Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 420.0

529US2

Unit: $U45

[09-26-01 10:03:40] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 344 (2000)

345

Syllabus

the sole question here is whether they “are applicable” to all warn-
ing devices actually installed with federal funds. Easterwood answers
this question as well, because it held that the requirements in (b)(3)
and (4) are mandatory for all such devices.
Id., at 666. They estab-
lish a standard of adequacy that determines the type of warning device
to be installed when federal funds participate in the crossing im-
provement project. Once the FHWA has approved and funded the
improvement and the devices are installed and operating, the regu-
lation displaces state and private decisionmaking authority with a
federal-law requirement.
Importantly, this is precisely the interpre-
tation of §§ 646.214(b)(3) and (4) that the FHWA endorsed in Easter-
wood. The Government’s position here—that (b)(3) and (4) only apply
where the warning devices have been selected based on diagnostic
studies and particularized analyses of a crossing’s conditions—is not
entitled to deference, because it contradicts the regulation’s plain text
as well as the FHWA’s own previous construction that the Court
adopted as authoritative in Easterwood. Respondent’s argument that
pre-emption does not apply here because this crossing presented sev-
eral (b)(3) factors, and because the TDOT did not install pavement
markings required by the FHWA’s Manual on Uniform Trafﬁc Control
Devices, misconceives how pre-emption operates under these circum-
stances.
If they are applicable, §§ 646.214(b)(3) and (4) establish a fed-
eral standard for adequacy that displaces state tort law addressing the
same subject. Whether the State should have originally installed dif-
ferent or additional devices, or whether conditions at the crossing have
since changed such that different devices would be appropriate, is im-
material. Nothing prevents a State from revisiting the adequacy of
devices installed using federal funds, or from installing more protec-
tive devices at such crossings with their own funds or additional FHWA
funding, but the State cannot hold the railroad responsible for the ade-
quacy of those devices. Pp. 352–359.

173 F. 3d 386, reversed and remanded.

O’Connor, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehnquist,
C. J., and Scalia, Kennedy, Souter, Thomas, and Breyer, JJ., joined.
Breyer, J., ﬁled a concurring opinion, post, p. 359. Ginsburg, J., ﬁled a
dissenting opinion, in which Stevens, J., joined, post, p. 360.

Carter G. Phillips argued the cause for petitioner. With
him on the briefs were G. Paul Moates, Stephen B. Kinnaird,
Everett B. Gibson, and Wiley G. Mitchell, Jr.