Broughshane student ‘on the level’ crossing aware

Launched with CAFRE at the Greenmount Campus, the new scheme is targeting key rail safety messages at first year Further Education Agriculture and Land Based Technology students who may not have travelled by train or worked near railway tracks before.

Keith Pollock, Level Crossing Risk Coordinator, Translink said: “This exciting new partnership with CAFRE helps us to communicate our safety messages to young people who are just starting out in their careers in agriculture.

“We presented a mixture of facts and figures, images and footage of near misses at level crossings in Northern Ireland and GB and then asked the 16-18 year old students a series of multiple choice questions based on the lecture. We also asked them to describe a safe system of work for herding dairy cows over a user worked level crossing to test what they had learned.”

Adam Hamilton from Broughshane took home second prize - all winners received a special trophy made from recycled railway track materials and a cash prize.

Each year Translink NI Railways promotes the safe use of private crossings by attending agricultural show, visiting landowners, carrying out training for crossing users and devising safety initiatives for young farmers, such as this Level Crossing Awareness Scheme.

Course Manager, Dr. Kate Semple said, “Including the level crossing awareness presentation as part of the course induction reinforces the message to our new students that safety should be at the forefront of their mind in all activities they undertake. This is a new development with Translink and the lecture and quiz were really well received by our young people yesterday, with some of the footage of level crossings they showed sending shockwaves around the room!”

Copies of Translink safety booklet, “The safe use of user worked crossings’ are available from Translink by calling the number above and can also be downloaded at http://www.translink.co.uk/privatecrossings