Risks
Conflicting routes must be controlled by interlocked signals to prevent collisions.
Level junctions, particularly those of fine angles or near right angles, create derailment risks and impose speed restrictions. The former can occur as the flanges of the wheels are momentarily unsupported and unguided and can slip through the gaps in the rails, and the latter because the assembly contains elements that can break or vibrate loose.
Level junctions are considered a maintenance issue by railroad companies as the inherent gaps tend to be hard on locomotive and rolling stock wheelsets. Switched diamonds partially solve these problems, but introduce new ones.
Read more about this topic: Level Junction
Famous quotes containing the word risks:
“The question is whether personal freedom is worth the terrible effort, the never-lifted burden and risks of self-reliance.”
—Rose Wilder Lane (1886–1968)
“In America any boy may become President, and I suppose it’s just one of the risks he takes!”
—Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965)
“If the children and youth of a nation are afforded opportunity to develop their capacities to the fullest, if they are given the knowledge to understand the world and the wisdom to change it, then the prospects for the future are bright. In contrast, a society which neglects its children, however well it may function in other respects, risks eventual disorganization and demise.”
—Urie Bronfenbrenner (b. 1917)