Railroad-highway crossing deck component

Claim 1

For use in a highway railroad crossing including a pair of spaced rails, a plurality of rail-supporting ties, and a plurality of tie plates spiked to the ties and securing the rails thereto, each rail comprising a horizontal base, an intermediate vertical web, and a rail head; a deck component comprising: (a) a flat pad of molded, comminuted rubber, the pad being dimensioned to lie adjacent a rail with its undersurface supported on and bearing against the ties and its upper surface lying at an elevation, substantially parallel to tread surface of the rail head, to provide a smooth, traffic-crossing surface, (b) one lateral edge surface being contoured and dimensioned to form a foot and bear against substantially the entire web of each rail, (c) the undersurface perpendicular to said lateral edge surface and immediately adjacent thereto, said foot being contoured and dimensioned to provide an elongated surface adapted to bear against each adjacent rail base, (d) the undersurface parallel to and immediately adjacent each foot being recessed to provide a channel dimensioned and contoured to form a channel ceiling adapted to bear against the tie plate-spike assembly associated with the rail, thereby stabilizing the deck, (e) the upper surface perpendicular to and immediately adjacent said lateral edge surface being recessed to provide a channel dimensioned and contoured to receive the rail head, and when positioned between the rails to receive also wheel flanges, and (f) securing means for attaching the pad to the ties.