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MASS TRANSIT IN THE NATIONAL CAPITAL

REGION: MEETING FUTURE CAPITAL NEEDS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

SEPTEMBER 21, 2001

Serial No. 107–89

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

STEPHEN HORN, California

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

BOB BARR, Georgia

DAN MILLER, Florida

DOUG OSE, California

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

DAVE WELDON, Florida

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

——— ———

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,

DC

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

JIM TURNER, Texas

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

——— ———

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

KEVIN BINGER, Staff Director

DANIEL R. MOLL, Deputy Staff Director

JAMES C. WILSON, Chief Counsel

ROBERT A. BRIGGS, Chief Clerk

PHIL SCHILIRO, Minority Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland, Chairman

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia,

——— ———

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,

DC

DIANE E. WATSON, California

——— ———

EX OFFICIO

DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

RUSSELL SMITH, Staff Director

VICTORIA PROCTOR, Professional Staff Member

MATTHEW BATT, Clerk

JOHN BOUKER, Minority Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on September 21, 2001 ..................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Hecker, Jay Etta, Director of Physical Infrastructure Issues, General

Accounting Office, accompanied by Rita Grieco, Senior Analyst, Physical Infrastructure Issues, General Accounting Office; Decatur Trotter,

chairman, Board of Directors, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit

Authority; Richard A. White, general manager, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority; Jennifer L. Dorn, Administrator, Federal

Transit Administration; Phil Mendelson, vice chairman, National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board; and Donna Sorkin (appearing in the place of Pamela Holmes) public board member, Access Board,

accompanied by David Capozi, director, technical programs, Access

Board .............................................................................................................. 14

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Davis, Hon. Thomas M., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Virginia, prepared statement of .............................................................. 11

Dorn, Jennifer L., Administrator, Federal Transit Administration, prepared statement of ........................................................................................ 87

Hecker, Jay Etta, Director of Physical Infrastructure Issues, General

Accounting Office, prepared statement of ................................................... 17

Mendelson, Phil, vice chairman, National Capital Region Transportation

Planning Board, prepared statement of ...................................................... 100

Morella, Hon. Constance A., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Maryland:

Letter dated November 20, 2001 .............................................................. 137

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 4

Norton, Hon. Eleanor Holmes, a Representative in Congress from the

District of Columbia, prepared statement of .............................................. 8

Holmes, Pamela, chair, Access Board, prepared statement of ...................... 109

Trotter, Decatur, chairman, Board of Directors, Washington Metropolitan

Area Transit Authority, prepared statement of ......................................... 37

White, Richard A., general manager, Washington Metropolitan Area

Transit Authority, prepared statement of .................................................. 47

(1)

MASS TRANSIT IN THE NATIONAL CAPITAL

REGION: MEETING FUTURE CAPITAL NEEDS

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2001

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:10 a.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Constance A. Morella

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Morella, Watson, Norton, and Davis.

Staff present: Russell Smith, staff director; Heea Vazirani-Fales,

counsel; Robert White, communications director; Matthew Batt,

clerk/legislative assistant; Shalley Kim, staff assistant; Victoria

Proctor and Howie Denis, professional staff members; Jon Bouker,

minority counsel; and Jean Gosa, minority assistant clerk.

Mrs. MORELLA. Good morning. The Subcommittee on the District

of Columbia is convening our seventh hearing of the 107th Congress, and I want to welcome all of those who have come here to

hear the testimony and the distinguished panel of witnesses who

will be testifying. I look forward to receiving the informative testimony in response to the General Accounting Office’s July 2001, report, ‘‘Mass Transit: Many Management Successes at WMATA, but

Capital Planning could be Enhanced,’’ the official title. We’ll examine WMATA’s efforts to address GAO’s recommendations, examine

WMATA’s responses to operational and maintenance problems, and

determine the accessibility of the transit system to customers with

disabilities.

I want to welcome our subcommittee members who are here and

those who will join us later. We’re joined by the ranking member,

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, and our newest Member

of Congress, Congresswoman Watson. I know that Congressman

Davis will be joining us and Congressman Platts has a transportation markup.

As you know, these are unusual and troubling times, and there

are duties that are conflicting.

I want to start off by, of course, thanking again the WMATA

Board, General Manager Dick White, Metro’s managers and employees for their agency’s response to the terrible events on September 11th. In times of danger, public transportation plays a pivotal role in getting our citizens back home safely and quickly, and

by nearly all the accounts that I’ve heard Metro accomplished that

task very well last Tuesday. As a matter of fact, you continue to

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fulfill that responsibility. You show that Government can operate

effectively in a crisis situation.

Disaster preparation is just one of the areas that we’re going to

be discussing today. We’ll also be examining the subway system’s

operational performance, how Mr. White and his management

team are preparing for the future, and Metro’s accessibility to disabled riders.

Regarding the ability of disabled riders to use the system, I’m

particularly interested in learning about the extent of Metro’s efforts to make its elevators, escalators, and other infrastructure

more user friendly for blind and disabled people.

The General Accounting Office in its July report on WMATA

gave the agency good marks for addressing safety concerns and

other operational factors. But, as anyone who has visited a subway

station lately and maybe had to walk down the stairs because the

escalator was out of service, and then waited on a crowded platform, and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with other passengers on the

train can testify, Metro faces some significant challenges in its near

future. Ridership is growing steadily, and yet the system is showing signs of aging. That means Metro must find a way to make

room for many new riders without overworking the system.

Our hearing today will focus on how Metro intends to meet these

twin challenges, as well as meet the expectation of its users.

The continued success of WMATA is absolutely critical for this

region. A healthy transit system helps reduce congestion on our

highways and pollution in our air. It makes employment centers

accessible to our workers. And it can help reduce sprawl in our

suburbs.

Metro Rail believes its ridership, which is roughly 600,000 passengers a day, could double in the next 25 years. Is the subway

system capable of handling such growth? Do we have the capacity

to run longer trains? Can we and how do we expand the size of

platforms? How can we relieve the awful parking situation at some

of our outer stations? Passengers who use the Shady Grove Garage

in my District, for example, have to get there before 7 or 7:30 a.m.,

or they don’t get a spot for parking. Also, where does it make the

most sense to build new lines and what factors should be driving

the decision as to which stations and lines get built?

Finally, there is a pressing question raised by the GAO report.

Should Metro change the way it presents its long-term capital program? The GAO came to the conclusion that, in a time of shrinking

resources and increasing demands, Metro ought to present various

options for its infrastructure funding requests. For example, ‘‘If we

get ’X’ amount of money we will be able to complete Projects A, B,

and C. If we get less, we will only be able to do one or two of the

three.’’ I think this could be an important change because it will

force the region to address dead on the issue of what its transportation priorities are and how much money it should be providing

for Metro expansion—how much it should be providing for not only

expansion, but maintenance and other non-operational needs. And

it would allow the decisionmakers to make informed choices, which

is vital at a time when we simply do not have the money to do everything that we want.

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It is imperative that Metro has the long-term plans in place to

ensure the system can continue to provide adequate mass transit

options well into the 21st century. And these are just some of the

questions facing us as we open this hearing. But the answers will

have substantial impacts on how the region grows over the next

several decades, how it handles that growth, how it will pay for

that growth, and what the consequences are if nothing is done.

I know Metro has begun working on answers to some of these

questions, and I look forward to hearing about the progress that

has been made.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Constance A. Morella follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. And now it is my pleasure to recognize the distinguished ranking member of the District of Columbia Subcommittee,

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Mrs. Morella.

I want to pause before giving my brief remarks to thank the

Chair for continuing with this hearing and for the sense of normalcy she has created in this subcommittee. We have been about

the work of the District of Columbia as if there had not been a terrible tragedy on September 11th and have been working closely together on the business of the city, some of which will emerge in a

markup to follow this meeting and plans for future markup.

I want also to say that, as the Chair has indicated, that this is

a terrible time for the country, and a time for the Congress, when

we are not only doing our normal business at the end of the fiscal

year, but business that no one ever imagined we’d have to do. I am

not going to be able to stay for this entire hearing. I am on the

Aviation Subcommittee. We have a hearing as we speak on security

for aviation, an issue of utmost concern to this city and this region,

because if people can’t fly here safely, even if we get National Airport open, they won’t fly, so we’ve got double duty here, both to get

it open and to send out a sense of confidence that it is secure so

that people will use the airport when it is open, so I’ve got to be

at that hearing for part of the time.

Mrs. Morella knows that we are waiting for the aviation bill to

go on the floor, because if we don’t do something to make sure that

the airlines are in financial shape to get up and fly, then, of course,

nothing else matters. No great power has ever remained great or

can remain great without airlines in this day and age, so we must

find the appropriate and proportionate assistance for the airlines,

from whence other things will flow, such as the tourism industry

of this city and region.

In addition, I’ve got to go into the city because the industry, the

tourism industry, is having a major meeting with the Mayor and

me on the fate of that industry. All of this simply must be done

at the same time.

WMATA figures deeply into this concern. WMATA is one of the

principal reasons that this is a successful tourist city. It has been

a very successful operation.

WMATA, indeed, uncharacteristically had a series of mishaps involving passengers traveling underground on the Metro Rail that

drew the attention of the subcommittee in the summer of 2000.

Tom Davis, who was then our Chair, Connie Morella, then vicechair, and I requested a GAO study because of the overwhelming

importance of safety to the system and because of the indispensable position of WMATA to the economy of this region and, of

course, its central place in the lives of our constituents.

Our hearing today focuses on the GAO findings on safety and on

actions taken to remedy the problems that led to the study, and,

of course, we are also interested in the overall condition of WMATA

and in issues that have been raised about access by disabled residents. Inevitably, as well, following the September 11th attack, we

will have questions for WMATA concerning security issues.

We are relieved by the written GAO findings that WMATA has

in place procedures to identify and minimize general safety risks

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to passengers. However, at the time of our request for this GAO investigation, our subcommittee was concerned with transit mishaps,

not the unthinkable events of September 11th. We can only hope

that WMATA has used greater foresight to prepare for emergencies

than the Federal Government demonstrated during the attack on

the Pentagon.

We all recognize how fortunate this region is to have a 103-mile

Metro Rail system that is close to state-of-the-art, second-largest in

passenger service next to New York City, and the envy of the rest

of the country. Already, local jurisdictions here are planning extensions of Metro beyond the original system as envisioned in 1969

when WMATA started building. The District’s anticipated New

York Avenue Metro stop currently underway may become a model

for the region, with one-third of the funds provided by local businesses, one-third by the D.C. government, and one-third by the

Federal Government.

The best news about WMATA is the vote of confidence regional

riders are showing in the system by the very significant increase

in their use of Metro. This use, however, is fraught with irony. I

can remember when the region wanted to attract more riders to the

system. Now Metro is confronting the challenge of too many riders,

given the existing capacity of the system.

Let’s do something about that, too. Let’s keep Metro not only

going but growing.

I look forward to the testimony of today’s witnesses to clarify old

as well as new issues that Metro must face. I very much welcome

each and every one of you to this hearing.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Ms. Norton.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Eleanor Holmes Norton follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I’m pleased to recognize my predecessor Chair of

this subcommittee, Tom Davis, who, as Ms. Norton mentioned,

asked for the GAO report with Ms. Norton and myself.

Mr. Davis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Madam Chair, I will try to be brief because I want to get to the panel.

I want to thank you for organizing today’s hearing. I want to applaud WMATA’s Metro Rail and Metro Bus services for their handling of the sudden influx of riders after the terrorist attacks on

September 11th. I understand there was some confusion initially

caused by the news media, as there was throughout the city and

on Capitol Hill, but WMATA ensured that the systems ran as

smoothly as possible under the circumstances. And since that tragic day WMATA has worked with DOD, the Department of Defense,

to expand its hours of operation and accommodate the increased

ridership in light of the tightened security and blocked roads surrounding the Pentagon.

Last October this subcommittee held a hearing that examined a

wide range of issues relating to WMATA’s operations, including its

budget process, communications system, safety, and its processes

for measuring performance standards and gauging customer satisfaction. At that time it was clear that WMATA faced many challenges ahead. The most immediate is still increased ridership,

which is putting a strain on the 25-year-old system’s resources.

Therefore, I am encouraged by the GAO’s reports regarding

WMATA’s efforts to improve its organization and management. I

look forward to hearing from our witnesses about the system improvements that are being implemented. I’m still concerned that

the organization lacks a fully developed long-term budgeting plan,

as highlighted in the GAO report.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Davis.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Thomas M. Davis follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. And now the newest member of this subcommittee, we welcome her so much, Congresswoman Diane Watson.

Ms. WATSON. Thank you, Madam Chair.

It’s a pleasure to be able to sit on this committee. I have been

very interested in the District of Columbia and how it progresses.

I want you to know back in the 1980’s, when I carried a bill in the

California State Senate to do a value capture project for our new

subway, we went around the world to see the rapid transit systems, the Metro Rail system. The first place we came was here to

Washington, DC. I was very impressed with your design, with your

efficiency, and we learned a lot.

I have watched it very closely. I have used it when I’ve come

here for long, extensive periods of time, and I am pleased to be a

member of this subcommittee focusing on D.C. and looking at

WMATA and seeing how I can assist all of our colleagues and you

in keeping this system moving forward.

Welcome to those who are going to make presentations. I will be

reading the GAO report, several pages here, as my midnight reading.

Thank you so much.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Ms. Watson.

Our distinguished panelists include: Jay Etta Hecker, Director of

Physical Infrastructure Issues for GAO, accompanied by Rita

Grieco, Senior Analyst, Physical Infrastructure Issues, GAO. We

have the Honorable Decatur Trotter, who is the chairman of the

Board of Directors of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit

Authority; Richard White, general manager of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority; the Honorable Jennifer L. Dorn,

who is the Administrator of the Federal Transit Administration;

Honorable Phil Mendelson, vice chair of the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board; and Donna Sorkin, appearing

in the place of Pamela Holmes, public board member of the Access

Board.

It is the tradition and the policy of the full committee and all its

subcommittees to swear in those people who will be testifying, so

I would ask you to stand, raise your right hands, and I would ask

Barry McDevitt, the chief of police of the Metro Transit Police Department, to also stand to take the oath.

If you’ll raise your right hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mrs. MORELLA. The record will show everybody responded affirmatively. And I’d like to ask you, too, so that we can hear all the

panelists and have a chance for some questions, if you would try

to confine your comments to 5 minutes. We even have our little

lights to signal—the green, yellow, and red. And you don’t have to

conform to your written statement, which will be included in its totality in the record. You can give a synopsis or change it any way

you’d like.

So, starting off that way, let’s start off in the order in which you

are seated—Jay Etta Hecker. Thank you.

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STATEMENTS OF JAY ETTA HECKER, DIRECTOR OF PHYSICAL

INFRASTRUCTURE ISSUES, GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE,

ACCOMPANIED BY RITA GRIECO, SENIOR ANALYST, PHYSICAL INFRASTRUCTURE ISSUES, GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE; DECATUR TROTTER, CHAIRMAN, BOARD OF DIRECTORS, WASHINGTON METROPOLITAN AREA TRANSIT AUTHORITY; RICHARD A. WHITE, GENERAL MANAGER, WASHINGTON METROPOLITAN AREA TRANSIT AUTHORITY; JENNIFER L. DORN, ADMINISTRATOR, FEDERAL TRANSIT ADMINISTRATION; PHIL MENDELSON, VICE CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION TRANSPORTATION PLANNING

BOARD; AND DONNA SORKIN (APPEARING IN THE PLACE OF

PAMELA HOLMES) PUBLIC BOARD MEMBER, ACCESS BOARD,

ACCOMPANIED BY DAVID CAPOZI, DIRECTOR, TECHNICAL

PROGRAMS, ACCESS BOARD

Ms. HECKER. Thank you, Madam Chair. Good morning to you,

Representative Norton, and other members of the committee.

As you all know, we are here to speak on the report that you requested, and I will summarize it so maybe you don’t even have to

read it. I think we can really give you the highlights and the essence of it, and then you’ll hear the reactions.

Mrs. MORELLA. You’re assuming we haven’t already read it.

[Laughter.]

Ms. HECKER. The report, as you know, and as you requested, focused on three very broad areas: the extent of the safety and security measures and initiatives within WMATA; the operating and

maintenance initiatives and challenges facing the organization;

and, finally, what kind of planning, selection process, and budgeting was in place for dealing with major capital projects.

I’d like to try to just briefly summarize it and give you the flavor

of it before I go into each of them very briefly.

Basically, in all three areas—safety and security, operations and

maintenance, and capital budgeting—the organization faces substantial challenges, and most of you have alluded to those. Many

of them are pretty clearly evident.

What we did find, because there had been a rash of incidents and

there was some concern about the readiness of the organization, we

did find that, in fact, significant policies and procedures and initiatives were in place to deal with two of those three areas—basically,

the safety and security measures and dealing with the kind of

loads of passengers, dealing with operating and maintenance concerns.

However, in the capital investment area we basically did an approach that looked at the best practices of leading organizations

and investment and capital, and, while there were many initiatives

in place in the organization following those best practices, we found

there were some really important opportunities to improve. Let me

again go back and recap each of those pretty quickly.

In the safety and security area, the good news was that there

really is a rigorous set of policies and procedures in place to deal

with both safety and security risks confronting the system. The

real problems that had come to light in the 1996–1997 areas, there

were several very critical reports, and I have to say that there has

been a real commitment within the organization elevating the level

15

of attention, giving it much more serious commitment within the

organization, and really a pervasive commitment to this within the

organization. There’s a monitoring of stations. There are procedures. And they’ve invited outside review and basically have both

a peer organization and Ms. Dorn’s organization have given a very

good sign to the organization that they’re really very good and,

while they continue to confront challenges, they really are among

the best in terms of having the critical procedures.

This even covers the terrorism area, which, of course, we all realize is far more serious and it presents more grave challenges than

any of us imagined, but in this area, as well, WMATA is really in

the lead nationally. They are the only system in the country to be

testing the use of sensors to detect and mitigate the possible use

of chemical and biological agents in the system. It is an important

new initiative. It is still in the testing phases. But it really shows

that the organization is in the front line and really providing leadership.

This has actually been evidenced by the fact that they have been

sought out by FTA really to help develop national guidelines for

being prepared for and mitigating terrorist attacks on transit systems.

So the safety, security area, the challenges are real. They can’t

ever be totally mitigated, but having those kind of commitments,

organizational commitments, the level of commitment in the organization, it’s clearly in place.

Now, the organization—the operations and maintenance area,

again, you’ve all outlined the very self-evident challenges that the

system faces. The crowds are at crush levels many times. It has

grown very rapidly to become the second-largest heavy rail transit

system in the country and really has a number of challenges. And

while the system, of course, was just completed, much of the infrastructure is actually 20 years old and approaching either requirements for major upgrades or replacement.

Now, when we looked in this area we again found, again within

the last few years, major initiatives in place, a comprehensive program called the infrastructure renewal program looking at needs

for upgrades to elevators, escalators, rail cars, and also the ordering of new cars. We’ve seen challenges they’ve confronted in those

new cars, but that has been dealt with. And the system really has

been dealing with the fact that there are a number of challenges

in this area.

In the longer term, there are more serious challenges, given the

projections for the likely doubling of ridership by 2025. This has,

again, led to a comprehensive study within the organization. They

call it the ‘‘Core Capacity Review.’’ And this isn’t just the new lines,

the expansion that is being talked about in different areas, but

really the capacity of the system, itself, the inner system, to absorb

the ridership that would result. And this isn’t, as I said, fancy new

lines. Sometimes it is widening the platforms and other such initiatives.

The challenge there in this core capacity relates to the third

area, and that’s the planning and budgeting. Again, we found very

positive features of their program, but the challenges were that

there really wasn’t an effective strategic planning in place, there

16

wasn’t the framework for really prioritizing the full range of capital

investments, and, as you noted, there really hasn’t been an approach that focuses on the anticipated shortfalls.

I see my light is on, so I’m going to skip over perhaps more detail

and leave it for questions about this area.

But, in sum, I think the organization is in a very complex environment politically with the multiple jurisdictions. It is one of the

very few transit systems that doesn’t have a dedicated source of tax

revenues to project and plan for long-term investments. But I think

we have an organization here that we can be proud of that adapts

to changing circumstances, that learns and grows and deals with

the significant challenges that they are facing.

That concludes the prepared statement, and, of course, I would

be pleased to take any questions. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much. We will have some questions for you. Thank you for the study that you did.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Hecker follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I didn’t know that you were not planning to testify, Ms. Grieco, but if there’s anything you wanted to briefly add

at this point, you may.

Ms. GRIECO. I would just point out in the area of capital planning WMATA did do an excellent study of the condition of its existing assets, and it is just in some of the areas of planning for the

future, the system expansion projects, we see an opportunity for

them to take a more expanded role.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you.

Honorable Decatur Trotter, good to see you again, sir.

Mr. TROTTER. Good morning, Chairwoman Morella and members

of the subcommittee. I’m happy to be here. With all those great

statements that have been made, very little for me to do, but I am

Decatur Trotter and I am the chairman of the Board of Directors

of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, and with

your permission, Madam Chair, I would like to submit my formal

statement for the record.

Mrs. MORELLA. Without objection, that will be the case.

Mr. TROTTER. OK. Thank you.

WMATA in many ways is the region. We are a unique, multijurisdictional operating entity. We cut across State boundaries and

make decisions based on regional consensus. We must work in

partnership with all levels of governments to accomplish our mission of providing quality transportation services to the national

capital region.

The Board recognizes as the GAO report stated that WMATA is,

in some ways, a victim of its own success. The challenges facing

WMATA are largely the result of growing ridership demands, coupled with aging equipment and infrastructure throughout the transit system.

These twin challenges have put tremendous stress and strain on

the system. Our very able general manager, Richard White, is

going to discuss in greater detail some of the programs and projects

WMATA undertook to deal with issues of aging pains and growing

pains as we often refer to this phenomenon.

Before I yield to Mr. White, I just want to take this opportunity

to make a few statements on behalf of the Board of Directors.

The WMATA Board of Directors is very pleased with the GAO

report issued in July entitled, ‘‘Many Management Successes at

WMATA, but Capital Planning Could be Enhanced.’’ The report

has pointed us in the direction that we were already heading. We

believe that Metro managers have very capably dealt with unprecedented and unexpected ridership growth, while at the same time

rising to the demands of aging infrastructure. The WMATA board

has been vigilant in its oversight role in ensuring that the Transit

Authority provides safe, reliable, affordable service within available

resources.

We have the responsibility to our customers, to the region, to the

Federal Government, to the Congress, and to all taxpayers to protect its $10 billion public investment made in the marvelous transit

system that we call ‘‘America’s Subway.’’ An investment, I might

add, that would cost $22 billion to construct today. We must ensure

that we make the reinvestments necessary for safety and reliability, as well as those investments needed to accommodate the growVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:18 Sep 09, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00039 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\81350.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ing ridership that is occurring and will continue in the foreseeable

future. We welcome the opportunity to discuss WMATA’s funding

needs and look forward to working closely with you and the Congress to make sure that WMATA has the necessary resources to

meet the ridership demands of a rapidly growing national capital

region.

In closing, I would like to express my personal gratitude to

WMATA employees who, with their regional MTA New York, New

Jersey Transit, and Path colleagues, provided safe passage for millions of Americans last Tuesday.

Thank you again for the opportunity to address this subcommittee.

Mrs. MORELLA. I thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Trotter follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Again I reiterate my agreement with you about

the incredible job that WMATA did during that catastrophe. As a

matter of fact, I noted last night after the President’s message to

the country and to the world so many people taking WMATA to go

back and forth, as really has become necessary.

The general manager, Richard White, I now recognize you, sir.

Mr. WHITE. Chairwoman Morella, Ms. Norton, Mr. Davis, and

Ms. Watson, good morning. My name is Richard White, and I am

the general manager of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit

Authority. I am grateful for this opportunity to appear before you

today.

I want to observe first that the events of September 11, 2001, are

still with us here today and will be with us for some time to come.

I am proud to say that the family of 10,000 WMATA employees is

eager to continue contributing whatever we can do to the work that

remains in our metropolitan area in the aftermath of the attacks.

We are all pained by the devastation that also took place in New

York City, and I would like to take this opportunity to compliment

the several transit agencies in the New York metropolitan area

that did a Herculean job of keeping that area functioning during

the immediate aftermath of those tragic events.

Here in the Nation’s Capital WMATA has a long history of dedication to moving our region’s residents where they need to go safely

and securely. Today we stand ready to help Congress, the Federal

agencies, and, of course, the State and local jurisdictions we serve

to do whatever it takes to achieve preparedness for our Nation and

for our region, while still providing safe and reliable transit service

to our residents, many of whom are employees of the Federal Government.

Yesterday, at the request of the Department of Defense, WMATA

agreed to open the transit system at 5 a.m., a half hour earlier

than normal, for a period of up to 30 days to help relieve congestion

and parking problems around the Pentagon and elsewhere in the

region. In addition, we have established supplemental satellite

parking areas and additional bus service to help accommodate

more riders.

Today, we offer the suggestion that another important way to

help facilitate a more orderly movement of people in our metropolitan area would be the formal implementation of a well-defined system of staggered arrival and departure schedules for Federal employees, since some 35 to 40 percent of Federal workers in the region use Metro on a regular basis. This could encourage private

employees to follow suit and benefit the road system, as well as the

transit system.

Committee members and staff have already received my written

testimony, which addresses the three aims for today’s hearing in

detail. My oral statement today will briefly address each of these

three issues.

Almost a year ago I testified before this committee on challenges

and opportunities facing our transit system. At the direction of the

committee, the General Accounting Office studied WMATA’s major

programs—safety and security, operations and maintenance, and

capital planning and funding—over a period of several months.

WMATA is pleased that the resulting report published in July 2001

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gives WMATA a clean bill of health overall. The report observes

that WMATA has been a victim of its success, that challenges have

largely resulted from increase in ridership growth on our bus and

rail system during a period of time when our equipment and infrastructure are showing their age. As the GAO report said, Metro is

experiencing both growing pains and aging pains.

We welcome the reports four specific recommendations for improvement, which, in fact, point us in a direction in which we are

already heading. WMATA’s staff and Board of Directors have already moved on these recommendations.

Concerning the first recommendation that the Authority develop

a long-range strategic plan, we do, indeed, intend to develop an updated strategic plan. Our last one was done in 1990. And our Board

has directed that this effort be completed within a year from now

by September 2002.

We have also moved on the GAO’s second recommendation, the

development of a long-term capital plan that is integrated, properly

documented, and linked to WMATA’s overall goals and objectives.

Our one comment on one element of this GAO recommendation is

that almost all of our capital funding depends upon decisions made

by others that are beyond our control. In fact, WMATA’s funding

is provided by other governmental bodies in response to our statement of needs. If we were to present a capital plan that specified

a lower level of funding than what was actually required, it would

inevitably result in a reduced funding level.

On the third GAO recommendation, formalizing our internal capital decisionmaking process, WMATA has been working toward this

end for a series of improvements initiated about 3 years ago and

others that are more recently underway.

Addressing the fourth GAO recommendation, WMATA is actively

discussing with its jurisdictional partners an expanded role for our

agency in regional transportation project and program planning.

The committee’s second aim today, examining WMATA’s response to operational and maintenance problems, leads me again

to the events of September 11th. Last week WMATA showed that

it has what it takes to respond quickly and effectively in a major

crisis and during a period of heightened anxiety to move our traveling public in a safe and reliable manner. We are proud that on September 11th, when the Federal Government and indeed the entire

region, needed our services urgently, we were ready and we delivered. An unprecedented number of customers provided positive

feedback to us. To quote one of them, ‘‘Never again will I criticize

you for running over-crowded trains or any of the other small inconveniences. You were there for us when we really needed you

and we appreciate it.’’

Indeed, as the GAO report noted, the Federal Transit Administration and the American Public Transportation Association rate

WMATA’s safety and security programs and its performance very

good. We believe we proved that last week during the crisis.

The GAO report, itself, speaks favorably of WMATA’s intervention strategies and corrective action programs to improve performance and reliability. One the statistic that makes this point is the

number of passenger off-loads from our trains, which have declined

from an average of 7.2 per day in the fourth quarter of fiscal year

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1999 to an average of 4.6 in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2001,

even though Metro Rail was carrying almost 100,000 more passengers per day.

The third aim of today’s hearing, examining Metro’s accessibility

for customers with disabilities, offers another area of demonstrable

progress at WMATA. Already regarded as one of the most accessible transit systems in the United States, WMATA has paid even

more attention to its performance in this area. We have implemented an eight-step plan to address inconsistent performance in

our para-transit service known as ‘‘Metro Access.’’ In addition, we

are rapidly responding to FTA’s preliminary findings of its key station assessment report that was recently conducted.

In short, although we have much to be proud of, we know that

our record in certain areas of system accessibility can be improved,

and we are addressing these areas aggressively and proactively.

In summary, I would observe that WMATA is doing a very good

job overall, from the challenges and accomplishments discussed in

the GAO report to our improving performance in making Metro

more accessible to our success in rising to the occasion on September 11th, Metro continues to be a vital part of the everyday lives

of the region’s residents and an agency that can and does deliver.

If I leave you today with no other message, I want to make clear

that the most urgent challenge WMATA faces today is upward spiraling demand for our service at a time when our system is aging.

I can’t over-emphasize the fact that the accomplishments I have

cited here today have all taken place during a period of time when

we have been experiencing the highest growth rate of any major

transit system in the United States. This tremendous surge in demand makes it even clearer that we urgently need to address the

issue of funding for mass transit in the national capital region.

Using the GAO study and report as an outline for action, we are

eager to go forward from this hearing to work with all of our stakeholders, including partners that make up the Council of Governments Transportation Planning Board, to insure that we have the

financial resources necessary to serve our national capital region at

a level of performance that it has come to expect and demand.

I want to take this opportunity to thank the chairwoman and the

subcommittee members for working so closely and constructively

with WMATA staff, and I would also like to thank the GAO again

for its many months of work with us. I would also like to thank

the Federal Transit Administration, the U.S. Department of Transportation, and, of course, the U.S. Congress for the strong support

that they have demonstrated over the years. I believe that, as full

partners in the policy process, we will continue to make progress

toward our vision of a region in which everyone benefits from a

well-run and adequately funded transit system.

Thank you again.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. White, and thank you for your

concise written testimony going into each one of those areas that

was represented.

[The prepared statement of Mr. White follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Ms. Dorn, it is a pleasure to welcome you to our

hearing. Congratulations on your appointment.

Ms. DORN. Thank you very much.

The committee has a copy of my written testimony, so I would,

as my colleagues before me, like to summarize several of the key

points.

As all of this committee is aware, being part of the city that

hosts WMATA, public transportation in the United States is

blessed with diversity across the country. It is geographically dispersed within communities everywhere, it is diverse in its delivery

mechanisms, and, most of all, it is shaped to meet the unique features of the areas it serves. That is both a blessing and a challenge,

and on September 21st, shortly after one of the greatest tragedies

that America has faced, this diversity means that we regulate at

the Federal Transit Administration and provide important service

in transit agencies throughout the country in rail and bus systems,

but also electric trolley systems, cable cars, street cars, ferries, and

taxi-like systems.

We provide 9 billion trips collectively on public transportation

every year. The hallmark of the Nation’s public transportation system is—has, in fact, been the freedom that they provide to an

America on the go. Unfortunately, that means that many of us in

every aspect of American life has to look again at the paradigm

that we have perhaps, on some occasions, taken for granted.

Indeed, while public transportation is the safest mode of travel,

this historic freedom and openness that we’ve enjoyed in a system

like this comes with a special set of security concerns.

Obviously, airports are in a relatively closed environment. They

are more readily controlled. And though we know even that is difficult to constrain, the security measures can be more focused than

they can in the Nation’s public transportation system.

As the members of this committee know, the Federal Transit Administration is not involved in the day-to-day operations in that regard. Those functions have historically been operated by the local

citizenry.

For public transportation then en masse, there is a unique set

of countermeasures required when we face a situation of the security type of 2 weeks ago. And, indeed, all of the major transit systems, from the FTA’s perspective, are in a high state of alert. The

security plans do take into account some potential terrorist attacks.

FTA has talked with every major operator in the country within 48

hours of the tragedy and found, again, that all of the major transit

systems had immediately deployed security personnel at key areas,

whether they be bus or rail. They have increased the inspection of

their facilities and their infrastructure, including bridges and tunnels and tracks. They are reinforcing critical transportation systems such as electric substations, operation control centers, signal

rooms. All of this has been and will continue to be critical to the

safe operation of our system in public transportation.

A few short hours after the tragedy, I had the opportunity to

speak with the chairman of the New York Metro, Peter Calico, and

he said to me, ‘‘If I had known that 24 hours after this tragedy,

when two of most significant structures of New York had fallen,

that the major transportation system throughout New York, with

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the exception of one small area, would be in full operation, I would

never have believed it.’’ He also said that’s the wonderful thing

about New York, and I would agree with that.

I would also maintain that the kind of readiness and drills, preparedness plans, leadership that WMATA has displayed, both in

the recent past and immediately past, demonstrates that this system is up and ready, and I’m confident that could handle any security matter that was brought to their attention.

On the other hand, we have to recognize that nothing can be

completely rid of risk, and we are, unfortunately, living in a new

reality. We’re not going to be able to guard against every risk, and

we must make improvements and refinements, and I think all

transit agencies would agree, especially those in high alert, because

they are probably more alert to the fact of risk.

I cannot emphasize enough the importance of security training

and awareness to combating terrorism, and we at the FTA, and I

know in agencies throughout the country, are redoubling our efforts

there. The Secretary has charged every mode to be looking ahead

in this new area of vulnerability, and FTA is an eager and has

been an eager participant in that respect.

Public transportation needs to keep communities safe and moving, and we intend to do that in partnership with the many fine

transit agencies across the country.

With respect to the issue of WMATA’s overall performance, I

wanted to make a couple of comments about FTA’s perspective.

First of all, as has been echoed by my colleagues before me, even

those who do not run the system, it is, in fact, a very excellent and

effective system, particularly in rail. They have been growing by

leaps and bounds and have handled the growth well, from our perspective. And that is in no small part as a result of the outstanding

leadership and the innovative ideas that have been brought forth

by that leadership. With respect to innovative financing and a businesslike approach, that is what is required, and it is our hope that

every system across the country could be so proactive in that sort

of arena. It’s particularly important for a system like WMATA that

does not have the benefit of a predictable source of funding.

And so, while FTA agrees with the recommendations of the GAO

and we, indeed, are confident that WMATA is making a concerted

effort to accomplish these goals, they do so in a very difficult environment, which is, of course, no secret to this subcommittee.

From an oversight perspective, then, we believe they are doing—

that WMATA is doing a good job in using the funds we provide in

meeting the requirements as the law has required.

In the past 2 years, we know that WMATA has begun serious

long-range financial planning and planning for capacity expansion

this year. These are tremendously important efforts, and we know

there is more to be done, and we’re working closely with the Transportation Planning Board. I know how critical that has been to

other systems across the country that you have a seamless fabric

of community, public, and private agencies that seek to provide

public transportation.

With respect to the para-transit service, I would like to briefly

comment about this. Obviously service to the disability community

continues to be a challenge, not only to WMATA but to systems

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throughout the country. I am not convinced that FTA has it right

yet in terms of ensuring that we do the best job of oversight and

the best job of problem solving, and I view that both of those efforts

are imperative from our agency’s perspective. We have every evidence that there is a spirit of cooperation and problem solving in

WMATA, and we’re eager to pursue vigorously the challenge that

we face in providing effective transportation for the disability community.

Thank you very much.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Ms. Dorn.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Dorn follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Now I am pleased to recognize the Honorable

Phil Mendelson, the vice chairman of the National Capital Region

Transportation Planning Board. Welcome.

Mr. MENDELSON. Thank you and good morning, Madam Chairman and members of the subcommittee. I am Phil Mendelson. I am

first vice chair of the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board. Mayor John Mason of Fairfax, who chairs the Transportation Planning Board, could not be here today.

The TPB is the metropolitan planning organization for the Washington region. We are responsible for implementing Federal requirements for transportation planning. Our members include

elected officials from the District, Maryland, and Virginia; representatives from the three Departments of Transportation;

WMATA; and others.

The Washington region is facing a crisis in transportation funding. This is a crisis that even now is affecting our economy and

quality of life. Unless we take action, the situation will get worse.

Our region needs an increase of more than 50 percent in funding

for highways and transit. We are facing a gap of at least $1.75 billion per year—that is, $43 billion over the next 25 years. This is

a gap between the funding we have available and what is needed

both to maintain our current transportation system and to accommodate the growth in travel that will be generated by our increasing population and growing economy.

The Washington area is unusual in that we have no dedicated regional sources of funding for regional transportation improvements.

We are one of the very few metropolitan regions in the country

without a dedicated source of funding for its rail transit system.

Because of this, we have strived to put the need for enhanced funding mechanisms on the front burner of regional concerns. It is our

goal of our TPB vision adopted in 1998 that was the focus of a regional transportation summit we convened last November. It was

reiterated in a TPB resolution adopted this past spring, recognizing

that WMATA’s preservation, rehabilitation, and expansion, and the

funding therefor are a regional priority, and we will emphasize it

again this November 28th in a second regional transportation summit.

Finding adequate funding for WMATA is crucial because

WMATA is a critical element in the viability of our transportation

system. WMATA has the second highest ridership in the country.

Our system of roads and highways would fail utterly without

WMATA. We could not possibly attain compliance with the Clean

Air Act without WMATA. Indeed, I chair the TPB’s Task Force on

Conformity with our Clean Air Act Attainment Plan. Virtually

every proposal to reduce pollution in the mobile sector involves increasing the use of public transit.

The kind of security measures we are seeing now at Federal garages and parking lots is going to put further demands on

WMATA, which we have already seen with the Defense Department’s request for earlier Metro Rail hours. We must recognize

that all of WMATA’s funding needs relate to and affect capacity.

First, there is long-term maintenance, the infrastructure renewal

program. WMATA must maintain its system adequately so that it

is reliable. Unreliability reduces demand and indirectly capacity.

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Second, WMATA must expand its capacity to meet projected or

desired ridership growth on the existing system.

Third, there are numerous proposals to expand the system, such

as rail extensions, that would also expand capacity. Yet, according

to the current 25-year constrained, long-range plan, the three

States have committed to fund only 90 percent of the costs to maintain the system, to fund zero percent of the cost to accommodate

ridership growth, and to fund 100 percent of already-adopted system expansion projects, but there are many more expansion

projects that have not been adopted, and so funding is critical.

We are aware that in July—that the July GAO report suggests

that WMATA develop contingency plans for potential funding

shortfalls. On this I would like to make two points.

First, although this has not been formally discussed by the TPB,

I think most of if not all of us agree with WMATA that, because

its funding is provided by other governmental bodies in response

to a statement of needs, a capital plan that provides a contingency—i.e., a lower level of funding than what is actually required—would inevitably result in a reduced funding level.

Second, WMATA is a key player in the regional transportation

planning process, a process that establishes priorities and is coordinated through the TPB. Although this process can appear complex

and unwieldy at times, it is, in fact, an effective method for determining which transportation solutions will best serve the public

and for obtaining the political and financial support that capital

projects need to move forward.

For instance, our planning process includes corridor studies,

which examine a variety of options, including public transit, to

meet transportation needs. These corridor studies are typically undertaken by the States in partnership with WMATA, local governments, and the TPB. Once a project is recommended by a study,

funding sources are identified. That is the only way the project can

be included in the constrained, long-range plan, the region’s federally required 25-year long-range transportation plan.

In short, it is our view that, in facing WMATA’s uncertain longterm capital funding, the solution is to press harder for the funds

rather than to urge WMATA to develop contingency proposals.

We greatly appreciate this opportunity to testify.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Councilman Mendelson.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Mendelson follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Now we shall recognize Donna Sorkin, who is the

public board member, Access Board.

Ms. SORKIN. Good morning, Madam Chairman and subcommittee

members. I’m Donna Sorkin, and I’m executive director of the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing

and a Presidential appointee to the Access Board. I am pleased to

testify this morning in the absence of the Board’s Chair, Pamela

Holmes, on the accessibility of WMATA to people with disabilities.

The Access Board is a small, independent Federal agency dedicated to accessibility to people with disabilities comprised of 25

members, 13 of whom are Presidential appointees like me and most

of whom have disabilities. I am hard of hearing.

The Board has a staff of 30 people and responsibilities under separate laws for separate laws that require accessibility to buildings

and facilities, transportation vehicles, telecommunications, and

electronic and information technology. WMATA is directly impacted

by two of these laws, which I will focus on today.

First, the Access Board is charged with developing accessibility

guidelines for and enforcing the Architectural Barriers Act [ABA],

which requires that certain federally funded buildings and facilities

be accessible.

Second, the Access Board is charged with developing the Americans with Disabilities Act Accessible Guidelines [ADAAG], and I’d

like to begin with the Architectural Barriers Act.

In order to understand the Access Board’s enforcement activities

under the ABA in relation to WMATA, a brief bit of history is in

order. The ABA was the Nation’s first Federal accessibility law and

was enacted in 1968. In 1970, Congress amended the ABA to specifically require that facilities constructed under the National Capital Transportation Acts of 1960 and 1965 and the Washington

Metropolitan Transit Compact be accessible.

Despite this legislation, WMATA’s transit stations were not designed to be accessible and did not have elevators, accessible paths

of travel, and other accessibility features. A lawsuit was filed in

1972 directed by the situation, and in 1973 the court enjoined

WMATA from opening any transit stations until they complied

with the current accessibility standards.

The applicable standards then were developed—that were developed in 1961 and reaffirmed in 1971 as a private consensus standard through the American National Standards Institute [ANSI].

The ANSI standards were very minimum and consisted of only six

pages. Today ADAAG is 71 pages long and requires greater accessibility than the old ANSI standards.

The Access Board began processing ABA complaints in 1977, and

since then we have received 28 complaints involving WMATA’s

transit stations. The complaints usually concern accessible parking,

accessible routes, and elevators.

For example, one complaint about the Van Dorn Street Station

involved several accessibility features which are delineated in the

Board’s written statement. As a result of the Access Board’s investigation of the complaint, WMATA made improvements in these accessibility features.

Another complaint involved elevator buttons. The complaint was

filed by a quadriplegic with limited arm strength who noticed that

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WMATA was installing new elevator buttons that were recessed

into the face of the panel. Such buttons are difficult if not impossible for individuals with limited strength and dexterity to operate,

and, as a result of the Access Board’s investigation, WMATA took

action to ensure that all elevator buttons in its transit stations are

either flush with the face of the panel or raised above the panel.

The Access Board has also received complaints about elevators

frequently being out of service. For people with disabilities, this is

more than just an inconvenience. It is equivalent to closing the station to them. Imagine the public reaction if all riders were told that

Metro Station or Gallery Place was closed for a few days or weeks

and they had to use another station. This is a common experience

for people with disabilities.

The Americans with Disabilities Act [ADA], requires that key

stations in existing transit systems be accessible. Each transit authority is responsible for designating its key stations, and then

must submit a plan to the Federal Transit Administration [FTA],

that establishes milestones for bringing those stations into compliance with ADAAG. WMATA submitted its key station plan to the

FTA in 1992, designating 45 of its 85 transit stations as key stations.

ADAAG requires greater accessibility at key stations than provided under the old ANSI standards. For example, the old ANSI

standards had no provisions for making public address systems accessible to people who are deaf and hard of hearing. When public

announcements in transit stations are made, I cannot understand

them. ADAAG requires that, when public address systems are used

to convey information to the general public in transit facilities, a

means must be provided for conveying the same or equivalent information for people who cannot hear the information. WMATA has

now installed additional electronic methods of conveying that information.

Public text telephones, or TTYs, and telephones with volume control now must be required in stations to provide greater accessibility, and these were not required under the old ANSI standards.

ADAAG requires that detectable warnings be placed on platform

edges of transit stations. Detectable warnings are small, truncated

domes designed to alert people who are blind or visually impaired

that they are approaching the edge of the platform. The old ANSI

standards did not require detectable warnings. In 1998, WMATA

began installing detectable warnings, and they are now in all of the

key stations.

The ADA has resulted in improvements in accessibility and at

WMATA’s key stations. People with disabilities use WMATA to get

to work and to enjoy the many activities available in the Washington metropolitan area. Think for a moment of the visually impaired

mother who can now take her child to the Smithsonian using

WMATA without fear of inadvertently getting too close to the platform station. And consider the deaf or hard-of-hearing executive

who is running late for a meeting and needs to call her colleagues

to tell them that she’s on her way. The ADA and ADAAG have benefited them and millions of other people with disabilities who use

WMATA and other transit systems across the country to live their

lives like other Americans.

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Thank you, Madam Chairman, for the opportunity to provide this

testimony.

Mrs. MORELLA. I want to thank you very much for the excellent

testimony.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Holmes follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I want to thank all of you.

Now we’ll start our round of questioning, and try to keep our

questions to about 5 minutes and back and forth until we appear

to have the major questions answered.

I think I’m going to get right into the center of things in terms

of preparedness for emergencies and security, so I guess I would

start off with the GAO and ask, you know, Metro—we’ve all said

that Metro acted in an exemplary fashion with the recent disaster.

I just wondered what your assessment is of Metro’s emergency preparedness to handle different kinds of threats, you know, like terrorist attacks on stations.

I’m going to direct that to you, Ms. Hecker, and then I will expand the question for Manager White.

Ms. HECKER. What we did was we looked at the procedures and

we didn’t rigorously evaluate them, so we’re really talking about

what kind of procedures were in place.

What we did find is that they clearly had a lot of preparedness

activity. There were exercises and there were initiatives across the

board to deal with the full range of both safety and security risks,

and activities continue to identify new risks, as we’ve heard today.

So it was really a question of an attitude and a posture of preparedness and a constant learning and putting appropriate procedures and improvements in place.

Mrs. MORELLA. Did you want to add anything, Ms. Grieco? I

could tell.

Ms. GRIECO. I would just add that WMATA does have very detailed procedures for instructing its employees as to how they

should determine the threat level, what actions they should take

when an incident occurs. I mean, WMATA’s role is generally one

of crisis management, so they would secure the scene and make

sure passengers are evacuated, but it’s really the local fire and police authorities who would have to respond if there were, you know,

a terrorist attack.

Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. White, that gets into the whole question of

looking at last Tuesday. There was a great exodus from Federal

buildings, tourist attractions, etc., and many people, including

some members of my own staff, didn’t know whether or not Metro

was going to be operating, whether it had been closed. The District

of Columbia didn’t hold a press conference until later that afternoon to advise people. And I just wondered, did WMATA attempt

to notify the public about their status of operation before the city

had its press conference?

Mr. WHITE. Yes, Madam Chair. We had, within minutes of the

first crash into the World Trade Center, increased our level of preparedness under our police standard operating procedures to a

threat level Charlie, and immediately upon the crash into the Pentagon had activated our command center.

And when we do that, we bring all of our—all of the various

parts of our organization together into one command center location. We have all of our safety and security personnel, our operations personnel, our media relations personnel, our physical—people who take care of our physical plant personnel all working in

one room accessing the same information that comes from a multitude of sources, and we have televisions, of course, in these

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rooms, and we have cameras in our stations that broadcast back

to these rooms.

When we immediately heard the first erroneous report—I’m not

exactly sure what the initial source of that erroneous report was— that we were closed down, our media relations people instantaneously contacted that news media outlet, and then others, that

those reports were false reports and that we were, indeed, operational. So I think that, although there was a period of time, I

think it was a very brief period of time where there were some outlets that were reporting that we were closed, and we made it clear.

And, for the record, we were open the entire time.

We did have, of course, a couple of our stations that were closed,

and some people were confusing that message with the message

that the system was closed. Obviously, the Pentagon Station was

closed, and then that closed immediately upon the incident at the

Pentagon, and then at 11 a.m., National Airport Station was

closed.

Other things that we did, for example, we stopped our service

over the Potomac, our Yellow Line service over the Potomac, the

bridge that we have that goes over the Potomac, based upon information we had that was going on at that moment in time of additional threats of airplanes on their way into the metropolitan area.

So I think there was some confusion. We responded immediately

to try and correct the confusion, to let everybody know that we

were fully functional, and I think the organization did an outstanding job in that regard, and everything comes from our access to information. And not only do we set up our own command center, we

immediately sent out personnel over to the Metropolitan Police Department’s command center, Chief Ramsey and all the folks that

he gathers over there, and then, once the Emergency Management

Agency created their command center, we sent somebody over

there. And also the Pentagon had its own field command center

under the jurisdiction of the military, but we had people over there.

And we also have a full-time officer who is assigned to the FBI

Counter-Terrorism Task Force on a full-time basis.

So we had all the information there was to be had, quite frankly,

and more than most people in our metropolitan area had when

they were making decisions, so we were the best informed entity,

I believe, to make the decisions. Unfortunately, there were some—

was some misinformation that the media spread, but I think we got

it corrected pretty quickly.

Mrs. MORELLA. I’m pleased to hear that. And I wondered also,

in the event of an emergency which disrupts the flow of bus—of

traffic buses, their routes, and they have to be altered, how is that

information conveyed to passengers and to the bus drivers?

Mr. WHITE. Well, of course, we’ve got to hear it ourselves, first.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. WHITE. And I think there was some confusion. I know Chief

Ramsey was concerned that they didn’t get quick notification on

things like the 14th Street Bridge being shut down and HOV lanes

being shut down, and we have buses that run in HOV lanes, so obviously we had our share of difficulty navigating through it.

But, you know, we were able, through our command center structure—and, I might add, although others suffered from communicaVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:18 Sep 09, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00122 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\81350.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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tion failures, we had no communication failures, based upon the

types of equipment that we use, including our own portable radio

system, where we’re able to communicate over the radio waves to

our people in our locations. But we have our internal phone system

that operates through the Authority’s internal switch, so we were

not accessing and competing with the phone capacity that goes in

or outside, and many people did have difficulty using land lines

and even cell phones, as well, so we did not experience any of those

kinds of problems.

So we were fully communicative to all of the aspects of our organization. We were both receiving instant information from them

and communicating it out.

A person staffs our bus desk, and that’s the chief operating officer for the bus system, so we had all of our executives who were

in there, and he was making sure that information on street closures was passed to our people, detour information was passed to

our people. Our people were reporting to us street closures, and we

were passing that information on.

So yes, our bus system did experience the same kind of trouble

that people driving their automobile experienced, but I must say

that our operators were enormously creative in their ability to

navigate through that, and a fair amount of the positive feedback

we got were from customers who were on our buses who were,

quite frankly, amazed at how well our bus drivers did in the middle of all that traffic chaos.

Mrs. MORELLA. You’re pleased with your working with or the cooperation that you get from the Police Department. I know we’ve

got Barry McDevitt here. And the communication, you are satisfied

with that stream of communication?

Mr. WHITE. Yes, Madam Chair. We immediately, as I said, sent

our personnel under the regular procedures to the MPD Command

Center the moment the MPD Command Center set up their operation, and they get a number of the other authorities, largely the

large number of Federal law enforcement authorities that we have,

and, of course, they have, you know, FBI, Secret Service participation in their Command Center, as well. So we had our person over

there immediately, and that was very useful. We had—as I said,

we had our person later in the morning, when the city’s Emergency

Management Agency set theirs up, that was close to noon, so that

was a little bit later. But yes, I am very pleased that those procedures worked well. And, of course, people’s complaints are around

what information they did or did not know, you know, with respect

to our communications.

Mrs. MORELLA. And fortunately this tragedy will never happen

again, but it does give us an opportunity, also, to look at what

we’ve got in order to come up with some kinds of improvements,

too, to even—even despite the fact that you’ve done extraordinarily

well, to even improve it for the future.

My time has expired for this round.

Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. I want to thank all the presenters for their presentations. And mass transit is just that, and I was very concerned on

Tuesday because I live diagonally across from the Pentagon, and

they closed the 14th Street Bridge. I never did get home that night.

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But I was very, very concerned about mass transit, particularly

your underground. You had mentioned, one of the first presenters,

that you were now looking into the biological emissions and so on.

I’d like you to elaborate. And I’m not sure which person made that

statement. Yes? And if you could elaborate, I’d be very appreciative.

Ms. HECKER. I would be happy to, but I think Mr. White would

be in a much better position.

Ms. WATSON. Mr. White.

Mr. WHITE. What was referred to is about more than 3 years ago

we entered into an interagency agreement first with the Justice

Department, and then subsequently party to a broader agreement

in the Government, not only with Justice but the Department of

Energy and the Department of Transportation, as well.

Our National Laboratories that worked under the auspices of the

Department of Energy, such as, you know, Sandia, Livermore, Argonne, and those labs, have been working with the Federal Government to redeploy military technology, you know, into our, you

know, domestic economy, and one area that they have had a keen

interest in, of course, is our urban transit systems, and they have— we installed a little over a year ago now a sensor that those labs

develops, and so these are some of the best minds, literally, in our

country that are working on this, and they’ve spent multiple millions of dollars already in this process of doing this, and these first

sensors are now installed in the initial part of our system at Smithsonian and its connection to the next adjacent station to Federal

Triangle. And these sensors are now under test, and obviously the

theory here is that you are able to detect, immediately upon the

smallest presence of such a chemical agent being released, the ability to detect that with alarms going off and then trying to have the

ability of first responders to have access to good information to

make decisions on what to do.

This also includes the ability to remotely look into those stations

through our CCTV cameras off of laptops that police officers, fire

personnel, emergency personnel, and WMATA personnel would be

able to do so we wouldn’t have to send somebody in there without

some sort of visual indication of other things that are going on.

The next step in this process is additional money is being appropriated, as I understand it, again through the Energy Department,

to expand this to another five stations in the Metro system. The

technology thus far is limited to chemical releases. Biological releases, the technology is not quite there, but people believe we are

close to that technology. And our sensors have been set up so that

they would be modular, so when biological is ready it just gets

added to the sensors we already have so we don’t have to go out

and get all new sensors.

This offers—we’re the only ones, not only in this country, but in

the world that is doing this. Others in Europe have already experienced tragedy in our urban subway systems, Asia, as well, you

know, Paris, Munich, Tokyo have all experienced unfortunate situations, yet they are not even as far advanced as we are in this effort.

So I know there are many, many people who are very hopeful

that our testing of this will develop a technology that can be usable

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in our country. It is going to require a considerable amount of

money, should we choose to make these investments, but there is

obvious great potential to this.

And the corollary to that is on the issue of preparedness. We are

also the only transit system that has quick masks or gas masks for

our operating personnel, so that gives them 20 minutes to be able

to get out of harm’s way the minute that there’s a detection of the

initial presence in small quantities. So if the alarms can detect

small quantities and we can get people out of there, our employees

and our customers, before they become deadly, then that’s what

this system is hopefully intended to do.

The ultimate of this system is to develop a set of engineering

controls so that not only is the release detected, but it is controlled

through some set of engineering controls to collect that which has

been released and then to disburse it to some other place where it

could safely be done so.

So this is quite advanced kinds of things that are going on with

that.

Ms. WATSON. Let me just suggest this. As we know, if there is

any kind of biological matter released, it is borne on the airways.

You’ve got passengers by the hundreds and thousands on your cars

in a tube. And this has been a concern because I don’t think the

terrorism is over yet, and I think probably the next attack will be

something biological emitted into a canister, one of your Metro Rail

cars or so on. You might have a sensor go off indicating the presence, but it doesn’t protect the passengers. You just can’t move that

fast.

Mr. WHITE. Well, the——

Ms. WATSON. So is there any thinking? What do the airlines do?

If the cabins become depressurized, immediately something drops

out so people can then put on a mask. Maybe this is something

that could be looked at in terms of the second step. You can sense

something has been emitted, but what do passengers do until you

can get them off of those cars?

So this might be something you will want to research, take into

consideration, since the airlines have dealt with that, too.

Mr. WHITE. Yes. I mean, that’s a very good point. I mean, we do

know that we need to, you know, get people out of harm’s way immediately, and this is now—you know, you have literally minutes

to be able to do that, and I think we will certainly investigate the

idea that you have with respect to the airlines about its feasibility.

I mean, we’ve got as many as 1,000, you know, people, you know,

on our train system, you know, moving in and out of that train system with much more regularity than, you know, an airline. Once

you get on a plane, you’re on that plane until you get where you

want to go. But it’s certainly an idea that needs to be explored.

There’s no doubt about it.

Ms. WATSON. Well, that dovetails right into my second concern,

and that is trying to design some kind of way to finance the Metro

service. And I know you are within a region. You have several

States involved. But we look—we have to look at some way where

you can project into your next fiscal year how you are going to finance and what your revenues will be, because I think you have

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an excellent program, but you’ve got to be able to address the concerns that have been mentioned here around the table.

Is it feasible to look at some way that the States involved and

the Federal Government might increase the cost of ridership or assess those services along the way so that you could anticipate a certain amount of money annually that you could be—that you could

count on for maintaining the ridership, maintaining the mechanics,

maintaining your program?

Mr. WHITE. Well, we have been attempting, to the best of our

abilities, to move people in that direction. Several of the people

who have testified have indicated how complex our political and

funding decisionmaking process is in our metropolitan area. We get

money that comes not only from the Federal Government to States

and the District of Columbia, but about five or six other local jurisdictions, as well, and it is—and there is no overall regional approach that is in place right now. It is a matter of, quite literally,

each year, certainly in the operating budgets, trying to define your

needs and passing your hat and going to 8 or 9 or 10 different

places, hoping that everybody will come up with their fair share.

We have all these nice little formulas in place to determine fair

share. The problem becomes when one jurisdiction, for whatever

reason, has other competing priorities or has fiscal conditions that

don’t allow it to get to that level, and they say we can’t do that.

Everybody retreats down to their percentage share of reduced level.

I call it ‘‘lowest common denominator budgeting.’’ It provides enormous challenge to us. And that’s just on the operating side. And

then, when you throw the capital side in place, as well, we do have

6, 10, and 25 capital plans, so we are trying to tell people what’s

coming with a pretty high degree of, you know, accuracy to the extent that one can predict that far out.

The problem really seems to be—and as Mr. Mendelson has already indicated—the size of what this metropolitan area is dealing with is about $1.7 billion per year for its transit and road system

that it needs on top of the $3 billion per year that it is spending.

So these are very, you know, big numbers.

Ms. WATSON. Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. I’m going to—thank you very much. I know Mr.

Davis has been very patiently waiting. I’d certainly like him to

have an opportunity to ask some questions.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you.

Ms. Dorn, let me ask a question. Has FTA reviewed WMATA’s

emergency evacuation plan?

Ms. DORN. Yes. Yes, we have. In the context of our regulatory

authority, we have done so.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. How does it compare to other mass transit systems nationwide?

Ms. DORN. Well, it is a good plan. It’s very difficult to make comparisons because there are so many differences and uniqueness, as

is the case in public transportation across the country. There are

ever different situations, whether you have a tunnel, whether you

have a new subway, an old subway, whether it is primarily bus

system, all those sorts of things, so that’s why it is very important

that we have security audit teams who have familiarity who can

come in and give an assessment about where we are.

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It is particularly important that those plans be revisited, as we

have, unfortunately, seen in the last couple of weeks. It also is very

tempting, I think, to yield to the opportunity or the thought that

there is some magic formula of technology that would reduce the

risk when, in fact, there are useful pieces of technology that have

been discussed by Mr. White.

Perhaps even more important than that is the aspect of training

and awareness of all the people and looking at the system that you

employ in a holistic way. You can have the best technology in the

world, and if the people are not acquainted with it or they’re not

trained and aware of how to react when they see a problem, then

the whole system fails. So it really needs to be a holistic look, and

it must be done by experts in the context of that local community

and what the risks, both geographic and technological, are.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Let me ask Mr. White, I mean, I know

you drill on these things occasionally, because I read about it in the

paper. This is a heightened awareness in terms of the importance

where you don’t want to have somebody reading from a book when

this comes. You want it drilled into them where they kind of act

instinctively. How do you feel about the plan at this point? Are you

looking to update it, and maybe some different perspectives after

the last couple of weeks?

Mr. WHITE. Well, I think one always can look back over an event,

no matter how well one thinks that they’ve performed, and say, ‘‘This could have been better and that could have been better,’’ and

we are certainly doing that ourselves right now, and the extent to

which we see things that make sense to change our procedures,

we’ll do that, but, you know, I do believe that we have the best set

of procedures that exist in this country and that we are the most

prepared transit system in this country.

But, having said that, that doesn’t mean that we can guarantee

anybody that—— Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Well, the passenger first—— Mr. WHITE [continuing]. We can keep things from happening. We

do have to be able to respond if and when they do happen. But I

do believe that we are very well prepared. We have annual exercises that we conduct under the coordination of Metro where we

take all of the jurisdictions and all of their fire and emergency rescue personnel and we replicate a significant tragical event, and

then we test how well everybody responds to that, that tabletop exercise, and then we debrief and critique how well everybody did

and what issues are human factors, what issues are procedures

and training, and then we work to improve ourselves.

I meet annually with all of the fire chiefs in the region to review

what we’re doing and to determine what the next steps are with

respect to our coordination and preparedness. Our police officers

are probably the only ones in the country who get annual terrorist

training.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Is WMATA’s core capacity study complete?

Mr. WHITE. Well, from the point of view of staff development, it

is largely done. We are——

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. So it’s not complete, but it is well on its

way?

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Mr. WHITE. Yes. To expand what this is, we’ve talked a lot about

the issue of capacity, and we have now, for the last year now, been

engaged in a very comprehensive review of the issue of when we

reach capacity in our system, what kinds of investments we need

to make in order to provide additional capacity in the system.

We’ve put everything under the microscope, from cars to stations

to our power distribution and signaling systems.

Next Thursday, Mr. Davis, will be the first presentation the staff

makes to the committee of our Board of Directors who has jurisdiction in reviewing this, and we’ve got at least two workshops scheduled with the Board, and we are hopeful that, within the next several weeks, the staff and the Board will have come to a single mind

as to what our go-forward plans and programs need to be to deal

with this phenomena of accommodating ridership growth, and

we’re breaking this down into 5-year increments looking out over

25 years.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. So that will then, obviously, impact your

long-range planning?

Mr. WHITE. Very much so, yes.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. But you don’t have anything at this point

you’ve been able to share with GAO or anyone else, because it is

still being done internally?

Mr. WHITE. We have been able to share with the GAO everything

that we have presented to our Board to date, and it is largely— what I will call it, it’s the framework for the analysis. It’s the background date for the analysis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Right.

Mr. WHITE. But it is not the plan. And we will certainly commit

ourselves, as we always have in our coordination with the GAO, to

take them through this analysis, and we’ll probably be able to do

that next week with them.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. OK. GAO has—I guess you don’t have

any reaction yet until you’ve seen the total plan?

Ms. HECKER. No. We did have detailed briefings that will be part

of the discussion, I think, with the Board. I think the magnitude

of the expenditures will really bring into relief the concern we

have, though, about the current budgeting situation, and I think at

that point the critical urgency of really getting some long-term

commitments within the region really come to fore.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you. My time is up. I appreciate

your responses.

Thank you, Madam Chairman.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Davis.

Going back to the security issue—and you mentioned the police,

Mr. White—do you traditionally have security training? Do you

have your employees who are trained for security? How do you do

that?

Mr. WHITE. We have, I believe it’s approximately 325 sworn police officers and about another 100 additional personnel in our Police Department, and that is now being augmented by another 37

hires in this year’s budget, and they go through, before they step

foot on our property, a very lengthy training program, and the

uniqueness of the requirements of our police officers is they need

to know the laws of three States.

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Mrs. MORELLA. Right.

Mr. WHITE. So they are probably the most educated officer in

this metropolitan area with respect to compliance with the law and

other training efforts that they undertake. It’s really an extraordinary level of training. So that when they get here, they are extremely well prepared, and, you know, should you have a desire to

know in greater detail what is involved with that training, I’m sure

our chief could answer a question for you.

And then on top of that we have annual types of refresher training for our officers, and a few years ago we introduced, before really people—anybody was really talking about the issue of terrorism,

certainly in our country, a program each year for refresher training

on responding to terrorist types of acts—— Mrs. MORELLA. Really?

Mr. WHITE [continuing]. On the Authority with our police officers.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. WHITE. That also has been a byproduct of our participation,

full-time participation on the FBI’s Counter-Terrorism Task Force.

So we have been, in my opinion, quite, quite leading edge as an

agency in the preparedness of our police officers to kind of be

aware of these issues and to be able to both have the intelligence

to prevent something from happening, access to high-level intelligence information—— Mrs. MORELLA. This morning’s paper mentions that some passengers had complained that they had not seen police anywhere on

the Metro in the days after the attacks. Is that incorrect? Are they

just not looking, or in the wrong places?

Mr. WHITE. I mean, obviously, all of us know how we all individually respond after an event like that, and people have a high level

of anxiety and insecurity, and my own—and I know we had all of

our personnel out. The chief, you know, canceled vacations, brought

people back, put them out there. They were in high-visibility vests

to try and even draw more attention to them. And, you know, a

number of people in a very crowded station, even with an officer

in a very loud-colored vest, may not see that officer and think that

there are not, you know, police personnel out there, but, you know,

I think that is both a product of the heightened anxiety that an individual has in the aftermath of this and——

Mrs. MORELLA. How many police—I don’t know, maybe I should

be asking this to Mr. McDevitt, but how many police do you traditionally have in the Metro stations?

Mr. WHITE. Let me ask the chief to answer that.

Mrs. MORELLA. And on active duty. I don’t mean in—maybe

you’d break it down, administrative versus——

Mr. MCDEVITT. Yes. We have on a daily basis probably 40 or 50

uniformed officers on patrol in the Metro Rail system, and they are

augmented by bicycle patrols in our parking lots, motorcycle patrols, and vehicular patrols where the car is parked at various— patrols various parking lots and subway stations.

Mrs. MORELLA. But you only have, what, 40 or 50 altogether?

Mr. MCDEVITT. It’s usually one officer per three stations, in general, but they can overlap and, depending on transfer stations and

different problems that we have throughout the day, they combine

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and work together on the situation, depending on what we’re trying

to do.

Mrs. MORELLA. Is that an adequate number?

Mr. MCDEVITT. Yes, ma’am.

Mrs. MORELLA. I mean, I don’t know. That—you find that’s working efficiently? They’re in the station, they’re in the parking lot,

they communicate with each other?

Mr. MCDEVITT. Yes, they do.

Mrs. MORELLA. And so—and each one has a good two, three stations, right?

Mr. MCDEVITT. They have a minimum two or three stations, but

they do—like I said, they do have overlaps. The cars overlap the

foot-beat officers, the bicycles overlap and the motorcycles overlap,

also, so it is very difficult to say, but usually the high-volume stations is where you are obviously going to have more presence.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. I’m pleased that you think it’s adequate. I

don’t really know whether that’s the case or not. I rely on you.

Director White, you are asking—Mr. Manager, you are asking for, like, $20 million I noticed from the appropriation that Congress

approved. And could you give us just a simple breakdown of how

you see that money being used?

Mr. WHITE. We have—and this is based on a very quick assessment in order to see if there is an opportunity to access this funding source—we have looked at the kinds of things that we think

should be done to kind of shore up our bus garages, our rail stations, and our rail maintenance facilities to prevent unauthorized

access into those facilities, so a portion of the funding is set up to

put physical devices—jersey barrier and other types of physical devices to try to secure our physical assets.

Another chunk of the money is set up to provide for a higher degree of accuracy in what is known as an intrusion detection system.

We already have the capabilities to know when people are—unauthorized people are in our system, but what we’d like to do is to

be able to narrow it down to a very precise location so people can

be dispatched very quickly to the precise location for which an

alarm is tripped. So there’s about $9 million of the $20 million that

has been identified for that purpose. There’s 5.5 million is identified for the perimeter fencing concept that I just explained to you.

Another $2 million is to complete the work we’re attempting to do.

We have 1,400 cameras in our system, and we’ve identified 30 of

our stations as being our high-traffic, high-profile stations, and we

would like to not only have video capabilities but to be able to have

recording capabilities. Right now we cannot record those cameras

so that the recording can take place if people are being—if there

are people who are being looked at from the FBI’s list in terms of

people who need to be—and we need to check to see whether people

are moving in and out of the system. That would help give us the

capability to do that, and then to bring all that information back

to a central location on a real-time basis so it could be accessed

with dispatch. There’s $2 million associated with that.

Some additional closed-circuit TV and motion detector alarms

and fencing in our rail yard, $2 million. And then some employee

ID and access at our central office building and other locations to

take advantage of the smart card technology that we have that our

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customers now use to pay for our rail system, to be able to use that

accept—that smart card as an employee ID and a building access

card so that—you know, to restrict access through our facilities by

the use of a smart card.

So those are the five ideas that we have advanced, the sum total

of which is $20 million.

Mrs. MORELLA. Ms. Dorn, that must make them a model for the

Nation, doesn’t it?

Ms. DORN. You mean by asking for the money? [Laughter.]

Mrs. MORELLA. Somehow, that’s something that wherever you

are, whenever you are there, you always get that kind of request.

But in terms of all of the procedures that they are looking

toward—— Ms. DORN. Absolutely. A number—first of all, they do have an incredibly model system in many respects, and I would also add to

what Mr. White has said in terms of the importance of the training

courses and having people be aware, and there are a number of— hundreds, actually, of courses that are available out there, the need

to modify plans to do security audits.

In addition to the capital needs, there are some more, perhaps,

basic needs of other systems and the need to take a look at the security plan in a new environment.

So the administration is currently looking through all of those

needs. We recognize that we are in a new day and a new paradigm.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Ms. DORN. And with respect to public transportation, we have to

very quickly prioritize where the needs are and which systems

have those needs, so we look forward to working with WMATA and

others to help determine and focus those anticipated dollars.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. I visited a company in my District just recently who has come up with a smart card. I’m sure a number of

others have, too. But it is remarkable the kind of information that

can be put on them and that there can still be privacy.

Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. Just a quick question. We were concerned about

some of your stations that have only—this is directed to Mr.

White—only one exit, and in an evacuation mode would that be efficient, effective? So can you comment on this, particularly one station. Why don’t I not mention it at this time. But you might want

to comment.

Mr. WHITE. Yes, you are correct in your observation that some

number of our stations are single entrance stations. It is the way

they were designed and how they were sized. You know, one of the

things that we have been examining and is a part of our core capacity study is to take a look at whether we need to expand the

capabilities of our stations in some regard, including putting additional access entrance points into the station at some of the highvolume stations. As you would imagine, that’s a pretty expensive

proposition to undertake. It is usually at least $20 million to do at

a particular location.

We have been steadily moving in that direction. We’ve put some

new entrances in at the Gallery Place Station when the MCI Center was built. We’re putting some new entrances in at our Mt. Vernon location to support the new convention center—actually, I’m

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sorry, widening and expanding that one single entrance. In Virginia there are two or three locations that we are working with Arlington County on to build additional entrances into those locations

and pursuing separate State funding for that purpose.

So clearly it is something that needs to be done, both for evacuation purposes as well as just for, you know, access to our system

and to deal with the crowding of the system, so we are doing our

level best to identify where we could benefit from doing things such

as that, but there are obviously costs associated with it.

Staff does remind me that each of our stations does have, in addition to the regular public entrance into that location, emergency

exits in those stations under emergency conditions, and people

would also be evacuated should there be such a requirement

through the emergency exit at those station locations.

Ms. WATSON. Is it anticipated that someone could get into the

station, get down on the tracks, and some way put some kind of

device that would, I guess, explode and cause some damage to the

linkages? Has that been anticipated? And if that were the case,

what would happen from there in terms of the passengers and the

movement of the trains?

Mr. WHITE. Yes, I mean, obviously that is what we are probably

best equipped to deal with at this stage right now in terms of being

prepared to be able to inspect our assets. You know, we have so

much train services moving through the system, all of our train operators and other personnel who are in the stations who are not

just our police personnel have special training on the kinds of

things to look for, unusual things that are on the track bed. Standard operating procedures have governed how we respond if there’s

something in our track bed with respect to helping our trains until

we can determine what it is.

We have sent all of our personnel who are in our stations doing

various types of job activities, they are all trained in how to alert

on suspicious packages—there’s probably no other system in the

country that does that, either—so that if there is some suspicious

package that is dropped and we have a person who is cleaning the

station or a station manager is in there or some other individual,

they can—they’re trained to alert on that.

And, quite frankly, we have had, you know, several instances

where we’ve actually closed the system down and evacuated the

stations based upon suspicious packages, and have responded accordingly.

So, you know, again, you know, everybody who is responsible for

public safety and security—and none of us can make guarantees to

people, but what we can say is that we are as prepared as we can

possibly be, and forever looking at other things that we should be

doing, and attempting to do that so that we can minimize the possibility or probability of anything taking place in our system. But

our employees are very well trained to do this, and it’s not just the

police who have the responsibility.

Mrs. MORELLA. OK. Ms. Sorkin, I would like to ask you, you

know, as we talk about emergency preparedness, I would like to

ask you if you are cognizant of plans that would deal with people

with disabilities in the event of any emergency.

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Ms. SORKIN. I’d like to ask the staff to assist me with that question, because I’m not—— Mrs. MORELLA. Indeed.

Ms. SORKIN [continuing]. I’m not aware of any such plans.

This is David Capozi. He’s director of technical programs for the

Access Board.

Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Capozi, could I ask you to be sworn in?

Would you raise your right hand.

[Witness sworn.]

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, sir.

Mr. CAPOZI. I think that’s an area that Metro could do a better

job in informing passengers as to the procedures to evacuate. They

do have information on the trains as to emergency evacuation. It’s

not particularly spelled out well for people with disabilities. And

one of the concerns that I would have, as a disabled rider, is when

the elevators are shut down or when the escalators are shut down

what procedures are in place to allow an individual in a wheelchair

to evacuate that particular station.

We’ve had problems at our building, in particular. We have evacuation chairs so that individuals can be moved out of our building,

but we know where those chairs are, we know where our employees

are. That’s not always going to be the case for Metro. And in the

stations that’s particularly more difficult than for a bus would be,

and I think Metro needs to—I’m sure that they have procedures in

place, but the passengers are not aware of the ways in which they

can be safely evacuated from stations.

Mrs. MORELLA. I know that Mr. White wants to respond, but before he does is there any other issue? I mean, the elevator issue

is a question not only during an emergency, but if it’s just not

working also, right?

Mr. CAPOZI. Right.

Mrs. MORELLA. Is there anything else in terms of the Access

Board concerns that you would like to pose?

Mr. CAPOZI. The other issue also is that, not just for people who

use wheelchairs, but for individuals who can’t hear the announcements that are made on the stations or on the trains.

Mrs. MORELLA. OK.

Mr. CAPOZI. To get that information to individuals. There have

been cases where you could be at the end of the line and the train

is out of service, and there is a person who is deaf or hard of hearing on that train and they’re not aware that train is out of service,

and they get taken into the yard and have difficulty getting off the

train. So think of that in terms of an emergency.

Mrs. MORELLA. Right.

Mr. CAPOZI. How is that information imparted to people who

can’t hear, as well.

Mrs. MORELLA. Right. Thank you.

Mr. White.

Mr. WHITE. Well, a variety of issues here.

The issue of elevators is certainly a challenging issue, as is the

issue of escalators. We have 180 elevators and about 570 or so escalators. We have the longest and deepest and highest quantity

number of elevators and escalators of any transit system in the

country, so it certainly is a challenging effort to deal with that.

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We are engaged in—first of all, all of our original stations, as

we’ve heard from Ms. Sorkin, the first plans were to build them

without an elevator until we were sued some, whatever it was, 20-

something years ago, and forced to do that. And now at least one

of the things we’re trying to do with our updated design standards

is for each of the new stations that we are now building we are

putting in two elevators. It is expensive to do, but we are putting

two elevators into each station rather than the one, so on a go-forward basis we even have a new set of standards for our stations

that would hopefully in the future and over time help address the

issue of a non-functioning elevator in the station.

We are spending an awful lot of money trying to rehabilitate

both our escalators and our elevators. We have engaged in the first

part of that process. We’ve recently rehabilitated 21 elevators with

another 11 to go. All of the things that were identified with our elevators that needed to be done to put us in compliance with the accessibility of the ADAAG accessibility guidelines that were described already all plotted out, and we’ve now made all the commitments to the kinds of things that we’re going to do. We’ve reported

it back through the Federal Transit Administration as to when

each and every one of these things would be accomplished, and in

all—with respect to the things that need to be done with our elevators, all of those will be completed in our key stations by November of next year, so considerable progress has been made there.

On evacuation, we have actually designed a special transport device. It’s an ETAC—an Emergency Transport Accessible Cart, or

something of that name, nature—which is actually designed to try

to be used to evacuate individuals who are in wheelchairs, and we

actually test the use of those ETAC carts out each year during our

annual disaster recovery drill. Our community of people that we

bring into that disaster recovery drill is the disabled community.

There are some number of disabled people who participate in our

drill, and then we exercise and test ourselves with respect to our

ability to evacuate disabled individuals from our trains, and then

to be able to move them off our trains and along our tracks during

emergency conditions. So we have those kinds of things that we do.

We do have monthly meetings. We have an Accessible Committee

that meets with us every month that’s got a very long list of agenda items that we deal with mutually with our Accessibility Committee to try to understand what the interests are of disabled individuals and the kinds of things that need to be done, and we have

a very good forum, and there’s a committee that’s set up to deal

with that.

And other things that we have done to try and help out in the

areas of announcements is to try and have multiple sources of access to information for people. We have our new passenger information display signs known as PIDS in all of our rail stations where

we can put up that information for people who have hearing disabilities to utilize the PIDS information. We have Web sites. Our

Web page has proven to be an enormously successful thing that

people access quite frequently—we have a very technological-savvy

group of people who live in our metropolitan area—and our Web

page has lots of information on it with respect to the status of eleVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:18 Sep 09, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00134 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\81350.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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vators that are out in the system and other kinds of things that

people need to know in terms of navigating the system.

I might add that the Web page was something else that proved

to be quite successful on September 11th. We had twice the amount

of normal hits on that Web page for people who were looking for

quick, instant information about our services as to what was going

on on that day of September 11th, and our call center also fielded

twice the number of calls that it would normally field on that same

day, as well, for people who were accessing information.

So I’m not here telling you that we’re perfect, and I know we

have things that don’t always work as well as they should, but we

are not neglecting those. We are doing our level best to be

proactive and responsive to those things that need to be addressed,

and then we just keep on chipping away, and the Federal Transit

Administration is quite vigilant in looking over our shoulder with

great regularity on all of the things that we as a grantee are responsible for doing. As a matter of fact, have a new—their updated

compliance review on accessibility issues that’s scheduled for next

week, so they are very vigilant in making sure that we are fulfilling all the responsibilities that we need to do.

Mrs. MORELLA. Keep chipping away.

Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. One more final question.

Could your tunnel sustain a dive bomber similar to the planes

that went into these buildings, and should they want to use that

same kind of missile, could your tunnel sustain a dive bomb? And

could your tunnels be used as safe havens for people who are escaping the streets?

Mr. WHITE. I think, as deep as we are under the ground, hopefully it is not a probable event that we’ll have a large jumbo jet

full of flammable—— Ms. WATSON. Anything is probable since September 11th.

Mr. WHITE. I think the one area that we would be more at risk

concerned about is our aerial structures would be the thing that

would cause us the greatest concern. And, for example, during that

particular day on September 11th we do have the one bridge I said

that crosses the Potomac River, the Yellow Line Bridge, and what

we would need to do is just to be prepared to divert our service or

to hold our trains or stop our service in any event under which

there are heightened security conditions associated with it.

I can’t—I could followup with you, Ms. Watson. I can’t sit here.

I’m not an engineer and I can’t give you load standards and other

things associated with how our structures have been constructed.

I do know that each and every time we have been building, we are

always using the strictest engineering and technical standards that

are in existence at that point in time to make sure that we have

the, you know, the strongest possible infrastructure that we build.

We are not California, like you are, where we have earthquake

standards that are in place, but we certainly use all of the other

strictest engineering and architectural design standards that are in

existence. But I could followup with you later on on some of

these——

Ms. WATSON. I raise that question because it was a matter of

concern when we were building our system in Los Angeles. Could

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these tunnels and these tracks sustain a quake measuring 6 to 7

points? And so if these diabolical intelligent minds that figured out

a way to destroy our towers and the Pentagon, anything is probable with them, and I think this is information we need to know

from the engineers, so I can put that in my note to you with some

other questions I have, and if you could respond I’d appreciate it.

Mr. WHITE. Absolutely.

Mr. TROTTER. May I add to that, we asked that question some

months ago. We had an engineer down from, I think from New

York City. What would happen if the tunnels were full of water,

how would we deal with an issue like that. And he indicated that

in Boston, I think, that they had these steel doors that if, in fact,

there is an attack inside the tunnel these doors would close, and

it would close off a section that would allow water to run into one

section but it would be dry in another, so those are questions that

we asked.

And most certainly we anticipated some months ago situations

like this, and this is why the general manager is talking about how

we train, how we anticipate any kind of activity. But most certainly

I would think and I think the general manager would also say that

you have opened our eyes to one thing that I don’t think that we

discussed, and that was, in the event of an attack of poison gas,

that airplanes, something dropped out of the ceiling, you put the—

I don’t think we discussed that, but that’s something that we could

look at.

Mrs. MORELLA. And that’s a very good question. I’d like you to

keep us all apprised of that, too, Mr. White. Thank you.

Mr. Trotter, I want to ask you a question.

Mr. TROTTER. Yes, ma’am.

rs. MORELLA. WMATA has established, I understand it, Elderly

and Handicapped Transportation Advisory Committee. Does the

Advisory Committee report to WMATA or does it report to—does

it have an executive director, reporting to the executive director?

What is the responsibility or responsibilities of that Advisory Committee? How large is it? Can you give us some background information on it?

Mr. TROTTER. Well, I’m not aware of that committee. Mr. White

can answer that question.

Mr. WHITE. The committee is a committee to the staff, not a committee to the Board, so I think——

Mrs. MORELLA. Oh, I see, to the staff. OK.

Mr. WHITE [continuing]. Your question was what’s the status of

the committee. It is not a Board-appointed committee. It is a staffappointed committee. So the Elderly and Handicapped Committee—and, again, you’re challenging my recollection of exactly how

many people are on that committee and we probably need to followup with you on it.

Mrs. MORELLA. It’s a rather new committee though, isn’t it?

Mr. WHITE. It has been in existence—here staff is going to bail

me out here. It has got its own Chair and 16 representatives, and

they have a process that they utilize to determine representation

on that committee, and also they self-determine the chair process

to that committee.

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That committee meets regularly on every single month, and we

do it at times and locations that the committee asks for to try and

make sure that it is convenient for people to be able to participate

in the committee. There really are no limits on the kinds of items

that the committee brings to the staff and asks for the staff to either provide information on or to challenge the staff about its performance in certain areas.

There is a regular agenda that is created for each meeting. We

make sure that, based upon what the interests are of the committee, that we bring all the other appropriate staff into those committees so that we can make sure that the right people with the best

knowledge are actually engaging in the discussion with the committee. And, again, staff points out that we have had this in existence for 15 years, so it has been in existence for 15 years and it’s

a pretty sizable group and it meets quite regularly.

Mrs. MORELLA. So it’s certainly not new, and I would imagine it

works with the Access Board, does it not? No? Maybe that’s something that we should look into.

Ms. SORKIN. I’ve actually not heard of it until now, so it might

be a good idea to have greater publicity about it and approach

some of the local organizations that are involved in disability access to get involved.

Mrs. MORELLA. Good. So maybe you’ll do something about that— 15 years old. Good.

Mr. WHITE. We’ll re-advertise, Madam Chair, and try to make

sure—— Mrs. MORELLA. Excellent. That will be good. It just seems

like——

Mr. WHITE [continuing]. That more people are aware of it.

Mrs. MORELLA [continuing]. Some coordination would be very

helpful.

Mr. WHITE. Yes.

Mrs. MORELLA. Did you want to ask another question right now?

Then I’d just like to ask a couple of others, and then I would like

to ask all of the panelists if they would be willing to respond to

questions that we submit to you in writing. There are just so many

questions and just really so little time, and I hate to hold you all

up, also.

To GAO, Metro fears that by adopting your recommendations

that they should prepare various scenarios on how funding shortfalls would be absorbed by various, you know, asset categories

under the infrastructure renewal program or by the system access

and capacity program would result in funding sources not funding

the optimal capital requirements of Metro.

What I want to know is: do other transit systems prepare capital

budgets? How are they funded? And how do you respond also to

Metro’s concern about, you know, preparing the alternate scenarios

about funding shortfalls and prioritizing?

Ms. HECKER. Well, that’s a very important question. We did not

look at lots of other systems. We do have pretty reliable information, though, that WMATA is one of the very few systems that has

no reliable, continual source of revenue. That source of revenue

clearly is a key factor for other organizations to do long-term capital planning. They know how much money is coming in. They can

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make projections. They can give representations to FTA about the

reliability of local matching funds for the Federal share. And,

therefore, it can be a more coherent and strategic approach to longterm planning. I think right now the estimates are that they are about $3.7 billion short in the current plans that are underway for system expansion and system access and capability program. These are two

different initiatives, and there’s shortfalls there.

Basically, there’s a plan every year to just try to get incrementally the most they can from each of the entities. Our concern is

that this will—it not only precludes the good kind of decisionmaking that’s needed for a long-term view of capital investments,

but it will be severely exacerbated once they start looking at these

core capacity requirements. They are of enormous magnitude, and

really any good system needs a long-term projection source of capital, and we are very concerned about how that would impede good

strategic planning and good appropriate decisionmaking.

And, in fact, right now most of the major decisions on expansion

are just done by a locality. The WMATA strategic view is really not

a key factor, and that was one of our recommendations—that it

needs to be a system-wide view and expansion not just by one locality saying, ‘‘Well, we’re going to fund an expansion.‘‘ Well, what

about the core system where they all come into? Where’s the commitment to be able to accommodate those expansions on the outskirts to be able to be accommodated within the core system?

So this is a very severe problem, and while we agree that the

current system is that their only hope is to basically cry ‘‘chicken’’ every year and say, ‘‘We’ve got to get the money,’’ at some point

there needs to be a long-term solution to this with a reliable source

of funds.

Mrs. MORELLA. That gives me an opportunity to let Mr.

Mendelson know that we haven’t forgotten the Transportation

Planning Board. In your testimony you stated that an enhanced

funding mechanism or mechanisms are needed to provide a level

of financial certainty for regional transportation priorities.

Now, if WMATA suffers shortfalls in funding from its primary

sources, shouldn’t there be alternative plans that should be implemented immediately? And what would be your suggestions?

Mr. MENDELSON. Well, I did point out in my testimony that the

funding is one of the critical problems—— Mrs. MORELLA. Right.

Mr. MENDELSON [continuing]. And the need to find enhanced

funding is a priority, one of our priorities. And I also point out in

my testimony that the process that the Transportation Planning

Board uses is a very complex, complicated process, and it is one

that is a combination of factors. It is—first of all, it incorporates

all of the decisions that have been made to date regarding what

projects, what funding is needed for maintenance operations and so

forth. It incorporates—where there are new projects, funding has

to be identified for those projects before we include them in the

constrained long-range plan, or the subset of that constrained longrange plan, which is the TIP—the Transportation Improvement

Plan. And so we don’t—there can’t be a project that goes forward

unless there is funding that is identified for it.

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We are—and then the third factor that comes into play is air

quality, and, although the Transportation Planning Board is not directly responsible for air quality, we are responsible for ensuring

conformity with the air quality attainment plan that is developed

by the Metropolitan Washington Air Quality Committee at COG.

The—and, in fact, we are right now going through some pain over

this because we are seeing that, having looked at the revised or updated emission estimates from the mobile sector—and when I say ‘‘mobile sector,’’ I am talking about all motor vehicles on the road— we see preliminarily that we may be exceeding the limits that we

have been permitted through our air quality attainment plan, and

so we are going back and looking at how we can reduce emissions,

and that process—and this may be illustrative of answering your

question—that process is one of identifying which ways we can reduce emissions and then seeing whether the States—and when I

say ‘‘States,’’ I include the District of Columbia—will agree, will

commit to fund what those initiatives are, and only at that point

do we include them in our formal plans, which begin with the constrained long-range plan, because there is that commitment for the

funding. And it is only the projects that are part of the constrained,

long-range plan that can go forward.

That was a little bit of a complicated answer.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. MENDELSON. It’s a complicated process.

Mrs. MORELLA. You actually got into another question I was

going to ask about, the air quality in the Washington region having

deteriorated and our danger of being put into a non-attainment

classification, and in terms of not being in compliance with the

Federal clean air regulations and what that impact would have on

WMATA’s short and long-range funding for capital improvements.

Mr. MENDELSON. Let me correct the premise of your question

slightly.

Mrs. MORELLA. OK.

Mr. MENDELSON. We are a non-attainment area, very serious

non-attainment area, and we have been all along. We are required,

under the Clean Air Act, to come into attainment—that is, to attain compliance with the Clean Air Act—and we have a plan for

doing that, and that plan shows that we will attain clean air under

the Federal standards for ozone by 2005.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. MENDELSON. So this is not something new.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. MENDELSON. We do have this plan. The plan was approved

earlier this year by the EPA, and it is also being challenged in

court.

The issue is, for us, on the regional level, is ensuring that we

continue as we get new data, ensuring that we continue to comply

with the requirements of our plan.

The plan requires substantial reduction in emissions from various categories. For instance, if I remember correctly, point sources,

which are power plants, the plan requires that there be a reduction

of about 70 percent of emissions of nitrous oxides between, if I remember correctly, 1999 and 2003. In the mobile sector—again,

that’s motor vehicles—the reduction is not as great, but, if I reVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:18 Sep 09, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00139 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\81350.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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member correctly, it’s from about 200 tons per day of nitrous oxides

to about 160 tons per day between now and 2003.

And so—and WMATA is a critical part of this because WMATA

is not polluting. If we cannot achieve attainment, then we do jeopardize Federal funding, and that was the other part of your question. We jeopardize Federal transportation funding.

What the impact of that is for WMATA is not crystal clear, and

Mr. White may be able to answer this better than I. My understanding is that some public transit projects are conformity exempt. They go forward. And other projects would have to argue

that they should be conformity exempt.

Mrs. MORELLA. I’m going to ask you in writing to give me your

comments about whether there should be a regional transportation

group to deal with, as a central piece, transit and WMATA to get

your opinions on all of that.

I look forward to sending you a list of some possible questions

that you can respond to. Look forward to also particularly hearing

about the improvements that are being made and about the planning that you will be doing.

I can understand the challenges and the difficulties of actually

prioritizing so that the world knows, in terms of what that might

do to the funding level, but it is also critically important.

I probably will be asking you in your questions also about whether you do anything with child care centers. It seems to me I remember one at Shady Grove. I don’t know. And as we look to trying to reduce the cars on the road and the use of transit, which is

increasing, seems to me if you can cut back on people’s need to

drive from one place to another, that also helps. So I look forward

to hearing about that.

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Mrs. MORELLA. And, Mr. Mendelson, maybe more people could

also drive hybrid cars. Since I have one, I say that. That, indeed,

cuts down on the pollution by, like, 90 percent.

Ms. Watson, do you have any final questions you would like to

ask?

Ms. WATSON. No.

Mrs. MORELLA. You’ve all been very patient. It is a very important issue. I appreciate your being here, and we’ll continue to be

in touch with you.

Thank you all very much. Our subcommittee is now adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 12:20 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned, to

reconvene at the call of the Chair.]

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