49 CFR 392.10 requires the driver of a bus transporting passengers to stop at every railroad grade crossing. Which of the following does that regulation itself list as an exception to the stop?

Explanation

A crossing where an officer or a flagman is waving traffic through is one of the regulation's own exceptions. The list at 49 CFR 392.10(b) is short and specific: a streetcar crossing, or track used only for industrial switching, inside a business district; a crossing where a police officer or crossing flagman directs traffic to proceed; a crossing under a working highway traffic signal showing green, where local law lets a vehicle go over without slowing or stopping; an abandoned crossing carrying a sign that says the line is abandoned; and an industrial or spur crossing posted Exempt, where that sign went up by or with the consent of the appropriate State or local authority. Each of those is a case where somebody else with authority has already settled whether a train is coming. The wrong options put something else in that authority's place: the driver's own read of approach speed, which is the lighter duty 49 CFR 392.11 lays on vehicles outside 392.10 and no exemption at all for one inside it; the driver's memory of a route, which tells you nothing about a train running late; and a stop made earlier in the day, which stops meaning anything the moment the bus pulls away. School bus guidance runs in the same direction: where an officer is working the crossing, do as directed, and where none is and the signal looks to be malfunctioning, raise the dispatcher for instructions instead of making the call alone. One forward-looking note, current as of October 2026: FMCSA has put forward a sixth exception, covering a crossing whose active warning device is not in an activated state, but that remains a notice of proposed rulemaking (90 FR 22914, May 30, 2025, Docket FMCSA-2021-0050, RIN 2126-AC39) and has not taken effect. The five above are the law today, and a stop is still owed at a crossing whose lights are dark and whose gates are up.

Source: 49 CFR 392.10(b)