Railroad crossing

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The Railroad crossing (RRC) feature was added to the Waze app in response to long-standing feature requests from users, railroad safety advocates, and emergency managers. Acting as a permanent hazard, RRCs alert users as they approach the RRC to ensure awareness of hazards such as uneven road surfaces, stopped traffic, and to ensure vehicles do not turn down the railroad tracks instead of nearby parallel road. The Railroad crossing notifications can be disabled by users in the app's alert settings.

RRCs can only be added via the WME. To see RRCs on the WME, enable the ``Railroad crossings`` layer in the layers menu.

When to Add

A RRC should be added to every segment that intersects a functional railroad line at grade AND has a gate, sign, or other control device. Because each RRC works on only one segment, this means that RRCs must also be placed on AGCs that cross the railroad independently of the relevant main road.

Placement

To add a RRC, select Railroad crossing from the Roads dropdown menu in the toolbar at the top of the WME. RRC should be added to the Waze map where the road meets the railroad tracks. This is very similar to the Cameras feature.

Generally

Important: the location of the railroad crossing in the app is set by the RRC icon itself. The red dot is only a handle used for alignment. Therefore, make all functional decisions based on the RRC icon, not on the red dot.

Relative to the road

On one-way segments (including the sides of a divided road), the RRC icon should be placed more or less on top of the segment which actually crosses the railroad. On two-way segments, the RRC icons should be offset slightly from the segment, on top of their respective lanes of traffic. Just make sure that the segment closest to the RRC icon is the one that actually crosses the railroad (important in tight areas—zoom in judiciously!).

Relative to the railroad

The icon should be made to touch the railroad “where the rubber meets the rail”—i.e., when the driver first hits the tracks with their wheels—at a tight zoom level (around 8). This is pretty straightforward at simple perpendicular crossings, but is important to consider when railroads cross roads at oblique angles.

Alignment

Similar to the Cameras feature, use the red handle to rotate the RRC icon to "face" in the direction of car/truck traffic.

Align the road part of the RRC icon with the road segment that intersects the railroad. Again, it is the road part that must be parallel with the road segment.

The railroad tracks part of the RRC icon should be pointed toward the front, relative to the direction of travel. If the RRC icon represents a car driving across the railroad, the railroad tracks represent the front of that car.