Washington Metro is looking to return its Red Line trains to automatic operation by next spring.
The transportation organization announced in a presentation on Monday that this would take the Red Line off manual human operation, and the rest of the lines would become automatic by the end of 2023.
Metro officials believe Automatic Train Operation, or ATO, will make rides for passengers smoother and safer while also saving power and money, according to the presentation. Most red signal and station overruns, in which a train goes beyond the platform, are human error, Metro said.
The Metro system was intended and operated to be fully automated until 2009, when a sensor malfunctioned and caused a train to crash at full speed into a standing train. Nine people were killed, and dozens were injured.
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Despite the ATO not being a direct cause of the crash, D.C. Metro took the system offline, replacing it with trains run by staff.
Over 70% of mass transit systems in other parts of the country utilize “GoA2” operations, meaning that starting and stopping are automated, with a driver operating the doors who will drive in case of emergency.
Of the 42 transit systems it reviewed, Metro is one of eight systems that operate at a level 1, driver-controlled operation, and the only one of the eight that was originally designed for ATO.
WMATA General Manager Randy Clarke said, per DCist, during a November board meeting that he believes it’s time to restart the automated operation.
“We are the only transit rail property in the world that has regressed from the technology we started with,” he said. “We ran on an ATO system, which is the way every major safe rail system in the world operates — and we don’t operate on that now. It is much safer to run an ATO than it is the way we do manual today.”
Since the crash in 2009, Metro has made updates to the rail system, including replacing all track circuits, creating a system for identifying faulty circuits, and developing a more effective preventive inspection and maintenance program.
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Metro has accomplished other goals in the meantime. After nearly eight years of construction, Metro launched the expanded Silver Line on Nov. 15, connecting Loudoun County and Washington Dulles International Airport to the Metrorail system for the first time.
The Yellow Line is out of service as Metro continues to expand its services. A new station, added along the Blue and Yellow lines, Potomac Yard, is close to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport and is set to open this fall.
