FRA staff conduct inspection activities on the Nation’s railroads to promote understanding of and compliance with the federal regulations related to signal and train control systems, highway-rail grade crossing active warning systems, and the hours of service laws applicable to signal employees. The regulations address the design, installation, maintenance, inspection, and testing of these signal systems and the adjustment, repair, or replacement of necessary system components. The regulations also address recordkeeping and reporting requirements. 

FRA staff also work to improve railroad safety by reducing the risk of train accidents and highway-rail grade crossing collisions that may be caused or contributed to by wrong-side failures in these safety-critical signal systems. Those failures are designated as “false proceed signal failures” within a signal or train control system and “activation failures” within highway-rail grade crossing active warning systems. These events are required to be reported to FRA by the railroads and are investigated by FRA staff. 

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