail signaling adjustments during and after crossing removal including the removal of the crossing signals
• Design consultants - assist with the adaptation of standard designs to unique site conditions and to provide 3D modeling and simulation as needed
• General Workers - broken up into different teams:
• Excavation team, with excavators, for any ground removal for example, doing an underpass under an elevated ground raised rail bed
• Temporary structure team; to create, put in place and remove any temporary structures, for example, to support the rail bed using a temporary system to then allow for digging and then for permanent structural components to be installed beneath the rail bed
• Construction team to put the new factory built permanent structural components into place
• Road and ground finishing team to pave the new road section and do any ground scaping work once the actual new structure that removed the level cross is complete
• Factory workers who build the standardized and non-standard structural components

Let us say that the very first level crossing we do is a pair of CN tracks that are flat and level with the surroundings. The project manager will have already enlisted funding from the different sources, 33% from the federal government, 33% from the provincial government and 34% from the rail company.

Then visiting the site will be:

• The surveyor team to get all of the required measurements to develop a plan
• the community engagement specialist will engage with the community around the level crossing,
• the designer, structural engineer, environmental assessor, traffic management consultant and the rail consultant will develop the plan for a bridge to go over the train tracks

After formulating a site and project plan for the bridge that will go over the train tracks:

1. The traffic management consultant and the project manager would coordinate with the local municipality to propose the level crossing project and to enlist their help to put in place a traffic management plan for the location, that the city will provide detour signs 
2. The road gets closed
3. The on-site office is placed, this is for the engineer, foremen and so on to have the plans, a desk and computer and anything needed
4. the road and ground team move in to destroy the road that is immediately adject to the train tracks and works with the rail operations coordinator to remove the crossing signals and the pavement that exists between and around the train tracks, this would require a short rail traffic  unavailable window
5. the construction team would install the standardized components that are delivered from the factory to put in the support structures on the North and South sides of the rail tracks and to create the up and down ramps on either side
6. Working with the rail operations coordinator, the crane crew will install the pre-fabbed span pieces that connect the supports that are already in place on the N and S sides, this will require a 4-8 hour window of rail traffic unavailability
7. The road and ground scape crew comes in to pave what is needed, ensure there is work done to manage drainage system and erosion control

The second level crossing removal we have is a pair of CP tracks on a raised ground elevated rail bed that is high enough that very little digging will need to be done beneath the tracks to have an appropriate height to pass beneath it. A slope up towards the crossing exists on both sides.

Once the traffic management consultant has finished developing and implementing the traffic management plan for the project 1 above, this consultant and the project manager can coordinate with the local municipality to propose this level crossing project and to enlist their help to put in place a traffic management plan for the location.

Once the site and project plan is done for project 1, the designer, structural engineer, environmental assessor, traffic management consultant and the rail consultant will develop the plans for the rail overpass that will now have the car and pedestrian traffic pass beneath. Some of these people will travel back and forth between project 1 and 2 as they are needed.

For project 2:

1. The traffic plan developed will get put into place and the road gets closed on both sides of this ground elevated rail bed
2. The excavation team will remove the slope material on both sides leaving and/or shoring up enough to keep the elevated rail beds sufficiently supported
3. The temporary structure team will, with the help of the excavation team, excavate what is needed to put support posts and put in the temporary structure which is made up of four support beams, on the left and right side of both the N and S sides which have a span beam secured to them at the top as close to the rail bed as possible
4. Dig near the rail bed as much as possible that can still maintain rail structural integrity in preparation for the rail traffic down time
5. close rail traffic, raise gently and by a small amount the rails, dig out from beneath them, put supporting cross braces that rest on and are secured to the temporary span beams, lower the rails, inspect and test the rails, open rail traffic
6. Fully excavate under the temporary structure, monitor frequently the temporary support structure to check for settlement or movement
7. once crane team is done with project 1 that team can come to project 2 to help move into place the standardized prefabricated support posts on the left and right side and the new span that goes beneath the rail bed
8. close rail traffic, raise gently and by a small amount the rails, remove the temporary support structure, and then lower the rails, inspect and test the rails, open rail traffic
9. The road finishing and ground scaping team, once finished from project #1 can come to project #2 and pave the new road passing underneath the train tracks

So as each project phase is reached, releasing the consultants and teams, they can move on to the subsequent project. Conceivably the project manager and the traffic management consultant will always be three to five projects ahead so as to have scheduled work available to every team in quick succession. By doing this over and over, each of the teams will gain more experience and find ways to improve efficiency, both to lower the total project time, and more importantly, to lessen the duration that rail traffic is interrupted. As a goal we would want to have a project completion time that is well under what can be reasonably estimated. Another goal would be to have any level crossing removal site idle as little as possible. This might include having certain teams work overtime at specific times; for example, if it is a large excavation compared to normal we might bring in an additional excavator and work much longer shifts.

The factory would be located in an industrial zone to receive cement either already formed in the shapes and sizes we need, or, we fabricate them into our own standardized shapes. Similarly, we would receive steel and either fabricate what we need, or receive what we need and modify it slightly as needed. The factory will also have a distribution organization to ship out to work sites the various components as they are needed.

In some cases the level crossing comes at an angle to the rail tracks, where possible, we would alter the road to now go below or above the rails at a 90 degree angle so as to facilitate the construction and to continue to use standardized structural components.

We would do our best to schedule any rail traffic stop durations to be as short as possible and at times where it would be least impactful to rail traffic, which includes overnight work.

As we move from level crossing to level crossing, wherever there is excavation required, we would contract with local excavation companies to have their dump trucks come and pick up all of the excavated material. The actual excavators themselves we will move from site to site. In special cases the excavated material from a rail over pass can be used to build up the slope to a road overpass over rails at a subsequent cross level removal project site.

And finally, as mentioned earlier in the law section, there are some private level crossings out in rural areas that join a farmer's two parcels of land. We would devote funds to buy out farmers in cases like this to have land exchanges done such that the need for that crossing is eliminated. Similarly, in some cases where two level crossings within a small town exist very near to each other, we would remove one of them altogether since the other will no longer be a crossing, but a bridge or rail overpass that makes crossing always possible.