[brazzy]

Oh fuck, apparently the bicycle malfunctioned and couldn't brake. If only the rider had had the presence of mind to just steer sideways as hard as posible and take a roll instead...

Edit: I'm not trying to but any blame on her. It's easy to think in hindsight of what could have been done, another thing entirely to do it in seconds while panicking.

[davedx]

Yeah of course, completely natural.

My point is that even with all these insights into how human perception works, I agree with the strategy that it's best to bypass railways completely by going under/over them. And if it's doable in a densely populated country like the Netherlands then it's doable anywhere. (Some of the underpasses that have been built in recent years have required significant changes to the whole surrounding layout of the town, like one they completed in Bilthoven near Utrecht. Yet it was done.)

[mschuster91]

> And if it's doable in a densely populated country like the Netherlands then it's doable anywhere.

There's three different "doables" at play here:

- technically doable: can you actually convert the level crossing to an underpass or a bridge? For example, it's hard to do an under/overpass when there is a river 10m away, or when everything bar the road/rail and a bit of space is filled with buildings.

- financially doable: is there actually enough budget in the city/responsible authority's coffers?

- politically doable: will the population support the necessary construction works and the limitations that come with it? Like, will there be heavy protests of people that rely on either the rail or the road to get to work and would require massive amounts of time to bypass?

It is rare that there is a combination of all three being true, with the exception of course being tragic disasters with people and especially children dying as such events usually eliminate the political and financial blockers.

[brazzy]

Yes, of course underpasses are the categorically better solution - if you can get the budget, which is often a hard problem. At least they have the positive side effect of speeding up road traffic significantly on busy crossings.