Stop Signs

Yep, very common on low-speed industrial trackage crossing a busier street. There's a few of these less than a mile from my house where a track runs past downtown to the harbour to service a large grain elevator and in doing so runs through a city park, crosses a fairly main street twice, and a few side streets and parking lot driveways alongside it. Where the track crosses the main road, there are stop signs and the train will come to a stop and verify traffic is stopped before crossing the busy road.

The stop signs can be a little rectangle with the word STOP as in your example; the ones near me are big red octagons like the STOP signs everyone is familiar with, except they're aligned to the train tracks instead of the road and have no lettering on them - just a red-painted octagon.

also at diamonds

There are also situations

There are also situations where trains using industrial track need to wait for crossing protection (bells,lights,gates) to be established before entering the crossing. I recall one railroad in KC I worked for had such a crossing where we had to stop and wait 20 seconds before entering the crossing...still sounding the bell and whistle. There are other times when coming off industrial track where the max. speed is 10 MPH or less that trains need to approach public crossings with no protection, other than crossbucks to be prepared to stop short of traffic until the crossing is occupied. At all times proper bell and whistle signals must be used regardless of "quiet crossings" if required.

I also recall places where a plain, old red, country stop sign was used to protect the crossing of two main line railroads in Wisconsin. As a train approached the crossing/diamond the engineer would see a sign which read "Railroad crossing one mile" meaning to stop in one mile. After stopping, if visiability allowed, and no other train was seen approaching from either direction the engineer could whistle off and proceed across the opposing route. 

It was easier to railroad years ago.

Barry 

Another stop sign

This is on the UP McPhersion Branch in 1978 at the Santa Fe crossing in McPherson, KS. Something I need to add to my McPherson Santa Fe layout. I swear, every time I look at these 40 year old pictures, I find a new detail I want to add.

I've seen several stop signs,

I've seen several stop signs, as well as a stop light: 

https://www.google.com/maps/@39.6412738,-105.0063785,3a,75y,203.89h,99.16t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s9mwi5u__LLy_2kjTUdowOQ!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

Another era, another procedure

In the early '80s, I worked at a plant that had a small road and a low-traffic siding (once per month).  Procedure to cross the road was to discharge a flagman with flare and stop traffic before proceeding to the siding.  

With the ever-prevalent reduction of crews to the present levels, that probably became the Stop you're discussing.

On the Turntable

On the Turntable - Pt 2

In reference to my layout photo above. By the mid 50's SP had STOP signs posted at the ends of the turntable for the #2 roundhouse in Roseville. They were visible to the crews both in going on and coming off of the turntable.

It doesn't take a lot of imagination to understand why they were placed..

Espee over Donner

Another Stop Signal

On Rt 42 in Mason Ohio at the intersection of Tylersville Rd, the Indiana and Ohio has a local spur than runs on the diagonal thru the intersection. The railroad has red/green signals  on small poles at each end of the entrance to this intersection. When the trains come, they stop and open a signal box to throw a switch which changes the traffic stop lights of the intersection to all red ( big 4 way stop). The train proceeds thru and the crew throws the switch on the other side restoring traffic flow..

As a result of this arrangement, there is a sign posted for the benefit of the school buses that says "Exempt Crossing" meaning they doen't have to stop and do their door thing each time they cross. This would be another little detail for someones' railroad.

Espee over Donner

Stop signs and traffic lights

Already Modeled

The Great Western crosses the UP in Kelim, Colorado. It's a low traffic area. maybe 1 UP and 2 GW trains per day. The crossing is "protected" by stop signs. The Class 1 UP crews pay better attention to procedures than the low budge short line GW crews.

The signs are modeled after the actual signs. The model GW crews will usually stop then continue (if I'm watching).

The Great Western crosses US-34 in about the same area. Gates or flashers are kind of pricey so the GW (or perhaps CO DOT) installed traffic lights instead. The lights are usually green for busy US-34 and the GW crews must stop, flag the crossing and change the light from red to green before crossing and set them back after clearing,

The model traffic lights are controlled by a 3-way slide switch and the operating crew must stop, change the lights, cross then change them back.  Usually only if I'm watching.

New Railroad??

There's a Bungrliton RR? Never heard of that one.

Marshall

Bungrliton

Never send your cars to the paint ship on a Monday!

I did that as a tongue-in-cheek thing to see if anyone pays attention. I had a string of four covered hoppers I painted and "mis-decaled" in 1990 and no one noticed the one Bungrliton until I pointed it out. Very disappointed, 

Good catch, trolleydriver!

S.P. in L. A. produce market.

I only went on a service call in the middle of the night years before the U.P merged with S.P.  The Los Angeles produce market is switched in the middle of the night.  I was on a service callout about midnight in South Central L.A. on Alameda Street while the S.P. was switching out some boxcars at the produce market.  The crew put out flares across Alameda St. to block traffic while switching.  I don't know how the U.P. does it today, but if they use radio controlled locomotives to switch the market, they operator probably has to put out flares to stop traffic before bringing the train across the street.  Alameda St. is 6 lanes wide at that point, but fortunately since it is in Southcentral L.A. there is very little traffic at midnight.

Fusees can be a conductor's

Fusees can be a conductor's best friend at night and in inclement weather.

I always would put a couple lited, ones, in the middle of the street to alert motorists to stop and if only crossbuck protected, then one each at the base to illuminate them also. It was always humorous when females were driving as they thought the fusees were dynamite and would slam on the brakes to avoid hitting them. This often resulted in a lot of screeching of tires and sliding during the winter. Most men just drove on or over them showing their lack of intelligence sometimes resulting in smoking or blown out tires. If a trainman was brave enough to stand in or to the side of the street/road you had to be ready to jump out of the way as most motorists couldn't, clearly, see the train coming/judge its distance and thought they could beat it to crossing. 

One night, many  years ago on the Illinois Central, I was flagging a country highway crossing and we were shoving a bunch of mty flatcars which just happened to be lower than the trackside weeds. When we started the movement there was no traffic and looking toward the crossing all you could see was the engine headlight shoving the flats ... but not the cars. Along comes a car speeding toward the crossing and I tried unsucessfully, to warn him with a fusee until he drove onto the crossing and the lead flat's coupler eliminated his passenger side rear door. Some folks never learn.

Oh, the fun of flagging crossings.

Barry