The Federal Railway Administration, FRA, has revealed that there has been a sharp increase in railway crossing accidents in the country over the past year so it’s leaning on tech companies for some help in order to bring down the number of accidents. Google is going to partner with the FRA to provide locations of every public and private highway railroad crossing in the country through Google Maps so that drivers navigating through it are made aware of such crossings ahead of time.
The FRA has revealed that so far in 2015 more than 270 people have been killed in railroad accidents, that’s 48 more than 2014, and it believes that the cause is inattention by the drivers caused by smartphone use.
In the New York Times report the FRA also points out that there are many cases where drivers just don’t have the situational awareness or because it might be too dark and they might not be familiar with the route, all of these possibilities can increase the chances of accidents.
If drivers use Google Maps to navigate to their locations in the future they will be warned before of a railroad crossing up ahead so that they can be prepared to go through it safely.
Federal Railway Administration has its own app that pinpoints locations while it’s also looking to partner up with Apple, Garmin, TomTom and MapQuest for this very same purpose.
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