A MAJOR inquiry into the causes of the Selby train crash, which killed ten people, was condemned last night for failing to recognise the condition of railway bridges.

Experts urged the rail industry to implement a series of safety measures to prevent a similar accident, but the recommendations of their ten-month investigation do not include calls for improvements to the potentially lethal condition of many bridges over railway lines.

The report says a detection system capable of spotting vehicles which have strayed on to railway lines should be considered.

It also calls for road signs to be erected near bridges, giving an exact location and details of how to contact Railtrack in case of emergencies.

Builder Gary Hart, who was convicted last month on ten counts of causing death by dangerous driving, was unable to tell a 999 operator his whereabouts after his Land Rover plunged down an embankment and on to the East Coast main line, near Great Heck, North Yorkshire, on February 28.

A 117mph GNER express hit the vehicle before derailing and crashing head-on into a freight train laden with 1,600 tonnes of coal.

The independent inquiry carried out by Railway Safety, a non-profit organisation aiming to improve railway safety, was criticised last night.

Structural engineer Professor John Knapton, of Newcastle University, said: "Without actually controlling vehicles and preventing them getting on to the lines in the first place, you cannot guarantee safety.

"It's all very well having emergency contact details, but if a train is only a couple of hundred yards away it is going to hit a vehicle anyway.

"But if they come up with something radical it becomes a political issue and would cost millions of pounds, so they try to avoid that."

Prof Knapton helped launch The Northern Echo's investigation into the state of railway bridges throughout the North-East and North Yorkshire.

Following Hart's conviction at Leeds Crown Court, the Echo revealed that almost nothing had been done to improve crumbling roadside barriers on bridges across the region in the ten months since the Selby disaster.

The report concluded there was "no obvious highway-related contributory factors leading to the vehicle leaving the carriageway."

The four-man inquiry panel included experts in rolling stock, track and structures, railway operations and road safety.

Hart, 37, of Strubby, Lincolnshire, is due to be sentenced next week