Posts about Safety Regulation

While this standard argument is compelling, there has been little engagement with the counterargument to federal oversight of urban transit. Consider the following concerns.

Urban rail is very safe: Subways and light rail are already very safe, safer by far than other modes of transportation that are regulated by the DOT including air travel. One wonders then if improving on an already very low fatality rate should be a priority for federal dollars given the other more dangerous modes regulated by the DOT.

The TOC can be improved easily without federal intervention: The criticism leveled against the TOC is not directed at their competence, but at their lack of enforcement powers and funding. So, instead of building a new federal agency, why not give the TOC enforcement powers and increased funding?

TOC audit was actually better than the FTA audit of Metro: While it received little press attention, the TOC audit released earlier this month was more detailed and actionable than either the NTSB or FTA audits concerning the systemic safety hazards at Metro.

Federal urban rail regulation may be unconstitutional: Federal regulation of urban transit systems may ultimately be overturned by the courts. The Commerce Clause of the Constitution limits federal regulation to interstate commerce, and most urban transit systems don't cross state lines like Metro does.

NTSB previously opposed FTA oversight of urban rail: Every urban transit system is very different, despite appearances to the contrary. Unlike other transit modes regulated by DOT which share a common network, urban transit systems develop independently according to unique needs and constraints. The NTSB argued in the 90s that this was reason enough to support the regional system of safety oversight in place today.

For these reasons, I would strongly oppose FTA regulation of Metro and other urban transit agencies if not for one prominent benefit that would result from FTA regulation:

FTA can balance NTSB: While the NTSB serves a valuable role in transportation safety, they are an exclusively reactive organization by statute. Unfortunately, the political pressure to implement any and all NTSB recommendations is overwhelming. This undermines attempts to create a proactive safety organization.

The USDOT, which requires transportation providers to take a more proactive approach to safety, balances the NTSB in the transport modes that it regulates. This balance will never be provided by the TOC or other regional safety oversight bodies.

I am honestly on the fence on this critical issue. While the answer to this issue seems obvious to many, I suspect that the damning of all things Metro since the Red Line Crash is undermining the healthy debate that this issue deserves.

The Obama administration supports a bill that would give the FTA this power, but Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) has put a hold on the bill in the Senate for many of the reasons listed here, as well as the lack of offsetting spending cuts or taxes in the legislation.

What do you think? Should the FTA regulate urban transit agencies?

Similarly, Metro decided not to explore having 4 doors per side on each car. Many other systems have 4 doors on cars of this length. New York even has 4 doors on many 60-foot cars, compared to Metro's 75-foot cars. More doors mean the car can load and unload faster, reducing dwell times and keeping trains moving. That increases capacity as well, because the faster each train gets in and out of the busiest stations, the sooner another train can come in and the more trains Metro can run overall.

Why has Metro chosen to forego this opportunity? They say it's because of safety. According to Debo Ogunrinde in a presentation made to the Riders' Advisory Council, the engineers believe there's some safety benefit to transverse seating. Having seats in front of and behind some riders could keep them from sliding into other riders or flying toward the end of the railcar in the event of a crash.

The argument is similar for doors. Fewer doors mean stronger car walls. Of course, the wall strength wasn't the problem in the June 2009 Red Line crash, where the cars telescoped, but there could be crashes where it matters.

That's probably right. But is it worth sacrificing capacity? Consider that overcrowded platforms and escalators present their own safety hazards. And overcrowding is a certainty, while train crashes are hopefully avoidable.

And the more crowded Metro gets, the more people will drive. If they do, they're much less safe. After the crash, BeyondDC calculated that driving Metro is 34 times safer per passenger mile than driving. Is the benefit of transverse seating 34 times greater than longitudinal?

Unfortunately, Metro's engineers don't have (or haven't been willing to share) any sort of quantifiable assessment of the safety value of transverse seating. It's just "some." But we can't tell if it's more of a safety benefit than the safety benefit of less crowded platforms and escalators. And we don't know if it's more of a safety benefit than the benefit of moving a few more people by rail instead of by car.

Mr. Ogunrinde said that Metro felt if there were anything it could do, no matter what, to improve safety, then they would be remiss in skipping it. But is that really true? Why haven't they designed the cars with seatbelts? What about four-point harnesses like on military jets? Airbags? Padded walls? If fewer doors is stronger, why are there still windows on the cars? Why don't the cars have foam peanuts filling their space, which riders can worm their way through? Maybe Metro should run every train at 10 mph?

When the FTA first announced its desire to regulate trainsit safety, I worried that this shortsighted tradeoff is exactly what would happen. Regulators whose sole responsibility is to prevent deaths or injuries in crashes would push transit systems to make changes that reduce the risk of crashes but increase other risks, like crowding and driving. That's what happened when the Federal Railroad Administraton over-regulated commuter and intercity railroads to make cars heavier and therefore slower, harming the overall value of rail passenger service.

FTA Administrator Peter Rogoff has assured everyone this is not what the FTA would do. He said,

We must remember that, despite WMATA's safety challenges, every Washington area commuter is safer traveling on WMATA than they are traveling on our highways. Thus, we cannot allow any degradation in WMATA's reliability and performance such that commuters opt to abandon Metro in favor of our already congested highways. We must also caution against any proposals that will reduce significantly WMATA's existing capacity, forcing more commuters onto our highways. Any actions or proposals pushing WMATA riders onto our highways simply will degrade safety and worsen congestion in the region.

Hopefully he's right and the FTA will avoid following the FRA's path. But Metro is going ahead and doing the same thing all by themselves. I can understand the viewpoint of the railcar designers as well. If someone is hurt in a crash, people might ask why the railcars weren't designed differently. But if people are hurt in stations, the questions won't revolve around the railcars. And if people die out on the roads, nobody (except maybe us) asks why that person couldn't have been on transit, where they would have been safer.

I don't know if the current political climate allows Metro to design its railcars for the maximum capacity and with the overall transportation safety picture in mind instead of the narrow goal of safest railcars at any operational cost.

Certainly Congress keeps hammering at safety without really analyzing the big picture. Yesterday, a Senate committee approved this year's $150 million federal contribution, but Senator Barbara Mikulski attached conditions that all money be spent on safety and WMATA report quarterly on its progress on safety. The focus on safety is important, but the big picture is more complex than a sound bite.

The Board is supposed to take the broader view. Can they? Is it politically feasible to approve railcars with higher capacity, which will cut down on unsafe overcrowding and reduce reliance on dangerous cars even though some engineers say that transverse seating is safer to some, undetermined and vague degree?

Hopefully they will, asking staff to go back to the longitudinal seating as well as evaluating whether it would bring additional cost to build railcars with 4 doors. Riders in 2030 would be glad they did.

Update: What about articulated cars, where the doors between some cars are replaced with flexible sections creating, in effect, double-length cars or even making the whole train a car? Mr. Ogunrinde said they had rejected that for three reasons.

First, security agencies say it would make things more difficult, perhaps by letting a suspect roam through the train to evade capture. That seems a little dubious. Second, there aren't examples in the US of these working in heavy rail environments. However, there are plenty of examples around the world. But third, and the one that is somewhat persuasive to me, Metro's existing facilities aren't set up to be able to handle articulated cars, making it very costly to switch.

Chairman Towns and Members of the Committee,

Thank you for inviting me to testify today. My name is David Alpert and I am the District of Columbia Vice-Chair of the WMATA Riders' Advisory Council. I also report on and advocate for transit and better urban design through my Web site, GreaterGreaterWashington.org.

The Riders' Advisory Council was established by WMATA in September 2005 and serves as the riders' voice within WMATA. The Council provides feedback to the Board and customer input to Metro staff. Council members are appointed by the Board of Directors. The Council consists of 21 members, two from each of the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia, two appointed at-large and the Chair of the Accessibility Advisory Committee. Members use Metro's transit services—Metrobus, Metrorail and MetroAccess—and represent a diverse mix of ages, backgrounds and ways in which they use Metro.

WMATA experienced its worst year in history in 2009, and suffered a substantial loss of public confidence. The June 2009 crash on the Red Line and subsequent track worker fatalities catalyzed that change, and accelerated awareness of the larger problem, the growing disrepair of the Metrorail infrastructure.

Despite the challenges faced by WMATA, it remains a vital asset to the Washington region. A recent Washington Post poll found that 80% of riders rate the system positively. During this past month, Metrorail recorded three of its top five highest ridership days (April 1st, 2nd and 7th). This underscores the region's dependence on Metro and also highlights the need to redouble efforts to maintain and expand the system.

WMATA, its new Interim General Manager Mr. Sarles, and its future permanent General Manager as well as all employees must ensure that safety is their top priority. We need the best safety managers and a culture from the top that ensures that all employees respect and follow the safety recommendations. One day, hopefully very soon, the immediate safety crisis will be a memory.

At that time, we will wrestle with the much more difficult task of repairing a system that is chronically underfunded, both from federal transportation spending rules which contain built-in biases against transit funding, to state and local fiscal decisions which fail to adequately fund a system that has brought hundreds of billions of dollars in economic value to the region.

Failing to keep the system in a state of good repair also seriously threatens safety. While certainly not as dramatic as the incidents that have occurred over the past year, crowded platforms following service disruptions, crumbling platform tiles and out-of-service elevators and escalators are significant, recurring safety concerns.

Ensuring stable and sufficient capital funding for Metro is necessary to improve safety. As WMATA prepares to enter into its next capital plan on July 1st of this year, governments must also provide the resources necessary to adequately maintain Metro's safety and service, from specific safety recommendations from the National Transportation Safety Board to the everyday yet critical maintenance challenges.

Renewing the local Metro Matters funding agreement, which is currently under negotiation, is essential. Recent news reports have revealed that Maryland, in particular, has deferred some 2010 capital payments, may defer additional payments i n 2011, and may not be able to renew its multi-year commitment to capital funding. In the Washington Post poll, 62% of respondents said that the region should "provide more public transportation options, such as trains or buses" rather than "expanding or building roads."

The Council appreciates Congress's support for the $150 million annual federal capital funding for WMATA last year and hopes Congress will continue to provide these funds. Unfortunately, even continuing that appropriation annually and renewing the Metro Matters agreement leaves WMATA about $3.4 billion short of its identified capital needs over the next 10 years.

In addition, WMATA must secure support for its Operating Budget. Closing the currently-projected $190 million operating budget gap for FY2011 will likely require both significant fare increases and substantial service cuts. Proposed cuts could create long headways up to 30 minutes on rail and an hour or more on some buses, increasing crowding and driving many choice riders away from transit. Others would eliminate some service entirely early in the morning and late at night, stranding riders who depend on Metro to get to work at those hours. The General Manager's proposed budget even shortened rush hour trains and eliminated Yellow Line service at many times.

During recent public hearings on WMATA's proposed operating budget and imminent fare increases and service reductions, riders expressed a clear preference for increased fares over reductions in service. However, fares cannot be raised too greatly lest riders, especially the most vulnerable, be priced off of Metro.

Riders are not the only ones who benefit from good transit. The entire region benefits economically. The federal government benefits from greater productivity. And drivers benefit from reduced congestion on roadways. For that reason, the Riders' Advisory Council and transit advocacy groups have asked local jurisdictions to increase their contributions enough to forestall severe service cuts.

The Northern Virginia counties have taken the greatest steps in this area, explicitly making room in their budgets for greater support for transit. Elected leaders including some DC Councilmembers and many Maryland state delegates and county councilmembers have expressed their support. However, there remains a great deal of uncertainty about the amount the funding jurisdictions can or will ultimately provide.

Over the long term, federal, state and local governments must recognize the tremendous asset that Metro represents to the region and support it accordingly. A majority of residents in the aforementioned poll said that the region should find new ways to fund Metro, even if that meant raising some taxes.

Metro's budget difficulties are certainly not unique among the nation's transit systems. A recent study released by the American Public Transit Association noted that 84% of transit systems in the United States are planning to raise fares and/or decrease service, or have already done so. Metro does provide uniquely direct value to the federal government, and therefore we hope Congress and the states can work together to explore long-term funding sources.

In the midst of all of these challenges, WMATA must also find a new, permanent General Manager. The Council hopes that as the Board begins its search it will solicit input from all of Metro's stakeholders, including its riders and its employees.

Riders have expressed their vision for improvements at Metro. They want more reliable service, greater focus on customers, and clearer, more direct and more frequent communication from Metro, especially when things go wrong. While the General Manager must ensure a safe system, the region also needs a GM able to improve service quality and communicate effectively with the public to restore confidence. The Board should seek a candidate able to address Metro's long-term as well as short-term challenges and listen to stakeholders' views about those challenges.

Safety should top the list of Metro's core values. Effective oversight is also critical to maintaining safety and customer confidence in transit. Still, safety cannot exist in a vacuum. Statistics show that commuting by rail is approximately 34 times safer than driving, and many riders make a daily decision between the two.

Mandates that improve safety while maintaining service quality can greatly enhance transit; mandates that impair service in the long run in the name of safety will only drive commuters to other, more dangerous modes of travel. Transit must be safe; it also must not be permanently hamstrung in ways that actually make travelers across all modes less safe.

We are pleased that Congress is taking a strong interest in the safety and success of the Washington area's transit system. At the same time, safety for commuters in our nation's capital does not start and end with Metrorail. A US Department of Agriculture employee was killed by a driver after the recent snowstorm when the employee tried to walk to the Branch Avenue Metrorail station in Prince George's County, Maryland, where the sidewalks had not been cleared. A military truck closing roads for the recent nuclear security summit killed a bicyclist last week right in downtown DC.

WMATA safety issues have received considerable press recently, but the degree of press attention has been so great specifically because Metrorail fatalities are so rare, while fatalities on roadways are common to the point that we have become inured to these tragedies. This Congress should not ignore these larger safety concerns, and could draw needed attention to them by also conducting oversight into the ways in which our roadway designs, snow removal policies, and traffic law enforcement succeed or fail at maximizing the safety of commuters on all modes.

A safe, reliable, well-maintained and adequately funded Metro system will enrich the entire region, notably including the federal government. I thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony and would be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Bianchi: Does the NCPC have a relationship with MD-NCPPC? If yes-then please help convince MD-NCPPC to treat bike trails, any bike trails but especially those within 3 miles of metro train stops as the commuter routes they are. Currently these trails are 'closed' at dark even within a half mile of a metro stop, i.e. West Hyattsville. This is patently stupid. During winter its dark during 'peak' hours.

Marcel Acosta: The Maryland National Capital Park and Planning Commission (M-NCPPC) often requests that NCPC provide comment on its plans, particularly on draft versions of Vicinity Sector Plans (i.e.: Kensington Sector Plan). Additionally, if changes are proposed to the stream valley parks NCPC review may be required, as authorized under the Capper-Cramton Act of 1930.

NCPC's comments usually focus on consistency with the planning principles and policies outlined in NCPC's Comprehensive Plan for the National Capital: Federal Elements. The overarching principles in the Comprehensive Plan states: "Reinforce 'Smart Growth' and Sustainable Development Planning Principles. NCPC staff views transportation elements as part of this effort and when providing feedback, NCPC strongly encourages the improvement of trail linkages between transit stations and the stream valley park bicycle trail system. I will ask my staff to talk to planners at MD-NCPPC about exploring ways that would allow the bike trails to serve as a more usable commute option.

timfry: If you have some power to coordinate the work of the region, I would like to see more emphasis placed on putting new Federal agency offices near transit. I live near the new DoD building (Seminary and 395). I take the bus from the area to the Pentagon to catch Metro so there are some transit options. But it is currently a one-way trip with the flow of commuting traffic.

Maybe we will get a reverse commute option but my anticipation is a lot more traffic around Seminary and 395. Why are we allowing the federal government and especially DoD to put these offices all over the region that are inaccessible except by car? Please stop it, it will cripple our region.

Marcel Acosta: The federal government has a long history in this region of having facilities located near transit and supporting transit options for its employees. NCPC has policies that we use to encourage federal facilities to make multi-modal, transit accessible location and design choices.

Over the last decade, NCPC has been working closely with numerous federal agencies to find approaches that balance security needs with convenient access to transit. These objectives are important, and solutions that achieve both are not easy. We recognize that many of the BRAC 2005 (Base Realignment and Closure) actions, in particular, have had significant transportation challenge, some of which are still being addressed.

We're also pleased that President Obama's Executive Order 13514 requires sustainable location policies for federal facilities nationally, which are currently under development. To help facilitate the Executive Order, NCPC has been working with other federal agencies to develop a national sustainability policy on facility location. We plan to incorporate this policy into our Comprehensive Plan that the Commission uses to guide its review of projects in the National Capital Region.

Lucy: Is it possible for NCPC to educate local officials and promote smarter planning policies? And control smarter development.

Marcel Acosta: As the region's largest "corporate citizen," the federal government has a significant impact on regional development patterns and the economy. We have a stake in what happens in the region. It impacts our day to day operations and our ability to recruit and retain great employees. The current Administration has placed a high priority on sustainable, livable communities and coordinated regional action.

NCPC has recently been working to foster discussions between the region's leadership and federal representatives on opportunities to advance shared objectives. In July 2009, NCPC joined forces with the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (MWCOG) to launch Building the Region Together. Our goal is to establish our region as a model of cooperative planning leadership.

Through several planned pilot projects, NCPC and COG aim to improve the built environment surrounding federal facilities, showcase federal sustainable practices, and support the region's livability goals outlined in COG's Greater Washington 2050 Initiative. Over the next several months NCPC and COG will continue working with federal and local partners to advance identified projects. Stay tuned.

Omar: Does the NCPC have an opinion on the NPS' proposal to narrow the Reflecting Pool from an aesthetic point of view?

Marcel Acosta: Omar must be referring to the Capitol Reflecting Pool, which was installed on the Mall in the early 1970s when the freeway was constructed. The draft National Mall Plan proposes the redevelopment of this pool and surrounding area as Union Square, a concept from the McMillan Plan. Staff supports redevelopment of this important site, to connect the Mall and the U.S. Capitol, and to create a place suitable for a range of public activities.

The National Park Service (NPS) envisions providing much-needed visitor amenities, such as restrooms, at this end of the Mall. While the draft Plan proposes uses and general redevelopment ideas for the site, it states that the location will require a comprehensive landscape plan. The size and nature of a future water feature and other features will be the subject of continued planning and public discussion. NPS has suggested that a national design competition would be appropriate for this site, and NCPC staff agrees.

Neil: Outside of the mall, the National Park Service has an even poorer record of managing the other properties it has scattered throughout the city. Maintaining non-historical, non-interpretive city parks is really outside their mission, as we learned over the blizzard. Would you consider spinning off some of the less central parks if it made better park uses available to Washingtonians?

Marcel Acosta: NCPC recognizes the myriad challenges facing management and upkeep of the many of parks and open spaces located throughout the nation's capital. In past years, jurisdiction over a number of the parks and open spaces within the District of Columbia has been transferred back and forth between the District government and the National Park Service.

That is one of the many reasons why we launched a partnership in 2006 with the National Park Service and the District government to develop a shared plan for Washington's parks, and particularly those in the city's neighborhoods. In the final plan, which comes before our Commission for review in April, we focused on a number of strategies for working together to achieve the full potential of our existing park resources, and to effectively balance both national and local demands on the parks. Additionally, since many of our downtown parks are historically and culturally significant; management of these spaces and improved park coordination between NPS and the District has become a key objective of the CapitalSpace effort.

I wish to note that public participation was an extremely important aspect of this planning process—the partners held numerous public meetings to hear what residents wanted—and public feedback has been incorporated into the final draft. I'd encourage you to check out the draft plan at www.capitalspace.gov.

Tuesday

• Introduction of the Board of Inquiry and Technical Panel
• Introduction of parties
• Accident overview
• WMATA's oversight of safety
• WMATA's operational actions to address safety issues
• Tri-State Oversight Committee (TOC) overview of WMATA

Wednesday

• State safety oversight of rail transit systems
• Federal oversight of rail passenger systems

Thursday

• High reliability organizations

A federal oversight board in charge of safety would have one mission: making transit safer. Would that lead to unreasonable unfunded mandates, forcing transit agencies to drastically cut service to pay for needed improvements? Would that lead to permanent slow-speed orders that make transit systems significantly slower than cars? After all, if a safety agency issues regulations that decrease deaths by two a year nationwide but also decrease ridership by a hundred thousand nationwide, that agency can point to the reduced deaths and say they've done their job.

If highway deaths increase as a result, they haven't. BeyondDC calculated that Metrorail is 34 times safer than driving per passenger mile. Even one person is much safer still riding Metrorail than switching to driving. Commenters have pointed out that good driving can reduce crash risk somewhat. That's true, to an extent. Of course, we don't know if the people who switch are good drivers or bad. There's also an argument that you can control your own risk on the road, instead of on Metro. So let's hold Metro to a higher standard than driving. But how much higher? Ten times? A hundred?

There haven't been calls for increased federal regulation of Secret Service vehicles, speed restrictions on Maryland Route 5, or mandating replacement of all old cars without side air bags. If a driver kills a pedestrian, police just wonder if the driver was criminally at fault, and if not, we shrug our shoulders and move on. That happens a few times a week just in this region. But when there's one tragic train crash for the first time since 1982, the federal government steps in. We have federal regulation of auto crashworthiness, but not roadway design, which is the bigger culprit in many deaths.

It'd be great for Metro to replace the 1000-series cars. But that would cost billions they don't have. Actually funding new cars would be best. What if that's not possible? Shorten all trains to four cars? Double rush hour headways? Delete the Blue Line permanently?

Safety oversight could certainly bring a lot of good. It's just just a capital issue. As Dave Stroup has written, some of the problems are organizational. Some involve processes. There does need to be some independent monitoring. And making people feel safe riding transit is absolutely vital to getting people to ride.

Ultimately, safety regulation is valuable as long as its net effect is to increase the safety of commuting overall, not just the safety of that one mode even if the regulation pushes people to a more dangerous mode. Instead of making the Federal Transit Administration responsible for transit safety, let's make the safety regulation body (federal or regional) responsible for improving surface transportation safety in general. Let them issue recommendations for driving, bicycling, walking, transit and commuter rail safety. Measure their success based on one thing: the overall death rate in a metropolitan area from people moving about. That will ensure they focus on whatever is killing the most people, rather than whatever gets the biggest headlines.

If that's not politically realistic, what else could we do to ensure that a federal or regional oversight board pushes for the right changes without going overboard and killing transit in the process?