Trotts Lane Level Crossing Explained (23/05/2026)

Added: 2026-06-02

[00:00:02]Hello and welcome to South Coast [music] Level Crossings. My name's Brad and I hope you're doing all right. So, [music] this is a video where I'm going to be summarizing some main points from my previous videos [music] at Marchwood and Trotts Lane Level Crossings. And I hope to also address some of those [music] comments that have been left against those videos.

[00:00:23]I also extend a warm welcome to some new viewers on the channel. I didn't [music] expect these recent videos to get so many hits, so I welcome you to this [music] hopefully interesting and explanatory video, if that's a word, >> [music] >> um, regarding some of the issues and operations shown in these Trotts Lane and Marchwood videos.

[00:00:46]Uh, so yeah, I hope you find this video interesting.

[00:00:52]And without further ado, let's get straight into seeing where we are in the world. This is Trotts Lane Level Crossing, >> [music] >> which is a level crossing situated on Trotts Lane. This lane is just to the northwest of Marchwood, which is on the opposite side of the River Test or Southampton Water from Southampton City, >> [music] >> which is a quite large city in Hampshire County in the south of England.

[00:01:20]The line itself, typically called the Fawley branch line, used to serve the oil refinery down in Fawley, which is another small town on the waterside area. Unfortunately, most of this railway line south [music] of Marchwood is now disused, and the only traffic on the line is one or two trains per week serving the Marchwood military port and container terminal.

[00:01:44]There has been a long-standing campaign to reinstate passenger [music] services on this line, but the future operator needs to overcome several major hurdles.

[00:01:54]One of those issues is the fact that everything on this line is very old. It does really [music] need replacing, is falling apart. Even though it is nice to see some historical [music] equipment including the older semaphore type signaling, it does really need replacing.

[00:02:12]Semaphore signaling [music] is where a signal is located in a signal box or cabin and they physically pull on levers on [music] the lever frame to operate points and switches on the track and the signals themselves.

[00:02:28]The signals [music] themselves are a wooden or metal arm mounted on a post or a gantry [music] painted red and when they are in a horizontal position, that indicates the train that it should [music] stop.

[00:02:40]When the signal pulls on its lever, that arm raises [music] or lowers through 45 degrees depending where you are in the country and that shows the train that it is allowed [music] to proceed.

[00:02:53]The second issue with this fully branch line is in fact, especially on this day, everything is broken. Now according to the Network Rail gentleman from Network Rail operating the crossing here, there was recently a about of cable theft. So the usual signal systems were inoperable including this level crossing. That's why the attendant was here today.

[00:03:21]Now because everything is broken, systems are put in place to allow the safe passage of this train and other trains through the line. There's two of these systems shown in this video.

[00:03:33]The first one is the movement of the train itself. The train driver is accompanied by someone called the pilot.

[00:03:39]Nothing to do with airplanes. It's a separate person within the train cab and their role is to escort the driver through the semaphore signals, through crossings and specifically allow them to travel on the single line from Totton down to Marchwood.

[00:03:57]Only a train with the pilot aboard is allowed to travel on that single line.

[00:04:05]The second system in place is what you can see in this video. It's the local control of the Trotts Lane level crossing by the mobile operations manager or MOM for short. [music] A network rail operations manager is a person who basically performs various different tasks on the ground. They can operate signal boxes. They can oversee duties such as tending to steam locos or in this case [music] being an attendant at a level crossing. Now, the attendant was appointed due to the cable theft.

[00:04:36]Otherwise, the crossing would not have worked or have gone wrong. Normally, these automatic half barrier level crossings are operated automatically through the passage of trains which press switches called treadles on the track to activate and deactivate the crossing.

[00:04:56]Now, I've seen some comments regarding the fact that this crossing only has two barriers. Now, this automatic half barrier has two barriers specifically [music] to allow anything that is stuck on the crossing when a train is approaching to leave and run away. If the crossing were to have four barriers, [music] then the person or car or what you call it, whatever is stuck on the crossing >> [music] >> has no chance to be able to leave. However, that does give a gaping [music] hole for people to go around the barriers if they dare chance it. I don't recommend [music] that. However, that still happens on four barrier level crossings as well.

[00:05:35]So, there's no real advantage. You can't rely on human nature for safety.

[00:05:44]Now, let's concentrate on the attendant and Trotts Lane level crossing. So, the attendant has protected the level crossing by putting a red flag on the track on both sides of the level crossing and he is in constant contact with the signal at the signal box in Marchwood. At the very start of the video, you can hear the telephone located at the level crossing starts to ring and this is the signal basically informing the operations manager, informing the attendant that the pilot has boarded the train at Totton and is making his way down towards Marchwood. It's at this point the attendant keeps an eye out for the train looking down the line and of course operating level crossing when he sees that train approaching.

[00:06:58]There's another sign of the age of equipment and it's caught a couple of you out watching the videos previously.

[00:07:04]It's the mechanical bell instead of the electronic yodeler.

[00:07:11]After the barriers are down, he sees the crossing is clear and he removes the red flags which serve as protection. Now, this is a quiet country lane. The likelihood of cars speeding around a corner and causing issues is quite low.

[00:07:25]So, he doesn't have to check too much, but obviously he needs to make sure everything is clear, everything is safe to push forward displaying the green hand signal to the approaching train through the use of a green flag. There's been a lot of comments recently on how he displays this. I don't think this is a particular issue. He is sort of behind but next to an electrical box.

[00:07:50]And I think his intent is perfectly clear holding the flag above his head.

[00:07:55]Remember the driver and pilot are sat quite high in the locomotives heading down the line. The attendant is wearing high visibility clothing so they'll know where to look. And of course, if there was any issue, the driver will slow or stop the train before crossing.

[00:08:15]See how the operation manager raises his arm to acknowledge a train horn sounded not only for the operation manager and attendant himself, but also there's other crossings along the line. There's Jacob's Gutter Lane and various other bits and pieces. So, the train needs to sound its horn for those in accordance to a specific sign called the whistle board.

[00:08:43]And here's the train itself. This is a train made up of four Class 56 locomotives operated by Colas Railfreight. These were built between 1976 and 1984.

[00:08:58]A total of 135 of these locos were built and the two white ones in the middle are being exported to Ghana.

[00:09:23]Now the train has passed and the operations manager, the attendant, re-protects the crossing first before opening the barriers by putting the red flags in the middle of the track on either the of the crossing. And once he's done that, he opens the barrier.

[00:09:40]Everything you see in this video is in accordance to published procedures called the rulebook and also various handbooks and guides, which I am sure the very experienced pilots and attendant here are applying competently.

[00:09:56]>> Um we've got a couple of class 56 >> And one quick stop back to Marchwood station just down the line from Crock's Lane, and you can see another aspect of the pilot. You can't see him specifically, but you can see the effect of him and the operation of the line due to it being so broken. Now, you can see the semaphore signal here at Marchwood, and you can see it's in the horizontal position, which means stop. Now, if I zoom out, and this caught me off guard, that's that's why I tripped over my words in this video, you can see that the train driver is passing that signal with that arm horizontally, with that arm showing stop. And this is because the pilot, up on authorization from the signaler, has told the driver that he can pass this one and head up back to Totton.

[00:10:51]Well, I hope that clears things up. A couple of things, hopefully that's interesting for you regards the operation of the crossing and the line on this video. [music] I hope you enjoyed it. Hopefully it's been a bit more interesting for some of you rather than awaiting the 2 minutes with nothing happening.

[00:11:09]Um >> [music] >> and yeah, just running running around holding flags. And uh yeah, thank you for watching. Thanks for your [music] subscriptions and views. It's been completely uh out of the blue. This I had no idea this would happen. [music] So, hello to all of you, and um I hope you enjoyed this, and uh go away with something a bit more knowledge of what went on in these videos. It's nice to see you, and uh nice to see the regulars here as well. Thanks for watching and I shall see you in the next video.