MESSAGE
| DATE | 2005-05-04 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
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| SUBJECT | Subject: [NYLXS - HANGOUT] Old Hood is going digital subway
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Subway riders at the southern end of the L line in Brooklyn will be the
first to ride computer-guided trains, a transit official said yesterday.
Starting this fall, the "robotrain" system will serve the stretch
between the Rockaway Parkway and Broadway-Junction stops, said Fred
Smith, vice president and deputy chief engineer in the Transit
Authority's capital program division.
Smith, testifying at a City Council Transportation Committee hearing on
the computerized system - called Communications Based Train Control -
said it will then be phased in along the rest of the 11-mile line,
ending next May.
The computer-guided system on the L line, which connects Eighth Ave. and
W. 14th St. in Manhattan with Canarsie in southern Brooklyn, was
originally supposed to go on line in December.
Committee members raised many safety concerns - about the possibility of
computer hackers wreaking havoc with trains, software glitches that have
delayed the program and the plan to remove conductors from L trains this
summer, among others.
Councilman Lew Fidler (D-Brooklyn) said, "This issue continues to plague
my constituents, who are going to be asked to be the lab rats and the
guinea pigs."
Canarsie line upgrades, including those to signals and the computer
systems, are expected to cost nearly $300 million. Testing continues,
Smith said, but he added: "There are no safety problems with any of the
equipment that has been installed and tested."
Smith said the TA has done studies that indicate hacking into the system
would not be possible.
The TA has said the computer-guided trains will allow it to pinpoint the
location of trains and let them run more frequently - and more safely -
by removing the possibility of human error. Under the plan, a motorman
will always be at the helm to manually operate a train if necessary.
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