A man was critically injured Friday morning after he drove around crossing guard arms that were down at the Woodward Avenue railroad crossing and was struck by a Union Pacific train.

Manteca Fire crews responded to the incident at 7:17 a.m.

The driver was trapped in the vehicle

Firefighters removed him and he was transported to a trauma center.

Incidents of motorists driving around crossing arms at any of Manteca’s 14 at-grade crossing are not rare and are illegal.

Fire Chief Dave Marques noted it is not usual for such moves to end badly at Manteca crossings.

“The trains are moving fast,” Marques noted.

Within the next year or so, doing such an illegal maneuver at the Woodward crossing would be almost impossible to do.

That’s because as part of the first phase of the Highway 99/120 Bypass interchange upgrades breaking ground later this year, the Woodward crossing is being upgraded.

The road itself will be realigned to cross the tracks at a 90-degree angle.

It will be widened to two lanes in each directions.

There will be a raised median with two sets of crossing arms on each side of the tracks.

Also, Woodward will intersect with Moffat Boulevard at a 90-degree angle instead of at an acute angle.

There also will be traffic signals.

In short, it will virtually be a carbon copy of the Industrial Park Drive crossing and its intersection with Moffat just to the west.

The 99/120 Bypass project also involves replacing the Austin Road overpass.

The replacement will be four lanes and will span both the Highway 99 freeway and the tracks.

It will effectively give Manteca its first separated railroad crossing while at the same time reducing the number of at-grade crossings.

Twenty years ago, a motorist on Austin Road drove into a train as it was passing through the crossing.

She escaped serious injury and the train cars did not derail.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com