Sad news on the westbound 353 Wolverine today (11-23-14) in Wayne, MI

According to the Detroit Free Press, a child was struck and killed by the westbound Amtrak train that departed Pontiac at 10:35 AM Eastern with a scheduled arrival in Chicago at 3:58 PM Central Time. The train had departed the Dearborn stop on time at 11:43 AM, but only arrived in Ann Arbor at 4:39 PM. Apparently the incident occurred in Wayne (between Dearborn & Ann Arbor).

http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/wayne/2014/11/23/train-accident-wayne/19449845/

This is the 2nd time in literally 3 days. Thursday evening a pedestrian committed suicide in Canton, MI. A Detroit-bound train was heavily delayed Thursday night.

http://www.mlive.com/news/detroit/index.ssf/2014/11/man_killed_after_stepping_in_f.html

And of course in Kalamazoo, MI earlier in the week we had this tragic incident:

http://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2014/11/it_was_a_mistake_drivers_famil.html

http://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2014/11/fatal_train-car_crash_victims.html

I hope that these types of incidents are brought under control before this becomes a full-fledged high-speed line. Does Amtrak plan to eliminate grade crossings along the route???

Condolences to the crew that will now always have this incident on the back of their mind while they are at work.

No, all grade crossings will not be eliminated by the current work. (Which, by the way, is more of an MDOT project rather than an Amtrak project.) And I think this line would be better termed an upgraded higher-speed line, not unlike NYP-ALB-SDY, PHL-HAR, CHI-STL, and perhaps a few others, rather than a full-fledged high-speed line, as its max speed will be 110mph, and only on portions of the route.

Also, it's not necessarily clear that this incident in Wayne occurred at a grade crossing. Trespassing (cut across the tracks at an unauthorized location) occurs on the NEC as well.

RIP....

According to the article, the incident occurred at Venoy in Wayne. If accurate:

https://goo.gl/maps/dhi5h

Here's a video by a rider going opposite direction on 350 awhile ago, starting at time reference 2:54, showing the Venoy crossing:

http://youtu.be/9x1hCVSEMlg?t=2m54s

I noted the speed of the train and the pedestrians on the sidewalk as the train crosses Venoy.