Rail crossing gates failure in Sleaford blocks road, forcing engineers to operate them by hand

Network Rail engineers are having to operate a set of crossing gates on a Sleaford street by hand after the mechanism failed earlier this morning, blocking the road to traffic.

Castle Causeway/King Edward Street was blocked at Sleaford West level crossing this morning just after 6.40am due to the crossing gates failure and it was likely to be a problem for most of the day for traffic trying to use the crossing.

A Network Rail spokesperson said: “The signaller at Sleaford West level crossing advised of a fault with the level crossing gates. To protect the safety of road users and those travelling on trains, the signaller closed the gates to vehicles.

“Network Rail engineers are on site and are working to resolve the issue. Network Rail workers are operating the gates manually until the fault is fixed.

“We’d like to apologise to anyone who has experienced disruption.”