Cite as: 529 U. S. 344 (2000)
Syllabus
the sole question here is whether they "are applicable" to all warning 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 establish a standard of adequacy that determines the type of warning device to be installed when federal funds participate in the crossing improvement project. Once the FHWA has approved and funded the improvement and the devices are installed and operating, the regulation displaces state and private decisionmaking authority with a federal-law requirement. Importantly, this is precisely the interpretation 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 several (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 circumstances. If they are applicable, §§ 646.214(b)(3) and (4) establish a federal standard for adequacy that displaces state tort law addressing the same subject. Whether the State should have originally installed different or additional devices, or whether conditions at the crossing have since changed such that different devices would be appropriate, is immaterial. Nothing prevents a State from revisiting the adequacy of devices installed using federal funds, or from installing more protective devices at such crossings with their own funds or additional FHWA funding, but the State cannot hold the railroad responsible for the adequacy 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.
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