Comment by AdrianCX

1 day ago

The train driver's job is to say: "it's red, I'm no moving, not my problem, you make it green if you want me to go"

That's why it's a union job

Also he's the first person to die on accident so it's that and the safety of everyone else

They do not 'need' to follow others, they just need to refuse unless all safe and green.

If they never start to drive it's the companies problem to deal with angry non-dead customers

That is not how the procedures work, so the driver would be fired as soon as they did that.

Every train network has situations where drivers are authorised to proceed against a red signal. Not usually at full speed though.

  • They wouldn't get fired. They are protected both in the US and Spain.

    At most face unlikely discipline.

    Here they would even have valid reason to refuse - order was given for full speed, regulation says low speed ready to stop.

    So a "No, i'm not doing that, you're moron" would be justified.

    • No, he would get fired, because that's not his job. It would be like the machine engineer on a race track refusing to fix the ignition, because somewhere on the track he doesn't see, the asphalt might be broken.

      13 replies →

> The train driver's job is to say: "it's red, I'm no moving, not my problem, you make it green if you want me to go"

A written movement authority is a signal as well in railway terms. It's more like "I don't trust your second traffic light, that you placed next to the normal one, because the normal one is broken".