Comment by porphyra

North American trains have a huge amount of level crossings, which, predictably, cause tons of accidents when oblivious drivers get hit by trains. Although most of the world considers high speed trains to be incompatible with level crossings, the recently built Brightline in Florida has several level crossings and has already hit many cars. [0][1]

Caltrain routinely has delays due to accidents involving grade crossings. Despite spending decades and hundreds of millions of dollars, they still haven't managed to fully grade separate the line. [2]

Fun fact, Canada's Turbotrain was one of the earliest examples of high speed rail in the world in the 1960s and was even faster than the Shinkansen at the time. However, it hit a truck only one hour into its debut run. This is often cited as the main reason why there's no high speed rail in Canada despite the density and proximity of Toronto and Montreal being ideal for such a line. [3]

[0] https://www.wptv.com/news/region-s-palm-beach-county/delray-...

[1] https://wsvn.com/news/local/broward/brightline-train-hits-ca...

[2] https://www.caltrain.com/projects/ccs

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UAC_TurboTrain