Eggcorn Forum

It has just recently been borne upon me that in the State of New York and in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (and perhaps in other entities in their vicinities?) the long barrier thingie that is often placed along the sides of a highway, especially where it curves or has a steep drop-off, is only incorrectly referred to as a guard-rail, but must be called a guide-rail instead. The reason, according to comments on several sites consulted on the matter, is that lawyers convinced a jury that the Dept of Transportation was at fault in an accident since what they advertized as guarding motorists from harm did not do so. E.g. (from https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=14700.0 ):

Re: Guardrail vs Guiderail ¶ « Reply #5 on: February 07, 2015, 03:19:56 PM » I had a law class in high school (in Pennsylvania) where the teacher was very quick to correct anyone who said “guardrail”, saying that, for legal reasons, it doesn’t definitively guard against a vehicle running off the road but instead attempts to guide it back on course.

Guide Rail is a term that was created because of the accident lawyers suing the state, claiming that “Guard Rails” didn’t guard vehicles from crashing through them. This claim was made again a few years ago by a lawyer working for the father of a kid who got tanked well over the limit, then crashed through numerous signs and rails and drowned in the Union Canal. ¶ The rails were never designed to prevent all vehicles from crashing through them, but rather to re-direct errant vehicles back on to the travelled way. Despite the sad feelings of a family losing a loved one, they were never intended to guard drunk drivers from meeting tragic ends to their lives. ¶ Yet lawyers still try to make that claimt, so the word “Guard” was replaced with “Guide” in all of the legal documents. A few of the design geek-types that Val referred to will always use that term to sound official, but everyone else uses the word guard in ordinary speech.

Only time is lacking for the lawyers to come after the PDOT or NYDOT when the barrier in question fails to guide an errant behicle back onto the road. What will they call the thing then? Or perhaps (vain hope?) common sense will prevail and a barrier that “attempts to guide” may also be recognized as only “attempting” to guard as well.
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The two sound enough alike that they would make good eggcorns for each other if they came about in a less-contrived fashion.
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There are things more properly (to my mind) called guide rails (e.g. concrete or steel barriers that actually steer certain commuter trains at airports and elsewhere), or guard rails (e.g. around a high-up vista point that people could easily fall off of.