WASHINGTON 鈥� The Federal Transit Administration says Metro is failing to address the root causes of track and other equipment problems.
Amid a that began this week, the FTA said Monday that as Metro’s new safety oversight agency, it sent back Metro’s internal investigation report into the near the Smithsonian Station 鈥渂ecause it failed to appropriately assess the root cause of the track condition that was identified.鈥�
Employees didn’t detect that the track near the station was too wide, and an alert from a track geometry inspection was deleted about four weeks before the derailment. That alert should have meant the track was immediately taken out of service. Instead, trains were allowed to continue running through the unsafe area. Metro’s after an聽empty train derailed leading to major service disruptions for commuters.
鈥淔TA鈥檚 action on track integrity is an outcome of continuing issues with WMATA鈥檚 track conditions and poor preventative maintenance as most recently evidenced by the March 14, 2016, arcing insulator fire near McPherson Square Station and the subsequent system-wide shutdown to perform emergency safety inspections of third rail jumper cable conditions,鈥� the statement says.
In addition to track inspections and a review of Metro鈥檚 entire track maintenance program, the FTA is also looking into the serious danger posed by rail equipment rolling away in rail yards because workers don’t apply聽the emergency brakes.
鈥淚n its WMATA safety oversight role, FTA has confirmed several instances where employees in WMATA rail yards are not following the transit agency鈥檚 own rules on this issue with the result that rail vehicles have rolled away striking other equipment or infrastructure,鈥� the statement says.
Across the rail system, worker safety has been a major issue and several Metro employees have died in recent years after being struck on the tracks.
The third focus of the federal safety blitz is trains running red signals, an issue the agency .
The FTA says Metro has had five red signal violations just since the agency assumed safety oversight in the fall, and 50 total since 2012.
鈥淲MATA’s trend line has been going in the wrong direction. WMATA had more red signal overruns in 2015 than in either of the preceding two years and these occurrences have continued into 2016,鈥� the statement says.
Investigators will analyze Metro鈥檚 rules, training and technology; interview those involved in past incidents; and review records from the troubled Rail Operations Control Center.
Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld asked for a similar internal review last month after one of the latest violations a train that had just gone out of service and another sitting on a platform with passengers on board.
After 鈥渟everal weeks鈥� of inspections in all three focus areas, the FTA expects to have final reports from the safety blitz and potentially new safety directives for Metro by early summer.
