Lakeside Station Pedestrian Crossing 

This is the Lakeside Station pedestrian crossing in Emerald, on the Puffing Billy railway, with footage I took in May 2018, January, October and November 2019, September and October 2022, January, February and August 2023, and April 2024
Lakeside Station has an island platform, and this crossing is the only pathway in and out of the station. Lakeside Station is the main terminus for the Puffing Billy Railway (aside from trains that go through to Gembrook on Fridays, weekends and public holidays), and so deals with a lot of passengers. This crossing was built specifically for this location. It features large white crossing gates, similar in design to interlocking gates, that move horizontally to shut the pathway to the station. It can be activated manually by a key at the signal on the platform or automatically by trains travelling through. It also features retractable belts on each side that can be extended by volunteers to close the gap from the footpath to the train line. This is to stop passengers from traversing onto the rails, which is a common occurrence
This crossing also has:
- A Westinghouse teardrop bell on the eastern side and a General Signals E-Bell on the western side. The teardrop bell is programmed to sound out after the gates have closed, while the e-bell is programmed to sound continuously until the gates open
- McKenzie & Holland bases on the signal poles for the bells
- Two red rotating beacon lights, one on each signal pole. These lights switch on when the crossing activates and switch off after the gates have closed. These were installed by January 2019
I filmed both before, during, and after the ban on legs dangling out the sides of Puffing Billy was implemented in 2018 following a collision at one of the crossings, and then subsequently removed in 2021, so you'll see some occasions where passengers have their legs out, and other occasions where they don't. One bit of consistency you WILL see, however, is the waving passengers. It is customary at Puffing Billy that you wave to the passengers on the train as it travels past. It's a good little bit of fun and brightens up everyone's day!
And apologies if the footage from 2018 seems to be of less quality and of a lower frame rate. My camera produces two types of videos files, the lower quality MP4 and the higher quality MTS. I used to always use the MP4 files for my videos, because the file size was heaps smaller, and if I made videos using the MTS files the high quality was lost when I rendered them for uploading. I've only recently figured out a way to render videos with MTS files that KEEPS the quality, which is why my most recent videos are of better quality. I didn't know this years ago though, so I unfortunately deleted a lot of the higher quality MTS video files because they took up so much room, not thinking that I'd need them. I have since adopted the practice of using the MTS files from now on for my videos, though there are some old bits of footage where I can only use lower quality MP4 files, as the MTS files have been deleted. Better than nothing I guess?