Metro riders who rely on the Foggy Bottom station had thought their escalator woes might be over when the transit agency finished replacing three escalators in November after months of construction.
But they were reminded Wednesday morning that the hiking isn’t over: All three new escalators went down for about 50 minutes at the end of the morning commute. And the new equipment itself could be partly to blame — for being so high-tech.
| Rosslyn riders face outages, too |
| Foggy Bottom Metro riders weren’t the only ones who had to do some hiking Wednesday. |
| The escalators went down at Rosslyn for 20 minutes during the morning rush. That meant riders had to climb up and down the agency’s fifth-longest escalators, all 194 feet. |
| Two of the four Rosslyn escalators were already out of service, one for maintenance and the other pending an inspection following a rider’s injury from Tuesday, Metro spokesman Dan Stessel said. (A 62-year-old had fallen, cutting his leg and bruising his side, when he lost his balance after a man bumped into him, according to Metro.) |
| The remaining two escalators shut off about 8:50 a.m. Metro crews reset them by 9:10 a.m., Stessel said, but they were trying to determine what triggered the sensors to shut them down. |
Metro spokesman Dan Stessel said the new units are more sensitive than past models, with more sensors to detect more things. But when a sensor is triggered, the escalators often shut down.
“They’re doing what they are supposed to do,” Stessel said.
That’s what happened at 9:10 a.m. when a speed sensor was triggered, shutting down the ascending escalator.
The middle escalator was already out of service, down since Tuesday because of a problem with an electrical component that is expected to be resolved by Friday, Stessel said.
When the ascending escalator went down, the remaining downward escalator had to be shut off, too, so riders could walk up or down it. That meant the sole exit and entrance to the busy station was whittled down to a two-person-wide staircase. Two escalators were restarted by 10 a.m. after escalator technicians checked them out and reset them.
Foggy Bottom riders have weathered the construction site since January 2011, with the promise of improved service.
On Nov. 30, the agency held a ribbon cutting to mark the completion of the final escalator replacement at the Orange/Blue Line station — the first replacement escalators in more than a decade.
Stessel said the new escalators are significantly more reliable than the ones they replaced. He could not provide outage data Wednesday.
“To date, we have not had major mechanical problems with them,” he wrote in an email. Most outages have been minor issues related to comb plates or sensor activation, he said, which is normal. Crews reset the unit or clean out what’s caught in the comb plate, which usually resolves the issue.
Escalator service has improved systemwide, Stessel said, with availability of the agency’s 588 escalators at 89.3 percent, he said, just above the agency’s goal of 89 percent. The agency lowered the goal from 93 percent in May.
The Foggy Bottom escalators remain under a yearlong warranty until November, so Metro is not on the hook for the cost of the repairs.
