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52–712 PDF 2009

BACK ON TRACK: WMATA RED LINE METRORAIL

ACCIDENT AND CONTINUAL FUNDING CHALLENGES

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON FEDERAL WORKFORCE,

POSTAL SERVICE, AND THE DISTRICT

OF COLUMBIA

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT

AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

JULY 14, 2009

Serial No. 111–16

Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York, Chairman

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

JIM COOPER, Tennessee

GERRY E. CONNOLLY, Virginia

MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois

MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

PATRICK J. KENNEDY, Rhode Island

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

HENRY CUELLAR, Texas

PAUL W. HODES, New Hampshire

CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut

PETER WELCH, Vermont

BILL FOSTER, Illinois

JACKIE SPEIER, California

STEVE DRIEHAUS, Ohio

——— ———

DARRELL E. ISSA, California

DAN BURTON, Indiana

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California

JIM JORDAN, Ohio

JEFF FLAKE, Arizona

JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska

JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah

AARON SCHOCK, Illinois

——— ———

RON STROMAN, Staff Director

MICHAEL MCCARTHY, Deputy Staff Director

CARLA HULTBERG, Chief Clerk

LARRY BRADY, Minority Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON FEDERAL WORKFORCE, POSTAL SERVICE, AND THE DISTRICT OF

COLUMBIA

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts, Chairman

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia

JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California

WILLIAM MILES, Staff Director

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on July 14, 2009 ............................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Davis, Hon. Tom, III, a former Representative in Congress from the

State of Virginia; Jackie Jeter, president, Amalgamated Transit Union,

Local 689; and William Millar, president, American Public Transportation Association .......................................................................................... 16

Davis, Hon. Tom, III ................................................................................. 16

Jeter, Jackie ............................................................................................... 22

Millar, William .......................................................................................... 31

Graham, Councilmember Jim, chairman, Board of Directors, Washington

Metropolitan Area Transit Authority; John B. Catoe, general manager,

Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority; Deborah A.P.

Hersman, member, National Transportation Safety Board; Peter M.

Rogoff, administrator, Federal Transit Administration; and Eric Madison, chairman, Tri-State Oversight Committee ......................................... 58

Catoe, John B. ........................................................................................... 63

Graham, Jim .............................................................................................. 58

Hersman, Deborah A.P. ............................................................................ 77

Madison, Eric ............................................................................................. 91

Rogoff, Peter M. ......................................................................................... 84

Tuite, Patrick, eye witness and Metrorail Train 112 rider ........................... 47

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

Catoe, John B., general manager, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit

Authority, prepared statement of ................................................................ 65

Chaffetz, Hon. Jason, a Representative in Congress from the State of

Utah, prepared statement of ........................................................................ 119

Connolly, Hon. Gerald E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Virginia, prepared statement of .............................................................. 123

Davis, Hon. Tom, III, a former Representative in Congress from the

State of Virginia, prepared statement of .................................................... 19

Graham, Councilmember Jim, chairman, Board of Directors, Washington

Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, prepared statement of .................. 60

Hersman, Deborah A.P., member, National Transportation Safety Board,

prepared statement of ................................................................................... 79

Jeter, Jackie, president, Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 689, prepared statement of ........................................................................................ 24

Lynch, Hon. Stephen F., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Massachusetts:

Letter dated July 14, 2009 ....................................................................... 14

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 7

Prepared statement of the Washington Metro Area Transportation

Authority Riders’ Advisory Council ...................................................... 2

Madison, Eric, chairman, Tri-State Oversight Committee, prepared statement of ........................................................................................................... 93

Millar, William, president, American Public Transportation Association,

prepared statement of ................................................................................... 33

Norton, Hon. Eleanor Holmes, a Delegate in Congress from the District

of Columbia, prepared statement of ............................................................ 121

Rogoff, Peter M., administrator, Federal Transit Administration, prepared statement of ........................................................................................ 86

Tuite, Patrick, eye witness and Metrorail Train 112 rider, prepared statement of ........................................................................................................... 51

(1)

BACK ON TRACK: WMATA RED LINE METRORAIL ACCIDENT AND CONTINUAL FUNDING

CHALLENGES

TUESDAY, JULY 14, 2009

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON FEDERAL WORKFORCE, POSTAL

SERVICE, AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM, Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:12 p.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Stephen F. Lynch

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Lynch, Norton, Cummings, Kucinich,

Connolly, Chaffetz, Bilbray, and Issa.

Also present: Representatives Van Hollen and Mica.

Staff present: William Miles, staff director; Aisha Elkheshin,

clerk; Jill Crissman, professional staff member; Margaret McDavid

and Jill Henderson, detailees; Daniel Zeidman and Christina

Severin, interns; Lawrence Brady, minority staff director; Dan

Blankenburg, minority director of outreach and senior advisor;

Adam Fromm, minority chief clerk and Member liaison; Tom Alexander, minority senior counsel; Christopher Bright, minority senior

professional staff member; and Glenn Sanders, minority Defense

fellow.

Mr. LYNCH. Good afternoon, everyone. I apologize for the brief

delay in starting this hearing. The Subcommittee on the Federal

Workforce, Postal Service, and the District of Columbia will now

come to order.

I welcome our ranking member, Jason Chaffetz, member of the

subcommittee, all hearing witnesses, and all those in attendance.

The Chair, ranking member, and the subcommittee members will

each have 5 minutes to make opening statements, and all Members

will have 3 days to submit statements for the record.

At this time, I would like to ask unanimous consent that the testimony from the Washington Metro Area Transportation Authority

Riders’ Advisory Council be submitted for the record.

[The information referred to follows:]

2

3

4

5

Mr. LYNCH. I would also like to ask unanimous consent that Representative Chris Van Hollen be allowed to join us and to ask questions of witnesses appearing before us today.

Hearing no objections, it is so ordered.

Ladies and gentlemen, again, let me welcome you to the subcommittee’s third District of Columbia-related oversight hearing,

entitled, ‘‘Back on Track: The Washington Metro Area Transit Authority Red Line Metrorail Accident and Continual Funding Challenges.’’

Before delving into the purpose of this afternoon’s hearing, I

would like to express this subcommittee’s heartfelt sympathy, and

that of all of our Members in Congress, for the victims of the Red

Line Metrorail accident on Monday, June 22, 2009, and for their

families and friends. The tragic loss of life and the dozens of injuries make today’s oversight hearing all that more important.

As the Nation’s capital area’s most public transportation authority, WMATA provides services to a population of over 31⁄2 million

people within a 1,500-square-mile area through Metrorail,

Metrobus, and MetroAccess. And given the reliance of Metro not

only for the local economy but also nationally, with an estimated

42 percent of our Federal employees commuting to work via Metro

and millions of tourists depending on the system to get around, it

is critically important that America’s transit system be both dependable and safe.

While, to their credit, the Washington Metro Area Transit Authority has at times certainly exhibited great qualities over its 33-

year history, last month’s accident points to the fact that there still

remains room for improvement in terms of ensuring that the highest standards of safety exist for Metro riders and employees.

Additionally, the June Red Line Metrorail accident also reignited

the debate over the state of WMATA’s financial condition and the

impact that the authority’s funding challenges has on such issues

as deferred maintenance, capital enhancement projects, and

WMATA’s ability to upgrade and replace aging equipment and railcars. Thus, it is the intent of the subcommittee that today’s hearing

also be used to reexamine and discuss WMATA’s financial condition and its effect on safety, reliability, and dependability.

I must also say that I am happy to learn that funds have been

provided in the fiscal year 2010 Transportation-HUD Appropriations bill marked up yesterday. Although it has only been a little

over 2 months since the subcommittee’s last oversight hearing on

WMATA, the events of the past month have obviously necessitated

a need for this panel to reassess and explore a host of issues relating to WMATA’s services and operations, which are indispensable

to the region and to the Federal Government.

While today’s hearing certainly won’t bring a final resolution as

to the cause or leading factors of the recent accident, given the various ongoing investigations, the hearing is meant to continue the

dialog between WMATA and its regional partners and the various

Federal Government oversight entities on the specific issue of system safety and to learn what is being done now to prevent, as best

as possible, another fatal accident from occurring in the future.

I would like to thank today’s witnesses for joining us as we discuss this important matter. I look forward to your testimony.

6

And I now yield to our ranking member, Jason Chaffetz, the gentleman from Utah, for 5 minutes.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Stephen F. Lynch follows:]

7

8

9

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Thank you, Chairman Lynch. I appreciate you

holding this hearing and participation today.

On April 29th, we held an oversight hearing on the Washington

Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. At that hearing, we examined Metro’s financial condition and internal controls, along with

safety and security issues.

On June 22, 2009, a tragic accident, the most serious in Metro’s

history, occurred on the Red Line. One train crashed into the back

of another, killing 9 and injuring 80. In addition to the dead and

injured, damage to the morale of Metro’s riders and its workers

and to Metro’s reputation as a whole is ongoing. A recent Washington Post editorial commented on the crash as having, ‘‘shattered

many riders’ assumptions about the safety of the system.’’

Today’s oversight hearing will examine that accident and continuing challenges faced by Metro. Metro appears to be in the

throws of an epic crisis. As a Member of Congress and as a Metro

user myself, I am very concerned about the direction.

Even before the catastrophe of June 22nd, a Washington Post

story described comments from the Metro riders as revealing, ‘‘a

band of beaten down and frustrated people who, despite their close

kinship with Metro, have had about enough.’’

In the wake of the June 22nd crash, a more recent story reflected

growing concerns about extensively cramped conditions, long commutes, jerky rides, abrupt stops, and passengers waiting for more

than three full trains to pass before boarding. There is also evidence of nerves rubbed raw and some reports of yelling and shoving along the way.

While investigations are continuing, there are deeply disturbing

reports of track circuit problems which should have been anticipated and which have been dealt with in other systems, notably

the Bay Area Rapid Transit system in San Francisco. Metro apparently never installed a backup system that is used by BART.

A significant segment of the Federal work force relies on the

Metro, plus millions of visitors each year. We are also quite aware

of the enhanced security issues which apply to the Metro because

it services the Washington region.

The last Congress approved a measure sponsored by the former

chairman of our committee, Tom Davis, who I am pleased to see

is one of our witnesses today. That law authorizes much-needed

funds and mandates management assistance, but follow-through by

the administration and this Congress is required to make that law

a reality.

I look forward to hearing from the witnesses today. And let me

just say, on a personal note, our heartfelt thoughts and prayers

with those who were injured and killed on the Metro. It is devastating anytime you see that. I think that is the importance of the

hearing today.

I look forward to the participation here. We want to make sure

that we are implementing the best practices. I think individually—

let’s break it up—everybody’s heart is in the right direction. But if

the management is not there to coordinate and move it forward in

a cohesive manner, I think that is where this committee needs to

be involved.

10

I have my Metro card. I like riding it. I enjoy it. But there are

also challenges. There are times and things and frustrations that

I think are appropriate for us to dive into. And so, Mr. Chairman,

I thank you for holding this hearing. I look forward to the dialog,

from hearing from our witnesses, and a better understanding of

what is happening or what is not happening with the Metro today.

And, with that, I will yield back.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

Before we continue with opening statements, I would invite our

first panel to come forward and be seated.

The Chair now recognizes the gentlelady from the District of Columbia, Ms. Holmes Norton, for 5 minutes.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I want to once again thank Chairman Stephen Lynch for his attention to Metro by responding to my request early in his tenure

as the new Chair of this subcommittee with a hearing on April

24th, and again today granting my request for this hearing in light

of the June 22nd Metro tragedy.

I had spoken with the appropriate Metro and National Transportation Safety Board officials concerning this hearing before the investigation is completed and learned that it is not unusual to be

asked to testify before an investigation is fully completed. The investigation of this collision may require well in excess of a year or

even more.

Following our hearing in April, we had every reason to believe

that the Metro system was a safe system. And, because of the consistent oversight of this subcommittee, I continue to believe that

the system that serves this region and millions of visitors is safe.

I would not hesitate to board a Metro train even after the tragedy

of June 22nd.

However, the public is not fully aware of what this subcommittee

has learned during years of consistent oversight about the overall

safety of the system. And, in any case, the public deserves to know

much more about this recent catastrophe. It is fair for riders to

seek reassurance now or to know whether there is reason to be concerned about the daily trip on a Metro train. The public has bits

and pieces of information about what may have caused the accident

and what is being done now to assure its safety. Today’s hearing,

however, will make public all that is known now, as Congress

opens its own investigation and will allow the public to separate

urban legend from authoritative facts and eyewitness testimony.

Long before the June 22nd accident, the regional congressional

delegation had been working to secure funds for Metro for capital

costs, such as replacement of Metro trains burdened by increasing

numbers of Federal and congressional employees, among others; actually subsidized by the Federal Government in order to encourage

employees to take Metro, who form the majority of Metro’s weekday employees.

Today, the region is particularly grateful to Transportation and

Housing and Urban Development Appropriations Chair John Olver

for finding the funds in his appropriation for the first $150 million

installment and the $1.5 billion Congress authorized for a 10-year

period.

11

Regrettably, despite our efforts over several years, funding was

not authorized until 2008, when control changed in the Congress.

But we particularly appreciate the efforts of the former Chair of

the full committee, Tom Davis, who started us down the road to today’s funding. And we are happy to have him testify today.

The necessary funds also were not included in the President’s

budget, despite constant urging from the regional delegation. But

Chairman Olver found the funds to meet this year’s commitment.

And I know that millions of public and private employees and residents are deeply grateful to him and to the subcommittee.

I have just come, Mr. Chairman, from managing a floor resolution recognizing those who were injured and remembering residents we lost in this tragedy: seven from the District of Columbia,

one from Maryland, and another from Virginia.

We do not have a response that can console the losses of the victims and their families and those who were injured. However, we

can begin with today’s hearing and the first appropriation for

Metro under our bill to demonstrate to all the families, friends, and

associates, and to current riders that this tragedy has already had

immediate effects for assuring the safety of our transportation system.

May I thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for your consistent attention to this system.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentlelady.

I would now like to ask unanimous consent to allow Mr. Mica

from Florida, who I am told was a past chairman of this subcommittee, to allow him to join the panel and in today’s discussion,

as well.

Hearing no objection, so ordered.

At this time, I would like to recognize Mr. Mica from Florida for

5 minutes.

Mr. MICA. Well, thank you. And thank you for yielding.

And while I am on the full committee, I am no longer a member

of this subcommittee, and I am pleased to be here to discuss an important topic. I also am the Republican ranking member of the full

Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. And Ms. Norton and

I also serve on that committee today. In that capacity, I did want

to make some remarks.

And, first of all, I want to join others in expressing our sympathy

to those that lost loved ones in the tragedy of the Metro crash. We

don’t know all of the details. I know NTSB is investigating. But,

again, our heartfelt sympathy to those who lost loved ones or had

family members injured in that tragedy.

And it is our important responsibility on this subcommittee, an

investigative committee of Congress, and I applaud you for holding

this hearing. I think it is very important that not just the Transportation Committee but an investigative committee take action,

like you are doing here today.

It has been reported that the automatic train control system

failed to detect a train waiting on the track. If the system had been

working properly, possibly, again, the crash could have been avoided. NTSB will really investigate the crash and let us know.

However, we do know that other transit systems around the

country rely on automatic train control systems, including San

12

Francisco, Boston, Baltimore, Atlanta, Philadelphia, and, in my

State, Miami.

Last year, Congress and a lot of us worked on it together. We

passed an Amtrak rail passenger, rail safety bill. And in that legislation, Congress required that within the next 6 years commuter

rail trains, inner-city passenger trains, and freight trains carrying

hazardous materials install similar positive train control systems.

We have to learn lessons from tragedies like the one we have experienced here in the Washington community for rail safety around

the country.

I do want to note for the record that, 3 years ago, the Highway

and Transit Subcommittee held an oversight hearing on transit

safety. And, at that hearing, the Government Accountability Office

made a number of findings and argued for a more robust safety

oversight program.

Unlike aviation, railroads, including commuter railroads, transit

safety oversight is handled at the local level by State safety oversight agencies. This is because the Federal Transit Administration

is a grantmaking agency; it is not a regulatory body.

Each rail transit system is different and has unique system specifications. The transit agency develops a system safety plan for

each transit system. And the State’s safety oversight agency directly oversees the safety of the transit system by reviewing safety

plans, performing audits, and investigating accidents.

Some of you may not know this, but FTA currently does not permit expenditure of funds to support those safety offices and officers

who have that responsibility. I am sending and some Members

have already joined me in sending this letter to the FTA Administer today. And it is as follows. Let me paraphrase it here.

We understand that the Federal Transit Administration administrative policy prohibits transit agencies from using their Federal

grant dollars to support expenses of the State safety offices that directly oversee the safety of transit systems. Again, according to a

GAO report from our committee, these State safety offices are often

inadequately funded and staffed. I think in Washington Metro, up

until about a year ago, they had about one position; now they have

two. And, again, they are prohibited from taking these Federal dollars. And it is not by law, it is by policy.

However, given what occurred last year with, I guess, the Boston

Green Line and also with the Washington Metro system recently,

we feel it is important that these safety offices be strengthened. So

we recommend in this letter here that the Federal Transit Administration work with us to provide those agencies, again, the flexibility to utilize some of the dollars, maybe a small percentage, for

some of these important positions.

So I will be asking other Members to sign this and send this.

And I think that the final concern that I have here, Members,

is that Mr. Oberstar and I have been trying to get a major highway

and transit bill passed. The current one we operate under expires

in just a few months, at the end of September. The administration

has now said, while we are in the process of drafting this thing,

sort of dropped a bomb on us and said, let’s extend this for 18

months.

13

What will happen is all of these safety projects, all of our transportation projects, our major transit projects and major highway

and infrastructure projects will be put on hold for 2 years. And if

we wanted to mandate changes by law, we would have a tough

time doing so.

So I urge everyone to work with Mr. Oberstar and myself to try

to move that legislation forward. I urge Members to sign this letter, because we don’t need legislation to get FTA to do what they

should be doing, is allowing more flexibility and the use of these

Federal funds for safety oversight purposes.

Thank you so much for the courtesy extended me, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LYNCH. Would the gentleman like to have the letter added

into the record?

Mr. MICA. I would. And I appreciate it. And I will also ask other

Members to sign. Thank you so much. I ask unanimous consent.

Mr. LYNCH. OK. I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman’s

letter be entered into the record.

Without objection, so ordered.

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr. Issa, for 5 minutes.

Mr. ISSA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I ask unanimous consent that my full opening statement be placed in the record.

Mr. LYNCH. Without objection, so ordered.

Mr. ISSA. Mr. Chairman, we are honored today, as Congresswoman Norton said, to have Mr. Davis here. Mr. Davis, when he

was Chairman Davis, championed the Metro system and continued

to do so until his departure last year. As I will predict, Congressman Davis would rightfully so say, ‘‘If you can’t get it right in D.C.,

you can’t get it right in public trains around the country.’’

There is a proposal in the stimulus package just passed a few

months ago to put a mag-lift type of train, a high-speed, 200-milean-hour train between Orange County and Las Vegas. It is pretty

clear that we have fundamental problems with going 59 miles an

hour with absolute safety in Washington, DC.

Here, today, we are going to hear about how the accident happened, how it won’t happen again. But, more importantly, I think

this is an opportunity for us to look at a 30-plus-year-old system,

since 1973 when the whole Metro system began being rolled together, and say, have we done all that we can do?

I know that Chairman Davis did all he could do on his watch.

But I do believe that Washington, DC, a compact city with a large

ridership that comes in to Federal systems or in and around the

city every day, commuters who, by both their own choice and by

incentives from the Federal Government, essentially in most cases

free passes, want to use this system and want it to be 100 percent

safe and 100 percent reliable.

Mr. Chairman, I believe that we, as a committee, have a special

obligation to look at this system. But I believe that what we get

right in this system, including the full funding of all the safety requirements, in fact is essential for all systems around the country.

And I, like many people—everyone has a solution when they

come after a tragedy like this. I might strongly suggest to this committee that we bear in mind that there are billions of unspent stimulus dollars that are, in fact, earmarked for train transportation

that will not be spent in the near future and might very well still

be redirectable to meet the needs of getting the Metro system both

safe and reliable at the level that we believed we were at and believe we should be at.

I look forward to hearing our panel. And I thank the chairman

for holding this important hearing, and yield back.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

Before we swear our witnesses, I want to ask, if Mr. Tuite is

here, come forward.

Mr. Tuite was an eyewitness on the day of the accident. We will

entertain him when he does arrive.

It is the custom in this subcommittee to swear witnesses who are

to testify. May I ask you all to stand and raise your right hands?

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. LYNCH. Let the record reflect that all of the witnesses have

answered in the affirmative, with the absence of Mr. Tuite, who

will be sworn when he arrives.

And your entire statement will be included in the record.

16

Mr. Davis, I am sure you don’t need to be instructed in this matter, but the green light indicates that each witness has 5 minutes

to summarize your statement. The yellow light means you have 1

minute remaining to complete your statement. And the red light indicates that your time for speaking has expired.

Originally, I had offered the courtesy to Mr. Connolly to introduce Mr. Davis. And here he is. Perfect.

Mr. ISSA. Gerry, you are a little late. We were just about to give

your seat away.

Mr. LYNCH. The gentleman is right on time, as always.

The Chair would now like to recognize the gentleman from northern Virginia, Mr. Connolly, for the purposes of introducing Mr.

Davis.

Mr. CONNOLLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you, as

ever, for your graciousness.

It is a great privilege for me to sit up here and welcome back to

this committee our distinguished former chairman, Tom Davis.

Tom Davis and I have followed in each other’s footsteps. He was

a longtime member of the Board of Supervisors of Fairfax County,

then became the chairman of Fairfax County, and then took this

congressional seat. I also was a longtime member of the Fairfax

County Board of Supervisors, succeeded Tom as chairman, and

then of course succeeded him in this seat.

Tom has been a friend and mentor. He has shown bipartisan inclinations that are deeply appreciated. And I want to say personally, in my transition to this job, Tom Davis could not have been

more gracious and more generous, he and his staff.

And I just want to thank him and thank him for his leadership

on Metro. Without Tom’s visions, this Congress would never have

come up with the idea of a $150 million matching grant to the localities putting up capital money for Metro.

As the tragedy of June 22nd underscored, Metro is starved for

capital investment. And the Federal Government bears some responsibility, as do the localities, in trying to address that investment shortage. And, again, I salute my predecessor, Tom Davis, for

his understanding of that issue, his vision for what had to be done,

and his willingness to make sure that this Congress lives up to

that obligation.

Welcome back, Tom.

STATEMENTS OF HON. TOM DAVIS III, A FORMER REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF VIRGINIA; JACKIE

JETER, PRESIDENT, AMALGAMATED TRANSIT UNION, LOCAL

689; AND WILLIAM MILLAR, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN PUBLIC

TRANSPORTATION ASSOCIATION

STATEMENT OF HON. TOM DAVIS III

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you very much. Thank you, Representative

Connolly, in your continued commitment to public service. We have

fought a lot of battles, usually together, not always, as local politics

go.

Chairman Lynch, thank you for calling this hearing. It is timely,

it is important.

17

Let me thank Ms. Norton, Mr. Issa, who helped us pass this legislation first in 2006 and then in 2008, and we finally got it

through the Senate and into law.

And to Ranking Member Chaffetz, it is nice to see you again, and

thank you for your leadership, as well. We saw early on, with GAO reports, that Metro has a $6 billion

shortfall in terms of its capital funding need, and there was no way

that this could have been raised within the existing system. Fares

would not have supported it. So the legislation simply bit off part of that, $3 billion: $1.5 bil- lion paid for by the Federal Government over 10 years; $1.5 billion

in matching funds—dedicated matching funds from localities. Prior

to the legislation, there was no dedicated funding. Metro got what

it got on an annual basis. And when local governments cut their

budget, Metro suffered as a result.

This has put, I think, a needed discipline on local governments

to get the match. And I was just thrilled to hear that Chairman

Olver put in the $150 million last night in the transportation appropriation bill. This is a precedent for the next 10 years that I

think will go a long way toward making the Metro system safer

and stronger.

I also want to offer my condolences to the friends and the families of the nine Metro passengers who were tragically lost in last

month’s crash. And for those that are injured, I wish them a

speedy recovery.

You know, as policymakers, like it or not, we bear some responsibility in funding and some of the shortfalls the system has had

over time. And I think, if anything else, we want to learn from this.

We don’t want this to happen again.

So let me go briefly over what the legislation called for and what

remains to be done and how we can continue to make this a safer

and a better system here in the Nation’s subway system. First of all, the Congress, last night, put in $150 million for the

fiscal year. The localities have already come up with their match.

An independent IG was established under the legislation so that

Metro—it wouldn’t be looking at itself. You would have an independent inspector general, which we think helps their operations

and keeps them on their toes, something that I think was overdue.

Metro actually—we introduced the legislation. Metro actually acted

on their own to establish this, but the legislation mandates it.

Finally, Federal representation on the Metro board was an important concept, and that has not taken place yet. It hasn’t taken

place because Congress has not adopted the changes to the Metro

compact. Representative Hoyer has pending legislation that will do

that. All three of the States have amended the Metro compact

through their State legislatures and city counsels. Now the Federal

Government has to do it, and I think as quickly as possible so the

President can appoint two Federal members to the Metro board.

Now, why is this important? It is important because, although

Virginia and Maryland and the District have representatives on

this subway system, the natural tendency—and I have been in

local government for 15 years before I came here—is to be rather

provincial in terms of how you look at the system. Is it good for

Maryland? Is it good for Virginia? Is it good for stations in my disVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:02 Oct 27, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00021 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\52712.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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trict? Having that Federal representation on there, that Federal expertise, I think will add a level, if you will, of maturity and a level

of analysis that I think will be helpful to this system. The President has to make good appointees, but I think we can count on

them to do that. So that has to happen, as well.

The legislation also expanded wireless service on the Metro system. Prior to this, it was reserved for one operator. This expands

it. We think this is helpful, particularly in cases of accidents and

crime.

Finally, let me say that I think the NTSB has identified some

improvements that need to be worked on immediately: this new

signaling system, monitoring and tracking systems. I think there

is stimulus money available. It would be helpful if the Congress

pushed to get a slug of money up there, right there, to make these

changes right away so that the kind of tragedy that happened on

June 22nd will not happen again and we can make those changes.

Other than that, I want to thank the Members up here in the

House for being so supportive of Metro over the years. It was the

Senate that held the legislation up for 4 years. And you all have

been great to work with.

Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Tom Davis III follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

And I want to add to Mr. Connolly’s remarks about you, Mr.

Davis, and how, as chairman of this committee, you were very fair

and bipartisan and provided a great example, I think, of strong

leadership in the Congress during your time here.

At this point, I would like to introduce Ms. Jackie Jeter. She is

the president of the Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 689. Ms.

Jeter began her career with the Transit Authority as a part-time

bus operator in 1979 and has worked as a full-time bus operator,

train operator, and interlocking operator. Ms. Jeter is a member of

today’s women’s caucus of Local 689 and has the distinction of

being the first female assistant business agent of Local 689.

And I also want to express my heartfelt sympathies for you and

your members. I know you lost a valued member of your local

union, Local 689, in Jeanice McMillan on the day of this accident.

And we understand that her conduct at the time of this accident,

in slowing the train down, may have saved lives, in terms of her

own action here.

But, again, we thank you for your attendance here. And you are

now recognized for 5 minutes for an opening statement.

STATEMENT OF JACKIE JETER

Ms. JETER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon, Mr.

Chairman, ladies and gentlemen of the committee. It is my honor

to serve as a witness before you today.

As a rail operator of 22 years and as president of the Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 689, I am deeply and personally affected by the tragic WMATA rail accident of June 22nd. I join my

union members and others to urge swift corrective actions.

We stand ready to help find solutions, improvements, and technological advancements capable of advancing the problems of the

aging WMATA system. I firmly believe that we cannot afford to

spend time on expensive studies and multiple meetings, but must

instead move into implementation mode without further delay.

When the National Transportation Safety Board’s report from its

investigation into the June 22nd accident is in hand, we will have

a much better idea of what went wrong and how to resolve those

problems. I urge the committee to be cautious about drawing any

conclusions from this hearing. I believe that it would be premature

to publicly conjecture about the causes of the crash.

I also call on WMATA and the NTSB to be transparent in their

investigation for the sake of the workers, the public, and policymakers.

Local 689’s motto is ‘‘We Make It Work.’’ Jeanice McMillan, the

operator killed in the crash, embodied that spirit. Her actions epitomized the heroism sometimes required of our members.

Safety is the No. 1 priority of Local 689. It is what we work hard

to deliver every day to every rider on the buses and trains. As

president of the workers union, one of my primary goals is to ensure that every worker receives appropriate safety measures and

training from WMATA.

While we do not yet know the exact causes of the accident, there

were troubling patterns of WMATA’s responses to previous NTSB

recommendations. Since the first fatal accident on WMATA in

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1982, the NTSB has recommended installing car-borne monitors in

every WMATA car to provide advanced performance data for every

department. None of the 1000-series cars in the system are so

equipped, including those involved in the accident.

After the 1996 Shady Grove accident, the NTSB recommended

WMATA evaluate all series of Metrorail cars with respect to resisting car body telescoping and providing better passenger protection,

and make the necessary modifications.

After the 2004 Woodley Park accident, the NTSB made a specific

recommendation to either retire or retrofit the Rohr-built 1000-series cars based on their crash worthiness. WMATA again failed to

comply with these recommendations, citing costs and binding lease

agreements through 2014.

The NTSB made an urgent recommendation to include specific

instructions when responding to rollback situations, and WMATA

responded that it would not address the issue. The recommendation was left as ‘‘open, unacceptable response,’’ in the NTSB reports.

It is unfortunate that the NTSB can do little more than make

recommendations based on these findings. It has no power as an

agency to enforce any of its own suggestions. Furthermore, there

is no independent body with oversight of WMATA other than Congress.

Over the years, Local 689’s leadership has continually made suggestions to WMATA for procedural and equipment changes.

WMATA is allowed to choose, ignore, defer recommendations until

it deems the time ripe for implementation. Safety should not fall

victim to fiscal constraints or internal priorities. Any legislation for

the WMATA system should include regulations, enforcement, and

oversight.

WMATA is heavily constrained by its funding—and I see that my

time is running out—and I believe that funding is important for

WMATA. We need dollars. It is an aging infrastructure, and in

order to make that infrastructure work for the members of Local

689 and all of the employees of WMATA, we have to put the money

where this Nation wants it. If public transportation is something

that we need—and we sorely need it; based on the economy itself,

it has been proven that public transportation is needed—then we

need to put the dollars where it is needed.

And I thank you so much for this opportunity.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Jeter follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentlelady.

Our next witness is Mr. William Millar, who joined the American

Public Transportation Association in 1996 and has worked to increase Federal investments in public transportation.

From 1973 to 1977, Mr. Millar worked for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, where he created Pennsylvania’s free

transit program for senior citizens. Mr. Millar also spent 13 years

as the executive director at the Port Authority of Allegheny County.

Mr. Millar, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

STATEMENT OF WILLIAM MILLAR

Mr. MILLAR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And let me thank you

for holding these hearings today. And I appreciate very much the

opportunity to be here on behalf of the public transportation industry.

You know, when a terrible tragedy such as the one that is the

subject of this hearing occurs, all of us certainly feel a great loss.

We feel certainly great sympathy, and our prayers and our sympathies go out to the victims, to their families, to their loved ones.

It is a tragedy like this that causes us to take a step back, to examine what we do, to see how we might improve the way we do things

in order to prevent these types of accidents from happening.

As others have already said, we do not yet know the exact

causes, but that shouldn’t stop us from taking prudent steps to

move forward. And I know later in this hearing you will hear testimony from WMATA and others about steps that are being taken.

Our association stands ready to support WMATA, this committee, and any other bodies involved here in trying to make our systems safer.

Now, notwithstanding the terrible tragedy we are discussing

today, Americans are using public transportation in modern record

numbers. There are many reasons why Americans are using public

transit, but there is one undeniable common thread: Tens of millions of customers rely on public transportation every day because

our systems are fundamentally safe, but, as this terrible tragedy

demonstrates, they can always and must be made safer.

Years of proven performance records have instilled a confidence

in the riding public that our systems will transport them safely. I

continue to use Metrorail for my commute on a daily basis because

it is a safe system and because the alternatives are much less safe.

The U.S. Department of Transportation data shows that a person

is 29 times safer when using heavy rail public transportation such

as WMATA operates rather than taking the same trip in an automobile.

Further, the congressionally created National Surface Transportation Revenue and Policy Study Commission indicated that highway travel accounts for over 94 percent of all fatalities and then

99 percent of all injuries on the Nation’s surface transportation system.

This data clearly indicates that the public’s trust in public transportation is not misplaced. Public transit is one of the safest modes

of transportation available.

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But, numbers and statistics aside, nothing is infallible. Therefore, APTA and its members remain vigilant in continuing our commitment to advancing transit safety and promoting the safety operation of rail transit systems.

I have been asked to comment on several areas by the committee

regarding safety standards and procedures in the industry. Please

note, I am not speaking of WMATA specifically but rather presenting information generally about the industry, much of which would

be applicable to WMATA.

For decades, we have been the leading force in developing safety

programs and standards for public transportation operations, maintenance, and procurement. In the 1980’s, APTA was asked by the

rail transit industry and FTA’s predecessor, the Urban Mass

Transportation Administration, to develop a standardized program

for rail transit safety, which we established under the auspices of

what was then known as the Rail Safety Review Board.

APTA’s commitment to safety was also the basis for our standards development program initiated in 1996, which currently include standards for rail transit, commuter rail, bus operations, procurement, intelligent communications interface, and security.

Our organization has been designated as a standards development organization [SDO], by the U.S. Department of Transportation and is funded, in part, through grants from the Federal

Transit Administration.

Congress has also officially recognized the importance of promoting voluntary, industry-based standards as a way of creating uniformity within the legal and regulatory structure of the United

States.

My written testimony contains much more detail on the nature

of these standards, the process that is used, and things of that sort.

I do think it is important to realize we don’t rely just on our own

members or our own expertise. We involve many other organizations, such as the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the

Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, the American Railway Engineering and Maintenance Association, and a host of others, as well as working with the Federal Transit Administration,

the Federal Railroad Administration, the National Transportation

Safety Board, and others in developing these standards.

To date, we have published over 170 rail standards in categories

applicable to heavy rail transit and such as those used by WMATA.

The heavy rail crash worthiness standard developed by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers in corroboration with APTA

is a good example, developed after some 5 years of work at the professional level.

Now, there is much more in my written comments. I appreciate

I have exhausted my time here, and I would certainly look forward

to answering any questions you might have. Thank you, sir.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Millar follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

I now yield myself 5 minutes.

Let me just say that I know there are four or five Federal agencies that have shared responsibility here, and this has resulted in

an inordinate amount of acronyms being used at this hearing. So

I would just caution people to at least, before you use the acronym,

just describe the full title of whatever that is you are referring to.

And for those listening or watching at home, ‘‘WMATA’’ stands

for Washington Metro Area Transit Authority. And so you will hear

that constantly referred to. WMATA is the Metro. Easier to understand it in that sense.

Let me ask, Ms. Jeter, you are in a unique position, I think. And

I know we were introduced previously to Steve McDougall, who is

the president of Local 589 in the Boston area. And we have had

situations on the T in Boston with train collisions.

Now, I understand where we are on the Metro. And I am a rider,

as well; I am a commuter. I don’t have a car down here, so I find

myself on the Metro quite a bit. But there are two systems, and

one is to have a manual operating system where the conductor actually operates the train manually, and then there is an automated

system that is used.

As I understand the circumstances of the most recent accident,

Train 214, which was the first train in line, was being operated

manually by that conductor, while the one that Ms. McMillan was

operating, hers was on automatic.

Ms. JETER. Yes.

Mr. LYNCH. And the way it should have worked was that Ms.

McMillan’s train, 112, should have detected the train in front of

her and should have automatically stopped the train or slowed it

down. And, as I understand it, she visually made a report that

there was a train ahead. So all the indications were that she recognized the threat but that, mechanically, the system did not work

and it failed.

When you have this seeming conflict—and I am not sure why the

first train was manually operated. Maybe that was a decision by

the conductor in that case. I understand those signals weren’t operating in that area, or they were operating intermittently in that

area. It may have been a decision on the part of the conductor just

to switch to manual operation. I am not sure.

But where you have this conflict, is there a way to safely resolve

that? What are your own observations, having been in the seat

yourself and being very, very familiar with the circumstances, for

your conductors, for your employees? How best might we resolve

that conflict between going in manual operation and automatic operation?

Ms. JETER. Well, Mr. Chairman, first of all, let me say that,

under no circumstances, whether the train was in manual or in

ATO, should it have happened. Safeguards are in place to protect

that kind of accident from occurring whether you are in manual or

in automatic.

I think that the operators are trained to know when it is best

for them to move up in a manual or switch from automatic to manual.

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And, also, from my experience and history as an operator, I have

also seen where all you should have to do is let central know that

you have encountered a problem. Once you let them know that you

have encountered a problem, they know that manual operation is

needed.

I believe in the system. I believe in it wholeheartedly. I, like you,

believe that it is a safe system, although it should be safer at this

point. But I do know that, under no—and I hope I answered your

question, because, under no circumstances, should it have occurred,

period.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank you.

And I now yield to the ranking member, Mr. Chaffetz from Utah,

for 5 minutes.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Congressman Davis, if you could expand a little bit about the

funding itself, what would happen if the funding were not to go forward, from your perspective and history?

And then the second part of that question is, is the funding alone

going to solve the problem, or are there other challenges that you

see above and beyond just the funding, lack of funding?

Mr. DAVIS. Money doesn’t always solve problems by itself. That

is why we put the independent IG into this legislation and Federal

representation. We thought all of these would enhance oversight

over the system, to help it being spent correctly along the way.

The history of this is it came under the old District of Columbia

Committee. Every other transit in the country came under the

Transportation Committee, Transportation and Infrastructure

[T&I]. But this came under the old D.C. Committee. This goes back

to the days of President Eisenhower.

And so, when we were putting together transportation bills, you

know, whether it was TEA-LU or whatever the machination was,

Metro’s funding wasn’t included in that. There was no grab-bag for

Metro to get money outside of the annual Federal appropriation. So

we want a separate route through this committee to get the authorization bill together. But that is one of the reasons I think that

money was not as forthcoming.

Of course, second, although the Metro system operates in three

different jurisdictions—D.C., Maryland, and Virginia—when it

comes to transportation funding, it is a grab-bag. And whether it

was under the Federal Transit Administration or UMTA, its precursors, we are not able to get it in the same way, because we

weren’t on the same list. We operated independently and separate.

That is why Metro needed its own funding legislation that we put

forward.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. But the consequence, if the funding doesn’t happen—I mean, it wasn’t in the President’s first budget. If these

things don’t come to fruition, what do you see happening?

Mr. DAVIS. There is a $6 billion documented need. Our legislation addresses $3 billion of it, which is half Federal and half local

dedicated revenue, which they never had before.

Under the President’s budget, there would have been nothing in

there originally. And that is why we are grateful that the House

put it in. Nothing proceeds. By the way, if the Federal Government

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doesn’t put their $150 million in, the local jurisdictions may decide

not to, too. So it is almost a $300 million hit.

But it looks like it is on its way.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Ms. Jeter, let me ask you real quickly in the brief

moments that I have here, as the chairman was talking about the

manual versus automatic, can you talk a little bit about the morale

and things that you are seeing happening now?

Because I really get concerned that when we have Federal employees and the public at large traveling here. Obviously, any crash

is devastating.

You were quoted as saying, ‘‘We haven’t received anything that

would make us think this was an isolated incident. I do need to

know that this is not going to happen again. I do have people out

there who are afraid.’’

Ms. JETER. Yes. You know, as operators report to work every

day, I think the main thing to remember is that we are trained to

be professionals, but your own basic need for survival and your instincts kick in, you know, at some point.

And because early on in the investigation we had received information from different operators that there had been other instances where, even though a crash had not taken place, that their

train did not respond to the commands, or the wayside equipment

did not command the train as it should have. And so, for that reason, yes, we do have employees that are apprehensive about whether or not this will occur again.

But I do believe that, as professional as we all try to be in our

occupations and as we report to our jobs, the operators will continue to work. Those who would like to go back to the bus and

maybe don’t have the stomach anymore for operating a train, I am

sure that Mr. Kubicek will make sure that they have the opportunity to do so.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. And real quickly, I only have seconds left here,

but maybe if each of the three of you could just address, what is

the No. 1 thing you would like to see us do?

Mr. MILLAR. Well, certainly, as Mr. Mica said, getting good funding in place for safety, getting a long-term transportation bill with

sufficient resources so not only WMATA but transit systems across

the country can address their fundamental needs is critical.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Thank you. Sorry, my time is short.

Ms. Jeter.

Ms. JETER. I think the funding is essential. No matter what you

talk about, whether you talk about training, whether you talk

about enhanced technology, you need dollars, no matter what.

Mr. DAVIS. Two things. First, adopt the Metro Compact amendments. The Federal Government has not adopted their share. I

think that enhances the annual funding $150 million, which is put

in. And second, I think we ought to take a shot at some of the stimulus money and bring it right here to correct these problems right

now.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank you.

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I want to recognize that Mr. Tuite has agreed to join us now. Let

me just do a brief introduction, and then I am going to have to

swear Mr. Tuite so that he can respond to questions.

Mr. Patrick Tuite is currently the associate chair and head of the

master’s of arts program in theater and history and criticism at the

Catholic University of America. He has also taught at the University of Notre Dame and the Ohio State University. At the time of

this accident relevant to this hearing, Mr. Tuite was in the front

of the second car of train 112, the one that actually came forward

and then struck 214, and he helped people exit the train after the

collision occurred.

Mr. Tuite, it is the custom of this committee to have witnesses

sworn who are here to provide testimony. Could I ask you to stand

and raise your right hand?

[Witness sworn.]

Mr. LYNCH. Let the record show that Mr. Tuite has answered in

the affirmative.

I will now yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from northern Virginia, Mr. Connolly.

Mr. CONNOLLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Let me ask my predecessor Mr. Davis, if we don’t amend the

compact for Metro, is the Federal money tied up until we do?

Mr. DAVIS. No. My understanding is it’s not tied up. One of the

reasons the administration didn’t fund it is because, under the law,

without the compact being amended, they weren’t obligated to fund

it. But I think this just puts it in motion, and it makes it a lot easier to get money in the outyears. One hundred fifty million dollars

in this environment is tough.

Mr. CONNOLLY. With respect to my colleague Mr. Chaffetz’s question, is it not true that Metro has either the highest fare box recovery rate or the second highest in the United States; do you know?

Mr. DAVIS. Second highest.

Mr. CONNOLLY. So the users are, in fact, certainly paying their

fair share.

Mr. DAVIS. I think they are, as somebody who uses it.

Mr. CONNOLLY. And until this legislation, most of the financial

burden in terms of subsidies has fallen on the State of Maryland,

the District of Columbia, and the localities in Virginia; is that not

correct?

Mr. DAVIS. That is correct. That’s where the subsidies come from,

right out of local and State budgets.

Mr. CONNOLLY. Is there any other subway system in America

that bears the brunt of almost 15 million visitors from all around

the country, and indeed around the world, other than the Metro

system?

Mr. DAVIS. Yeah, I mean, New York may. I don’t know the answer, but New York has a State funding mechanism and a completely different mechanism. It was built at a different time in a

different era.

Mr. CONNOLLY. And isn’t it true, Congressman Davis, that perhaps the largest single beneficiary daily of the Metro system being

here is, in fact, the Federal Government moving its Federal work

force?

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Mr. DAVIS. It’s Federal Government moving its workers, it’s tourists who come here to visit their Nation’s Capital. You know, the

Moscow subway system is an elaborate system, and they didn’t

chintz on it. They funded it; this was a statement of how they

wanted the world to see their government. Unfortunately, I don’t

think it’s been the same here.

Mr. CONNOLLY. I think that’s really a good point. This is the Nation’s Capital. It’s arguably been called the capital of the free

world. And the Federal Government has some responsibility, beyond the initial construction costs, to help make sure that system

remains healthy and safe and, indeed, hopefully can be expanded

in what is, after all, a nonattainment region in terms of air quality,

with, by some measurements, the second worst congestion in the

United States.

Mr. DAVIS. And that was President Eisenhower’s vision, that this

would be the Nation’s subway system, it wouldn’t just be another

local subway system competing with all the other local subway systems.

Mr. CONNOLLY. Ms. Jeter, you were being asked about previous

statements you made about the nervousness of the work force. And,

of course, I do think it’s important to put in perspective, the tragedy notwithstanding, in the 33 years of operation of the Metro system, it has functioned on a daily basis as one of the safest transit

systems in the United States; is that not correct?

Ms. JETER. That is correct.

Mr. CONNOLLY. And, as a matter of fact, I think we’ve had a total

of three major accidents in the history of the system; is that not

correct?

Ms. JETER. That’s correct. But I would also like to add, Mr.

Connolly, that even though we have not had those types of accidents, as a rail operator I know that when an accident occurs, it

occurs.

Mr. CONNOLLY. Absolutely. And one of the things that occurred,

Ms. Jeter—and, Mr. Millar, you may want to comment as well—

was because we were having what’s called 1000-series cars, some

of the very earliest cars in the system, in the front of the train that

crashed into the stationary train; is that correct?

Ms. JETER. Yes.

Mr. CONNOLLY. And the 1000-series cars are, in terms of crashworthiness and safe haven for passengers, a lot less safe and reliable than more recently constructed cars; is that correct?

Ms. JETER. They are the weaker-built cars.

Mr. CONNOLLY. And is it also true, to your knowledge, that there

is no Federal standard in terms of crashworthiness and safety of

passengers on transit systems; there is for rail systems like Amtrak, but there is not for transit? And my time is up, but perhaps

you would like to comment on that.

Ms. JETER. Not that I know of.

Mr. MILLAR. What there is is the federally endorsed voluntary

standard system, crashworthiness, that I describe in my testimony

that’s been developed. Obviously, older cars were built under the

practices of the time. As newer cars are built and purchased, they

will be bought, presumably, to the standards of that time. And cars

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that are bought 10 years from now will have to their standards;

continuously moving and improving over time.

Mr. CONNOLLY. Mr. Chairman, my time is up, but this is an

issue that has come out of the regional delegation’s examination of

the tragedy of June 22nd, this anomaly in Federal regulation

where we do regulate for hard railcars on railroad systems, but not

for transit. It’s a voluntary system of safety. And this committee

may want to take a fresh look at that.

I thank the Chair.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

I would now like to recognize the gentlewoman from the District

of Columbia Ms. Holmes Norton, who has been a driving force,

along with Mr. Cummings and Mr. Connolly, on this issue. The

gentlelady is recognized for 5 minutes.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Millar, your testimony is replete with standards. I mean,

they’re the kind of standards that I think the public thought were

required.

First I want to know who has adopted these standards? And then

I want to ask you why you believe the Federal Government has

done no more than give you a charge to develop standards while

apparently not giving anyone the charge to enforce standards?

Mr. MILLAR. Yes. The standards are developed under Federal law

that allow for industry-developed standards. The development of

our standards has been funded both by our own members as well

as the Federal Transit Administration when it comes to rail transit

and bus transit standards. When it comes to commuter rail standards, those have also been worked on by the Federal Railroad Administration as well. It is up to each transit property themselves

to adopt standards as——

Ms. NORTON. So what is the usual practice? When you develop

standards, have you found that transit systems across the United

States readily develop these standards, and did WMATA do so?

Mr. MILLAR. Yes. We have found that once the standards are developed and agreed to—they’re called ‘‘consensus standards’’ because there is agreement that this is the right standard—then we

find transit systems do, in fact, use those standards because they

want to improve safety, and the standards do that. As to whether

WMATA——

Ms. NORTON. They are common carriers, and, of course, in our

law you would expect them to improve and want to do so.

Let me ask Mr. Davis, who knows so much about the system and

began us in this process, you heard the testimony here that we

have a long list of standards. Do you believe the time has come,

Mr. Davis, for the Federal Transit Administration or some agency

of the Federal Government to, in fact, enforce some of these minimal standards for safety of passengers in transit systems throughout the United States?

Mr. DAVIS. Sure. But let me note one other thing. There is, to

my knowledge, no identifiable grant source to buy railcars outside

of the New Starts Program. So when you start talking about our

ability to buy railcars and the like, it comes right out of Metro’s

hide. They can’t go to the Federal Government for that.

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Ms. NORTON. Are you implying that the Federal Government

does not have the authority under the interstate commerce clause

to require minimal standards?

Mr. DAVIS. No. I think they have the authority.

Ms. NORTON. Let me ask Ms. Jeter.

Ms. Jeter, you talk about people aging out. These are union jobs,

which, as far as I know, are high-paid union jobs. May I offer again

my condolences to you and to the excellent work force at WMATA,

and congratulate you especially for what you did through the inauguration. You were way beyond the call of duty.

Ms. JETER. Thank you.

Ms. NORTON. But here you talk about operators aging out. The

operator who sacrificed her life worked her way up the ladder. Is

there some difficulty in attracting people to these high-paid union

jobs?

Ms. JETER. I think there is to a certain point. Let me say this:

WMATA, the union we have right now, the majority of the 7,900

or so employees, the majority of them have less than 10 years of

service. So you have a relatively young work force, young in the

amount of time that they have been on the property.

I think that where transportation is concerned, although it is a

very well-paid position, it can be something that some of us don’t

enjoy doing. As a person who has been employed by WMATA for

30 years, there are many Christmases and Thanksgivings that I

did not spend with my family. There were plenty of PTA

meetings——

Ms. NORTON. But is there a work force ready and willing to step

up as the work force ages out?

Ms. JETER. I think that there have been some changes that have

been made. I know as soon as Mr. Catoe got on board, probably

about 6 months after I became president and he became the general manager, we had a conversation about bringing people in full

time versus part time so that they would be willing to step into

regular positions.

I don’t think that WMATA has any trouble recruiting. I think

that transportation, because of its stringent rules and regulations,

have trouble staying, to be honest.

Ms. NORTON. I see my time is up. I hope we have a second round,

Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LYNCH. The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Maryland, Mr. Cummings, for 5 minutes.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I want to thank all of you for your testimony.

Mr. Millar, when I was looking at the Washington Post this

morning, they were talking about the NTSB and their letter that

they apparently sent to you all within the last few days, and your

immediate response, which I thought was good. And I’m just wondering, is the level of automation on the operation of the WMATA

system unusual compared to other systems?

Mr. MILLAR. I would say yes. I would say that at the time that

it was designed, only the BART system in California really had

comparable, and WMATA really even went a step further. On the

other hand, around the world, newer systems now have much more

advanced systems. So at the time, absolutely; today, not so much.

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Mr. CUMMINGS. And in your opinion, what are the particular

risks that come with relying on such a high level of automation?

Mr. MILLAR. Well, you have to make sure of the proper design

of the automation. You certainly have to make sure of the proper

maintenance of the automation. You have to be very careful that

when any changes are made—for example, if a new technology fix

is intended to be brought in—that there aren’t unintended consequences. You certainly have to make sure that the employees are

well trained and familiar with both how to maintain and how to

use the service. You also have to make sure that you don’t expect

it to deliver more than it can deliver. So you always have to use

your technology appropriately. This is no different.

Mr. CUMMINGS. And how do you make sure that the things that

you just said are done? The other day I went to get my brakes

fixed, and when I got in my car, literally my foot went down to the

metal, and the car wasn’t stopping. I won’t name the company, but

the reason why I mention that is I think that when you have automation, it takes human beings to make sure that all of that stuff

works. And I’m just trying to figure out how do you make sure that

you’ve got everything. It seems like when you’re depending upon a

train to stop or to do certain things, and it could result, as here,

in the loss of life and significant injuries, how do you make sure

that you have layers of compliance and make sure that people do

what they’re supposed to do? And I’m not saying they don’t.

Mr. MILLAR. A couple of ways I would answer your question.

First, each transit agency in America is a public agency; it has its

own procedures, it has its own adopted processes, it has its own responsibility to train its employees in those processes. More recently, over the last few years, APTA, in cooperation with FTA and

others, has been developing standard operating procedures and

maintenance procedures that can be used. You gave the example

of brakes on your car. That’s one of the very early areas that we

develop standards in so that employees can have a standard to

work against.

We also now have a certification program in our industry. I believe WMATA participates in that certification program so the men

and women can know what the standards are, know what the procedures are, be trained in those, tested in those to make sure that

they are well qualified to work. So those are usually the general

ways that these things are handled.

Mr. CUMMINGS. And in response to two WMATA accidents in

2006, the NTSB determined that the lack of rule compliance testing and enforcement on the WMATA system contributed to both

2006 WMATA accidents. And how does WMATA’s rule-compliance

testing measure up to other systems?

Mr. MILLAR. We have worked with WMATA and other transit

systems in this particular area. Recently, WMATA has been particularly placing emphasis on safety and compliance with safety. I

believe when the WMATA folks testify later in this hearing, they

could tell you much more about that than I’m capable of relating

to you. If there is a followup question after that, I would be happy

to supply it to you and for the record as the committee might desire.

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Mr. CUMMINGS. Ms. Jeter, I heard the last few seconds of your

answer to a question. One of the things that you said is that they

need the resources. I think you were talking about funding; I

caught that. How confident do you feel that if the money were

there, that it would be used for the right things?

Ms. JETER. I feel relatively confident. I also think that, along

with funding, you also have to have regulations, and you have to

have those criteria in place when they’re supposed to do it.

In your questioning, you were talking about the training that

people would have to have in order to do all of this. Funding provides the money for the training, but I also think that we have to

stop paying lip service and actually do it. If it’s necessary to train

the entire fleet of employees in a particular new technology, then

all of them need to be trained, not just part of them today, and

then 6 months later we get to the other part. By the time we get

to the other part 6 months later, a number of things have occurred.

So I think that’s some of what we have to do.

As an employee I’ve watched where 25 people go to training for

one particular thing, and then we don’t see that training anymore,

we move on to the next thing. We have to stop doing that. I think

we, as transit, have to stop doing that to ensure that all employees

are trained on all things that concern any part of transit.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I see my time is up. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

The Chair is now pleased to recognize the gentleman from California, Mr. Bilbray, for 5 minutes.

Mr. BILBRAY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I apologize to the committee because I like to get into the weeds;

you know, once a transit operator, always a transit operator. I

guess the question will be technical, but also from the union’s point

of view.

One of the things that was developed in the early 1970’s and late

1960’s was this concept that automation was the thing of the future. It wasn’t until late in the 1970’s that we started seeing that

you still have to have somebody in the cab.

Now, my question is this: As I remember, in 1978 when we were

building our LRT system in San Diego, we were told by BART, we

were told by Edmonton, we were told quietly out of D.C. that the

system of having automated operation with a manual override—

which is basically what we have now—was not the way to go; that

the fact is the opposite should be the way to go, have manual operation and an automated override. Now, there may be the issue of

proximity of trains and everything else, but what we were told

when we were talking to the people on the front line was that the

fatigue of an operator was more when they were not operating the

car itself, were sitting and basically just keeping an eye on the machine than to physically operate the system.

Has anybody done a system study on the reaction time of somebody who is not actually operating the vehicle as opposed to somebody who is physically doing the operation?

Mr. MILLAR. I’m not familiar if there is such a study. I can tell

you the question you’ve posed is an unresolved question. There are

transit systems built today in the world that are fully automatic,

no manual override whatsoever. There are transit systems in the

46

world that have some automatic train-control features but much

more heavily reliance on the operator.

Where there is clear agreement, is that having automatic train

protection systems, such as was included earlier in testimony today

about in the Rail Safety Act last fall. There is no disagreement

about that. That needs to be done and is being done around the

world.

But I am not familiar with such a study. I will check our records,

and if I find such a study, I will be glad to make it available for

you, sir.

Mr. BILBRAY. Ma’am, from the labor point of view.

Ms. JETER. I believe that running a system automatic is the right

system to run in. The train just runs smoother as a whole. I think

that having a human being there stops whatever from occurring

whatever problems you might have with the system from occurring.

And the operator can override and put it in manual. But I do believe, as an operator, that running that system on automatic, we

are supposed to have an automatic system, it should be able to run

and run sufficiently in automatic.

Mr. BILBRAY. But, see, that’s the theory. And we had the bells

and whistles; you basically had the engineers that like to engineer

everything and try to engineer the human factor out. But we were

strongly urged, after BART got into operation, not ignore the impact on the human of not doing anything. The mind ends up drifting off; there is a lack of concentration. So the reaction to an emergency is going to be much slower for somebody who’s not actually

engaged in the operation than somebody who is observing it and

then is expected to impose on. I think that we’ve got to be open and

frank.

I’ll give you an example. When you fly a B–2 bomber, they’re

being flown by the person in the pilot seat, but the computer can

override and stop you from doing the wrong things. We’ve got technology that’s one of the most sophisticated systems that Americans

ever developed operating off that mode, and we’re operating on a

1970 mode that machines and computers can do it. And it was all

actually an afterthought that we put people on board as a backup.

I’m not so sure that we shouldn’t be taking the time to study

this, and make sure the assumptions we made earlier in the 1970’s

are the best assumptions going into the next century. I think we

need to legitimately say we assume that the driver will respond to

the crisis in a timely manner as opposed to the other way around.

And I think we should rethink that. I’ll tell you personally, as

somebody who was building a system back in the late 1970’s, I still

remember being told again and again by drivers to watch out for

this system, it has this problem. And when the accident happened,

Madam Chair, I thought back to those warnings I kept hearing.

Go ahead.

Ms. JETER. The other part of that is when you operate for 8

hours manually, you also run the risk of someone getting tired. So

I think that it has a dual effect on individuals.

You know, as a seasoned operator, I say when you get tired and

you feel yourself maybe not paying attention, stand up, do something other than just sit there and be lulled with the movement of

the train. You have to condition yourself to know that being alert;

47

is your job, that’s what you’re supposed to do. When you’re not operating that train in manual, you’re supposed to be alert, you’re

supposed to know what that train is doing at all times.

Mr. BILBRAY. Madam Chair, I appreciate the time. I think it may

be time to go back and study the human impact on this. We always

are looking at the machines, but I think we’ve got to integrate the

human factor. Assumptions made 20, 30 years ago may not be reality today, and I think that we ought to ultimately and frankly

discuss that.

Ms. NORTON [presiding]. Thank you, Mr. Bilbray.

Mr. Tuite, the chairman promised that on the second round of

questions, we would let you begin, because we have not yet heard

from an eyewitness who was involved in this accident. You have 5

minutes to summarize your testimony, please.

Mr. TUITE. Thank you, Chairwoman.

Ms. NORTON. Could I just say that I have received word, Mr.

Davis, that you may have to leave. I want to thank you for the

chairman and the committee for taking the time to follow through

on what you began here when you were Chair of the full committee. So if you have to leave, you will be excused with thanks and

gratitude.

Mr. Tuite.

STATEMENT OF PATRICK TUITE, EYE WITNESS AND

METRORAIL TRAIN 112 RIDER

Mr. TUITE. I want to apologize first for my delay. I knew that I

had to be here at 2 o’clock. I live in Kensington, MD. I decided for

the first time since the accident to take the Red Line. I left my

home at 12:37. I did not arrive here at Capitol South until 2:55.

Ms. NORTON. The Red Line is being held up because of the accident, I take it.

Mr. TUITE. Yes. And the elevators weren’t operating at Forest

Glen, and there were a number of other problems that caused that

delay. So I apologize, but please appreciate my frustration in even

giving you that apology.

On the afternoon of June 22nd, I was on my way to teach a night

class at the Catholic University of America. I decided that night,

on a whim to save some gas, to park at the Wheaton Metro, and

take the Red Line down.

I normally ride in the first car of the train, but on that evening

it was hot, I was dressed for work, I decided to stay in front of an

air conditioner on the platform at the Wheaton station, and because of that got on the second car of the train and sat on the forward-most right-hand side facing forward near the forward-most

doors, if that helps at all.

While riding the train, I read the paper, as I do in the tunnel.

And then, as we came out of the tunnel, approaching the Silver

Spring station, somewhere around Silver Spring or Takoma, I got

a little tired and put down the paper. The operator came on and

told us to expect a delay. This was a typical announcement, this

was nothing unusual. I could hear the operator’s voice. She reassured us that we would take a delay, stop in between stations, and

then start back up again.

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So as the train came to a stop somewhere south of Silver Spring

or south of Takoma, I don’t remember which, I closed my eyes and

relaxed a little bit. The train began to move again while my eyes

were closed. I had put the paper down. And then somewhere in

there we got to a normal cruising speed, I’ll call it, when I heard

a screeching noise. A shuddering feeling came through the car;

someone yelled behind me that she believed that we had derailed,

and then one of the loudest bangs I’ve ever heard in my life.

Everyone in the second car—and there weren’t many of us—were

thrown from their seats. I hit the seat in front of me. I don’t remember much of that, but I do remember being on the floor of the

second car with a lot of dust, a lot of smoke, not much in the way

of screaming, but all my belongings had been thrown to the front

of that car.

It’s at that point—first of all, there was no noise. All the electricity was down. You could see the sunlight coming through, but

it was very difficult to make out what was going on. A gentleman

who had been sitting forward of me got to his feet and told everyone in the car we should go, everyone get out of the car.

So people did get up. We moved in an orderly fashion; again, no

screaming. A woman opened the emergency lever to get the center

doors open. The center doors did not open. I helped by reaching in

and sliding one of the doors open to the left, and we proceeded to

get people out of that car and onto the rocks below. It was quite

a big jump. I mean, it’s a good 41⁄2 feet, 4 feet up to the rocks at

that point. So we helped lower people out of the car. And it’s only

at that point when I paused, looked to my left out of the door, and

realized that the car of the train was actually in the air.

I could see debris on the ground, things thrown from the first car

into the fencing. There was at least one man that I saw on the

ground, khaki shorts, moving, but he did not look good; he was

bleeding profusely from his legs. People were already moving toward him so that the people in my car decided to just exit as quickly as we could, as safely as we could, and then move to the back

of the car—or all the way to the back of the train.

We helped people off the train. When everyone was out of our

car, I noticed two gentlemen had gotten into the second car and

were moving to the doors in the interior of the car. I got back onto

the train to assist those two gentlemen. They were attempting to

open the interior door that connects the second car to the first car.

That door was stuck. I learned later that the car I was in was also

a 1000-series car, and what had happened was the roof of the car

actually dimpled like a soda can. If you take your Sprite can or

something, turn it sideways, imagine it’s like the car and just press

on the top, that’s what happened to that second car. Because the

roof was down, the struts that support that roof were also down.

That prevented the door in the second car from opening enough for

anyone in the first car to exit.

There were two gentlemen with me. We could see, as we were

trying to remove that door, that possibly we could take some ceiling

panels down. We did that. That didn’t work because the metal

struts underneath that ceiling panel were stronger, we couldn’t rip

those out. So the door was stuck.

49

We could hear the people at this point in the first car, and it

didn’t—it was pretty chaotic. They were screaming, they were

upset. I could see through the window there were about four to five

people in the rear-most section of the first car. I could not see beyond that, which would be the rear-most door as the side doors

that open; you couldn’t see past that because the flooring had

crushed accordion like into that section, so all the handrails, all the

seating was askew. We had handrails and posts pointing toward

us, almost like tooth picks, and then four to five people trapped inside there.

When this one young man on the other side realized that we

could not open our door, he told us that he was going to break the

glass. So he took his shirt off, wrapped it around his wrist, and

started punching the glass. It was at that point that myself and the

two other gentlemen moved out of the way to avoid the broken

glass.

At this time—and this is the first time that a first responder

came to us—a WMATA operator, I don’t know where from, but obviously not on our train, had come in through the third car into the

second car. He had the vest, the walkie-talkie, goatee, and told us

that we should just exit that car as quickly as possible, that he

would take care of that situation as best he could, and that first

responders were on their way.

So we moved through the cars themselves. They were empty at

that point. The second and third car were empty. We moved into,

I believe, the fourth car, jumped from the car, and then just got

more people out of the cars as best we could, helped lower them.

Again, I did not see a lot of first responders at this point because

I had not been to the back of the train itself.

I don’t know what the time was, I don’t know how long this narrative would account for, but when we got out of the train and were

moving people out, someone shouted that they needed doctors and

nurses. And that was quite vivid for me because I was lowering a

woman in scrubs from maybe the fourth or fifth car, and she said,

I’m a nurse, but I’m hurt. We said, we need you, and she went to

the first car.

After that, we pretty much moved everyone to the back of the

train. It was very confusing. We saw two, I believe, plain-clothes

policemen in shorts with safety vests. I don’t know who they represented, but they told us to stay away from the third rail, stay

grouped at the back of the train.

We had people wandering away from the scene. We had four passengers, at the very least, that I witnessed who picked up their belongings at the end of the train and simply walked north. They left.

And there were not enough first responders to prevent them from

leaving, and certainly none of us had our wits about us to say,

don’t go. We just let them go.

The firemen who arrived on scene went to the parking lot between the Community Gardens north of New Hampshire Avenue

bridge and the Jabroe—I think it’s Jabroe Printing that has a

parking lot there. They could not get to us because we had fencing

between the CSX tracks and the Metro tracks. There are four sets

of tracks at that point by the New Hampshire Street bridge. The

50

Metro tracks are in the middle. There is fencing there to this day,

with barbed wire on the top.

The firemen can’t get to you. The firemen’s equipment, their

trucks and whatnot, could not get on the tracks. So they had to lug

their gear, things like jaws of life, diamond-cutting saws, and other

equipment, on stretchers, manually carrying that equipment toward the first car. This is when we started to see people at the

back of the train. So we just waited. We waited and took care of

one another as best we could.

Mr. LYNCH [presiding]. I thank the gentleman.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Tuite follows:]

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53

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Mr. LYNCH. At this time I would like to recognize the gentlelady

from the District of Columbia, Ms. Holmes Norton, for 5 minutes.

Ms. NORTON. I need to get on to Mr. Millar and Ms. Jeter, but

I must ask you, were you injured, Mr. Tuite?

Mr. TUITE. No, but I did have some soreness in my neck and

back. I eventually was triaged, along with the other people in the

parking lot. I just stayed. And toward the end of the evening, some

of the first responders told people, look, if we’ve got your name and

number, and we’ve looked after you, you’re free to go, which I

thought was a surprise.

Ms. NORTON. Your testimony has been really indispensable to

this hearing. It’s riveting testimony. I’m sure it’s been helpful to

the NTSB as well.

Because I have only a short period of time. Mr. Millar, would you

have advised WMATA to do what it now has done, to place the

1000-series cars in the middle and the more crashworthy cars at

either end, yes or no?

Mr. MILLAR. Yes. That seems like a prudent thing to do.

Ms. NORTON. Do you understand why they would not have done

it before?

Mr. MILLAR. I don’t know what information they might have possessed then.

Ms. NORTON. Let me ask you this: Therefore, faced with choices

that you can pull 30 percent of your fleet that goes back almost 40

years or put them in the middle, the choice should have been to

put them in the middle so that either end would have the most

crashworthy cars. Have you ever recommended anything of that

kind?

Mr. MILLAR. That is not a type of detailed recommendation we

would normally participate in.

I would caution that what looks like a very good idea, given the

circumstances that we think we understand now, could, in a different set of circumstances, look like a very bad idea.

Ms. NORTON. And we will question the next panel on that.

Ms. Jeter, it’s important to hear your testimony about automatic

versus manual. You know that some members of the public have

been concerned about reports of a Metro operator who seemed to

be sleeping. I tell you one thing, it’s easy to go to sleep on any kind

of moving vehicle, especially a train. There was concern, and we

are so pleased to learn that the operator didn’t even have her cell

phone with her, so we know that she was paying close attention.

I understand what automatic does, but I really have to ask you,

what is there, and shouldn’t there be something, that the operator

has to do fairly often during the trip to keep her alert in light of

human instinct to get bored if you’re just sitting there doing the

same thing over and over again? Isn’t there something more that

should be done, either you or Mr. Millar, to keep people alert?

Ms. JETER. Well, actually we do. The operators are responsible

for opening and closing the doors at this point. We are also responsible for giving out announcements. It’s our job to listen to the radios and monitor the radios so that we know what is going on in

the railroad ahead of us.

Ms. NORTON. So you really think there is enough to keep people

alert already.

56

Ms. JETER. I do.

Ms. NORTON. And I see you shaking your head, Mr. Millar.

Mr. Millar, in your testimony, I note that you say this fundamental system, that WMATA had adopted, also provides safe and effective service in other major cities. You name Boston, Atlanta, Baltimore, Miami, Philadelphia and San Francisco. Do you believe that

the system here is as safe as those systems you had enumerated

in your testimony?

Mr. MILLAR. It’s at least as safe. I have full confidence in the

Metro system here.

Ms. NORTON. In reading your testimony, Ms. Jeter, I sometimes,

because I don’t understand enough about trains, had to try to distinguish between what WMATA could have done and what was too

costly to do. You were generous in saying WMATA didn’t have a

lot of money to do what really needed to be done.

You recommended retrofitting some of the cars. Given the age of

this car and the kind of funds it would take to retrofit—and I suppose I should ask this question to Mr. Millar—40-year-old cars, and

make them crashworthy, was that a real option for WMATA? Mr.

Millar, yes or no, do you think that was a real option?

Mr. MILLAR. I don’t know the facts specifically here, but I agree

with the fundamentals of your point that if you’re going to be retiring a car soon, you want to do only what is absolutely necessary

to keep safety and operational efficiency.

Ms. NORTON. I will have to ask whether it was worth the investment.

Let me ask about your testimony, Ms. Jeter, about car-borne

monitors. You say that NTSB recommended car-borne monitors in

every WMATA car to give advance performance data. Now, would

that have been costly? And do you believe that WMATA installed

what it could that was not excessively costly, or that contraptions

like these car-borne monitors could have and should have been installed in any case?

Ms. JETER. I think over the years WMATA probably purchased

new cars hoping to alleviate the problems that had been identified.

It would be harsh for me to say that they purposefully did not

follow——

Ms. NORTON. No, but that’s not my question. You talk about rollback, and there are some things that they didn’t install.

Ms. JETER. Correct.

Ms. NORTON. Do you think that WMATA, given the circumstances it faced with Congress not providing the money and the

system not having anything like the funds, did what it could to

prevent this accident, assuming that it didn’t have the money for

all new cars or maybe even retrofitting cars?

Ms. JETER. Where this accident is concerned, to be perfectly honest, I think there was part of the situation that was missed, either

through supervision, whether or not it was monitoring that should

have taken place after some of the circuitry was changed on the

rails. I think that’s a place where we probably need to go back and

look at what the procedures are so that we would have the procedures in place.

It’s my understanding that once that Wee-Z bond was changed,

or once there was a problem identified with that Wee-Z bond, there

57

should have been certain things done to assure that it was operating as it should have been. And apparently it wasn’t, because it’s

my understanding that train 112 wasn’t even seen. So if the train

wasn’t seen, why? Was that a bond that prohibited that train from

being able to be monitored by either central control or some other

manual?

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Ms. Jeter.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you.

Now I would like to recognize the gentleman from Maryland, Mr.

Van Hollen, who has been an active and attentive Member on this

issue, a member of our full committee. I recognize the gentleman

for 5 minutes.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for

bringing this together on this very important issue, and I won’t use

the whole 5 minutes.

I do want to thank our former colleague Mr. Davis, who had to

leave, again for his longtime leadership on the question of

WMATA. All of us from this region are very pleased that we were

able to get the $150 million appropriation from the Appropriations

Committee subcommittee. And obviously that’s the first step in providing the Federal component of the ongoing funding.

To Mr. Tuite, it’s great to have a fellow resident of the town of

Kensington with us. And thank you for sharing your story.

I thank all of our witnesses.

In fact, my colleague Ms. Norton asked some of the questions I

was going to ask of the other two of you. So in the interest of time,

Mr. Chairman, I will move to the next one. I want to thank you.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

We want to thank each of you for your testimony here today. As

always, there are a number of other hearings going on at the same

time. Also, as you know, we’ve had votes on the floor. I will ask

that you remain responsive. If Members who were not here at the

hearing today have any questions that they would submit in writing, I would forward them to you and would ask that you respond

to them within 5 days.

With that, I want to thank you for your testimony today, and I

bid you a good day. Thank you.

The Chair would like to call forward our second panel.

Good afternoon. I would like to welcome our second panel and

thank you in advance for your testimony.

It is the custom of this committee to ask witnesses to be sworn

who are to provide testimony before it. So could I ask you all to

rise and raise your right hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. LYNCH. Let the record show that all of the witnesses have

answered in the affirmative.

In the interest of time, what I would like to do is just to offer

a brief introduction of each of the witnesses, and then we will go

back and allow the witnesses to provide an opening statement.

Council Member Jim Graham became chairman of the Metro

Board in January 1999. Mr. Graham currently serves on the Council of the District of Columbia representing Ward 1. He also chairs

the council’s committee on public works and transportation. Mr.

Graham served as executive director of the Whitman Walker Clinic

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from 1984 to 1998. Previously Mr. Graham served as staff counsel

for Senator Abe Ribicoff, a Democrat from Connecticut, and clerked

for Chief Justice Earl Warren, now retired.

Mr. John B. Catoe has more than 30 years of experience in public transportation. As general manager of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, he oversees the second largest rail

transit system and the fifth largest bus network in the United

States, with more than 10,000 employees, a $1.3 billion operating

budget, and a $3.1 billion 5-year capital improvements program.

Ms. Deborah A.P. Hersman was sworn in as the 35th member of

the National Transportation Safety Board on June 21, 2004. Since

her appointment to the Board, Ms. Hersman has been the member

on scene at 15 major transportation accidents. Before joining the

NTSB, Ms. Hersman was a senior professional staff member of the

U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation

from 1999 to 2004.

Mr. Eric Madison joined the Mass Transit Administration as

transportation planner in 2007. Mr. Madison was appointed as a

district representative to the Tri-State Oversight Committee for

State safety oversight of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit

Authority Metrorail system, and in April 2007 became Chair of the

committee. Mr. Madison began his career with the District Department of Transportation in 2003 as an administrative management

officer for the Public Space Management Administration.

Mr. Peter M. Rogoff was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as Administrator of the Federal Transit Administration in May 2009. Prior

to joining the Federal Transit Authority, Mr. Rogoff served on the

staff of the Senate Appropriations Committee for 22 years, including 14 years as the Democratic staff director of the Transportation

Subcommittee. Mr. Rogoff has a strong background in Federal infrastructure, budgeting and finance, and has played an active role

in the financing of the last three comprehensive surface transportation reauthorization bills.

I would now like to recognize Mr. Graham for 5 minutes for an

opening statement.

STATEMENTS OF COUNCILMEMBER JIM GRAHAM, CHAIRMAN,

BOARD OF DIRECTORS, WASHINGTON METROPOLITAN AREA

TRANSIT AUTHORITY; JOHN B. CATOE, GENERAL MANAGER,

WASHINGTON METROPOLITAN AREA TRANSIT AUTHORITY;

DEBORAH A.P. HERSMAN, MEMBER, NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD; PETER M. ROGOFF, ADMINISTRATOR, FEDERAL TRANSIT ADMINISTRATION; AND ERIC

MADISON, CHAIRMAN, TRI-STATE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE

STATEMENT OF JIM GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Ranking

Member Chaffetz, Delegate Norton, Congressman Connolly and

Congressman Van Hollen. I am here today in my capacity as chairman of the Metro/WMATA board.

June 22, 2009, was and will always be a date of great tragedy

for our agency and for all who rely on it. Those most directly impacted remain in our hearts and prayers and motivate our every

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action. I want to especially thank Mr. Tuite for coming here today

to share his personal experience, which I found very impactful.

As a first step, our board did act within 24 hours to authorize

the general manager to provide emergency hardship relief funds to

those who were victims of this tragedy. That relief was not contingent on anything, and it was made clear that it had no ramifications of a legal nature insofar as ultimate liability. It was, rather,

a humanitarian gesture to relieve immediate hardship. And I know

firsthand from working with certain of these families that it was

really very much appreciated.

On behalf of our board of directors, I want to say that we believe

in our management, and we have confidence in the skill and dedication of our general manager John Catoe. We believe our system

is safe, and we will do all we can to ensure that once the probable

cause or causes of the accident are identified, action will be taken

by the authority to remedy and address those problems.

Please keep in mind that in all of our history, there has been but

one other fatality involving passengers, and that was more than 25

years ago. But for pressing infrastructure needs, we need real action by the Congress to make good on the promise in last year’s authorization act and thereby provide a full payment of $150 million

in fiscal year 2010 Federal appropriations.

Presently, our local jurisdictions carry nearly the entire burden.

For example, D.C. taxpayers will send some $300 million to Metro/

WMATA in fiscal year 2010. We are very encouraged, Mr. Chairman, by the action that was taken yesterday by the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation to take that first and extraordinarily important step in appropriating $150 million for fiscal

year 2010.

I want to commend everyone that was involved in this, most particularly our regional delegation. Some of the Members are here

today: Delegate Norton, Congressman Connolly, Congressman Van

Hollen, and others. And I also want to single out our Majority

Leader Mr. Hoyer for his fine role in all of this.

I believe that if Congress acts to finalize the $150 million for fiscal year 2010, that D.C., Maryland, and the Commonwealth of Virginia will all find the matching funds to bring together $300 million annually for each of the next 10 years. This money will make

a critical difference in our abilities.

Mr. Chairman, I remember our last hearing where you were so

diligent in terms of making sure that we had put everything out

of the path in terms of obstacles in order to make sure that this

money would become available. But, Mr. Chairman, we also need

to have the active commitment of President Barack Obama and his

administration to find emergency stimulus dollars for immediate

assistance with these infrastructure issues. I noted that Congressman Davis made a particular point of this in his comments today.

Finally, we appreciate the support of our local congressional delegation, as I have said, and it’s continued to work to move all of this

forward. Thank you.

Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Graham follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. Mr. Catoe, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.

STATEMENT OF JOHN B. CATOE

Mr. CATOE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and also Ranking Member

Chaffetz. I’mhappy to be here today to testify in front of you in the

position of general manager of the Washington Metropolitan Area

Transit Authority [WMATA], or Metro.

The basic facts of what happened on June 22nd are really described in my written testimony, as well as the testimony from the

National Transportation Safety Board. And through this questioning this afternoon, I’m sure we will cover every aspect of that.

I do want to say that we were working with the National Transportation Safety Board to provide support in their investigation,

and they have the lead responsibility for the investigation of this

accident.

Today, I will focus on the steps that Metro has taken since the

accident to ensure the safety of our riders and employees, and also

touch on the capital needs of this organization.

First, I would like to extend my sympathy and those of all Metro

employees to the families of those who died in this accident. I, as

well as all Metro employees, are saddened by this event, but my

grief is only small compared to the grief of the families of those

who lost their lives.

Our thoughts are also with those who are injured, and we pray

for their speedy recovery. This is a difficult time for them and their

loved ones, and we would do whatever we can to help them come

through this process.

I would also like to take a moment to acknowledge and thank the

first responders from the District of Columbia as well as from other

local fire departments, police departments, as well as members of

the Metro Transit Police and our employees, who responded to this

accident and provided assistance in a very quick, in my judgment,

time period. My written testimony also includes the list of those

who provided assistance, for which I am truly, deeply grateful.

Safety is at the foundation of what we do at Metro. We have always taken our responsibility to safety seriously, and we have always taken a number of steps to ensure that this system is as safe

as possible.

First, upon notice of this accident, we began to operate all of our

trains in manual mode, rather than automated mode, to ensure,

again, the integrity of the system.

Second, within days of discovering that a track circuit in the area

of the accident had lost its ability from time to time to detect

trains, we physically inspected each of the 3,000 track circuits in

our rail system. And we are also running daily computerized tests

on those circuits.

Third, we have arranged for an independent review of our automated transit train control system. In working with the National

Transportation Safety Board, this review will be conducted by a

group of outside transit signal experts. And I appreciate the assistance provided by the American Public Transportation Association

for assistance in this effort.

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Finally, while they are safe to operate, I decided to place our oldest railcars in the center of trains. We plan to replace those cars

as soon as funding is available and funding is secured.

As you may be aware, yesterday the National Transportation

Safety Board recommended that Metro enhance redundancy in our

train control system by using real-time data and automatic alert.

We have already begun contacting vendors with experts or expertise in this area. And we are preparing an estimate of the cost to

develop and implement the automated system.

When we are able to determine the steps necessary, we will move

forward with this system. We will do what we have to to ensure

that this system is put into place. However, it requires a specialized development for the WMATA system, but we would dedicate

the necessary resources to implement this recommendation as soon

as that system is ready.

This meeting and this process will not begin next week; it has

already begun. And, in fact, a meeting is scheduled tomorrow

morning with the vendors within WMATA to begin the process of

moving forward to meet the recommendations by the National

Transportation Safety Board.

We also recognize and I realize that this is an inconvenience to

many of our customers, of operating our system the way we are

doing so today. We have not been able to return to pre-accident levels of service, and we will not be able to do so until this investigation is completed.

Finally, I would like to thank the Subcommittee on Appropria- tions for including the $150 million in funding for Metro’s capital

needs. Our capital needs over the next 10 years total $11.4 billion.

And what I am asking that this committee and the Congress do is

to pass the compact amendments necessary to make the changes

in our compact and to also appropriate the $150 million and pass

it through the House so we can receive those funds for needed capital improvements.

Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Catoe follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

Ms. Hersman, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.

STATEMENT OF DEBORAH A.P. HERSMAN

Ms. HERSMAN. Thank you for the invitation to appear before the

committee, Mr. Lynch, Mr. Chaffetz, and members of the regional

delegation. Ms. Norton has been a long supporter of NTSB’s investigations. And Mr. Van Hollen and Connolly, who is my representative, have been very engaged on this accident investigation.

Since 1982, the NTSB has investigated seven accidents on

WMATA’s property, resulting in 76 recommendations on a variety

of issues. I am here today to brief you on the accident that occurred

on June 22nd involving two Red Line trains traveling inbound near

the Fort Totten station.

There were nine fatalities and scores of injuries transported to

local area hospitals. On behalf of the Board, I would like to extend

our thoughts and prayers to those who lost loved ones and those

who remain in recovery from this accident.

We launched our team within hours of the collision. Parties to

our investigation involve many of the people that you see at this

table: WMATA, FTA, Amalgamated Transit Union that was at the

table before, and the Tri-State Oversight Committee.

We were also assisted, as is customary in our accident investigations, by the FBI’s Evidence Response Team, documenting evidence

on scene, as well as in the early stages of the investigation by

many local responders from the area, who did a great job assisting

us.

Let me begin by reviewing some factual information about our

investigation.

The standing train, Train 214, was a six-car train consisting of

four 3000-series cars and two 5000-series cars placed at the rear

of that train. It had stopped before entering the Fort Totten station. It was following a train that was servicing the platform at

Fort Totten. The striking train, Train 112, was a six-car train composed of six 1000-series cars, and it was following Train 214.

As you heard from the eyewitness to the accident, when we interviewed passengers after the accident, they told us that there was

an announcement that came onboard that there was a train ahead

of them, they slowed or stopped, and then they began accelerating,

and then the collision occurred. There was no communication between the train operators and Metro’s Operations Control Center

prior to the collision.

Metro’s railcars are approximately 75 feet long. That lead car of

the striking train telescoped into this last car of the standing train.

Approximately 50 feet of that car’s survivable space, or two-thirds

of that car’s survivable space, was compromised in the collision.

Our investigators found metal-to-metal compression marks consistent with heavy braking on both rails of the track for about 125 feet

about 425 feet before the point of impact.

Trains operate under the direction of WMATA’s Operations Control Center [OCC]. They utilize an automatic train control system

that is supplemented by wayside signals at interlockings. The system is designed to prevent collisions regardless of whether or not

trains are operating in the manual or the automatic mode. Speed

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commands for individual train movements should not allow for

more than one train to occupy a track circuit at a time. And the

maximum authorized speed for this section of track was 59 miles

per hour.

Post-accident testing shows that the track’s circuit at the accident site intermittently failed to detect a train that was at that location. On the day of the accident, the system did not detect the

stopped train, and the following train did not receive speed commands to slow or to stop prior to the collision.

WMATA’s maintenance records show that, on June 17th, 5 days

before the accident, that an impedance bond, pictured in the

slideshow, was replaced in the track circuit as part of a multi-year

program for scheduled maintenance.

Investigators are continuing to examine the train control system’s circuitry and recorded data to better understand how the

train control system functioned prior to the accident. In addition,

we will be conducting, with the assistance of WMATA, some sight

distance tests on that stretch of track between Takoma and Fort

Totten this weekend.

The Operations Control Center computer system receives realtime train location data. It displays this information on a monitor

in the control center. After a post-accident review of the circuit

data, WMATA reported that the track circuit intermittently lost its

ability to detect a train after June 17th.

WMATA has now assigned personnel to review recorded data

once a day to identify anomalies systemwide. They do not have an

automatic monitoring system that would identify and promptly report a situation in which a train stops being detected by the system.

That is why we issued two urgent safety recommendations yesterday, one to WMATA and one to FTA. The recommendation to

WMATA asks that it enhance the safety redundancy of its train

control system that monitors track circuit data so that it can detect

any lost trains and immediately alert the control center so that

they can stop or slow the trains. The safety recommendation to

FTA urges it to alert other transit operators that have systems

similar to Metro’s to determine if their systems have adequate safety redundancies and, if they don’t, to take corrective action.

Thank you for inviting me here today. I am happy to answer any

questions.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Hersman follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony.

Mr. Rogoff, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.

STATEMENT OF PETER M. ROGOFF

Mr. ROGOFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member

Chaffetz, and other members of the subcommittee. The Federal

Transit Administration appreciates very much being called to testify on the overall safety posture of our Nation’s rail transit systems and the FTA’s very limited role in overseeing rail transit safety.

As we address this issue of transit safety, it is essential to remember that rail transit remains our safest form of surface transportation by far. The citizens of the Washington area are always

far safer riding in a Metro railcar, any type of Metro car, than traveling on the highway. The Metrorail system has experienced 13 onboard crash-related fatalities during its 33-year history. And while

every one of those fatalities has been a tragedy, the fact is that

automobile accidents on the roads of the Washington area claim

the same number of fatalities every 2 weeks. Any proposal that

could result in passengers getting in their cars versus riding Metro

will immediately degrade safety.

That said, the Obama administration believes that there are improvements and reforms that can and should be made to make our

transit systems even safer.

While it is not very widely known right now, our Nation’s rail

transit systems operate under two very different Federal safety regimes. Commuter rail systems, like MARC and the VRE, are subject to the Federal Railroad Administration’s very extensive safety

regulations. Those rail transit systems are governed by national

mandatory safety standards and may undergo onsite spot inspections and audits by Federal inspectors. Those Federal safety inspectors are empowered to dictate operating practices and assess

fines for any deficiencies found.

By contrast, rail transit systems, like Washington Metro, the

New York City Subway, the trolley operations and the ‘‘T’’ in Boston, and 45 other systems are subject to a very different Federal

safety regime. In the case of those rail transit systems, the States

are expected to establish and implement a safety program. The role

of the Federal Transit Administration is limited to setting minimum program requirements and assuring that the States have a

safety authority in place.

In performing our safety oversight role, the FTA is prohibited, as

a matter of Federal law, from dictating safety practices or setting

mandatory national standards. FTA does not have the authority to

assess fines, set operating rules, or even mandate the level of technical expertise the State authorities must have. And, unfortunately, the vast majority of these State agencies, including the triState authority that oversees Metro, are very thinly staffed.

The distinction between these two safety systems was plainly apparent at the site of the recent Red Line crash. When I visited the

crash site at the invitation of Member Hersman, I saw a chainlink

fence that separated the Metro tracks from other tracks in the

same corridor that served Amtrak, MARC, and CSX trains. Under

our two separate safety systems, the Federal inspector that periodiVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:02 Oct 27, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00088 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\52712.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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cally inspects the tracks serving Amtrak and MARC cannot inspect

the track on the other side of the fence, the side serving Metro.

As the new team has come on board with the Obama administration, we find the status quo to be unacceptable and we expect to

propose reforms. Secretary LaHood has established a multi-modal

departmental committee chaired by Deputy Secretary Porcari to

identify alternative approaches to address what we consider a gap

in transit safety oversight. The team will review the different safety authorities and inspection regimes we have at DOT with an eye

toward proposing reforms to Congress soon.

Now, on the matter of financing, it is impossible to discuss the

issue of safety of our Nation’s transit systems without simultaneously discussing the financing of those systems. At the FTA, we

find that the systems that are adequately financed are those with

a dedicated funding source that provides a predictable revenue

stream, and WMATA does not have such a system.

WMATA does benefit from a regular stream of Federal formula grants that totaled approximately $220 million in 2008. Also,

WMATA operates in the only region of the United States where the

Federal Government has mandated transit benefits for all Federal

employees. That generates an additional $170 million each year in

fare box revenue for WMATA.

In addition to these Federal resources, the Secretary and I do

support congressional efforts to make matching Federal grants

available to WMATA for 2010, while working within the overall

spending ceiling established in the President’s annual budget. We

believe strongly, however, that these Federal matching funds must

be used by WMATA to address the most safety critical issues in the

system as identified by appropriate vulnerability assessments.

I want to make clear that in calling for reform and endorsing additional funding for WMATA, I do not intend to leave the impression that the cause of the recent Red Line disaster was related to

inadequate safety rules, inadequate safety oversight, inadequate

funding, or poor compliance on the part of Metro. Only the NTSB

investigation will reveal to us the true cause or causes of the accident. And we at the FTA stand ready to review and implement any

recommendations that arise from the Board’s investigation, just as

we did yesterday evening, while working within the very limited

safety authorities we have under current law.

Mr. Chairman, my time is up. I hope I will have an opportunity

later to respond to the concerns raised by Mr. Mica regarding our

grant rules. And maybe we can do that in Q and A.

And, with that, I thank you for the opportunity to testify.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Rogoff follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

Mr. Madison, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.

STATEMENT OF ERIC MADISON

Mr. MADISON. Distinguished members of the committee, good

afternoon, and thank you for inviting me to discuss rail operations

and safety at the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority

[WMATA], and the tragic accident of June 22, 2009, as well as the

activities of the Tri-State Oversight Committee [TOC].

Before I begin, I would like to take this opportunity, on behalf

of the members of the TOC, to express our heartfelt sympathies

and condolences to the victims and the families of those who were

affected by this tragic accident. We will continue to keep them in

our thoughts and prayers.

The members of the TOC are fully committed to working closely

with WMATA, the Federal Transit Administration, the NTSB, and

Congress to improve safety operations and prevent another similar

accident from ever occurring again.

My testimony will provide a brief overview of the State Safety

Oversight program in general, as prescribed by 49 Code of Federal

Regulations, Part 659, and the TOC’s roles, responsibilities, and

authorities. I will also discuss the TOC’s recent history and address

the limitations faced by the TOC in performing safety oversight

and regulation of WMATA.

The TOC is the State Safety Oversight agency [SSO], responsible

for overseeing Metro’s rail safety program. Under 49 CFR, Part

659, each State with a rail transit agency, like the Metro system,

that receives FTA funding and is not under the jurisdiction of the

Federal Railroad Administration must designate a State agency to

carry out the SSO requirements. The TOC is a joint effort of staff

from State government agencies from the District of Columbia, Virginia, and Maryland.

State safety oversight agencies approve a transit agency’s safety

and security plans, review accident reports and corrective action

plans, and conduct periodic safety audits, among other tasks. Unlike some transportation regulators like the FAA and the FRA, the

TOC lacks the authority to levee fines or enforce civil penalties for

noncompliance.

In 2006, the Government Accountability Office conducted an assessment of the SSO program on a national level, including a case

study on multistate SSOs including the TOC. The GAO report

made note of administrative, financial, and organizational issues

facing the TOC, to which we have responded by streamlining our

organization, further empowering the TOC Chair, and improving

our working relationship with WMATA.

In addition to the GAO report, the Federal Transit Administration audited the TOC program in 2007. The audit resulted in eight

findings of ‘‘noncompliance’’ and four findings of ‘‘compliance with

recommendations.’’ Working with WMATA, TOC was able to close

all but two findings of ‘‘noncompliance’’ and one finding of ‘‘compliance with a recommendation.’’ The TOC is in the process of preparing its next audit response submission to the FTA and expects to

satisfy the three remaining audit findings in the near future.

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While the administration of the TOC program has improved, significant challenges remain. These include the lack of a traditional

regulatory structure and continued funding constraints.

The TOC has limited regulatory authority under 49 CFR, Part

659. The only authority inherent to 659 is the ability of the SSO

to recommend to the FTA to withhold 5 percent of grant funding

if the rail transit agency is noncompliant. Compliance with the

SSO program is a requirement for FTA funding; however, SSO

agencies themselves receive no FTA funds for program administration.

Despite its limitations, State safety oversight programs nationwide have improved and expanded in the last few years. For example, the FTA now funds some training through the Transportation

Safety Institute as well as hosting workshops for SSO managers.

Such courses have helped to improve the program overall and

should be continued.

The TOC is professionally and personally invested in the safety

and security of the Metrorail system. Our members, as well as

their friends and loved ones, are regular Metrorail riders. We hope

our testimony can assist Congress with assessing and improving

the SSO program and, in turn, improve rail transit safety nationally.

With that, I conclude my statement and look forward to your

questions.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Madison follows:]

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Mr. LYNCH. I thank the gentleman.

I now yield myself 5 minutes.

We obviously have some votes pending, but what I would like to

do is to keep the hearing going so that we are not here at an unreasonably late hour.

Mr. Graham, in trying to follow the budgetary priorities for the

Washington Metro Area Transportation Authority, I know that the

administration and Oversight Committee just preliminarily approved a $177 million system infrastructure and rehab program.

And trying to follow those items, it appears—and I may be

wrong, so I am not opposed to being corrected on this—like the

project includes new escalators, platform rehab, track repairs, upgrades to the train power system and, most relevant here, the automatic train controls, but I could not find any allocation, probably

because of the significant cost, to new train sets. In other words,

retiring that 1000-series and bringing in the 7000 or whatever the

next iteration of that train set might be.

What are the plans? And does the work that was done last night

by the local regional delegation and Mr. Olver on the Transportation Appropriations Committee of $150 million change the dynamic here, and what might we expect?

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. Chairman, it most definitely does change the

dynamic. As you know, we have an RFP, which we have received

bids on, for replacement of the 1000-series cars, as well as new cars

for the expansion to Dulles, and what we are waiting on is the

dedicated funding. There is no question about it. And if I may add, in terms of the $177 million Red Line rehab,

it has gone through the committee but has not been approved by

the board of directors. In fact, our board is well aware of the fact

that there may be additional demands that will take a higher priority than what has been set forth in that proposal.

Mr. LYNCH. OK.

I still have several minutes left, and I am going to have to take

these answers on the record. I would like to ask each of you what

you think the priorities are for the next step. What has to happen

next in terms of whatever you think the top priorities should be,

whether it is in response to this accident or infrastructure needs,

operational needs, or the grant programs that Mr. Rogoff was talking about earlier.

And I am going to yield, and I am going to allow the answers

to go on the record. And I am going to ask Mr. Eleanor Holmes

Norton to take the chair and to continue with the process and use

her allocation of time.

But could we just use the next few minutes to go down the line

and list what the priorities should be?

Mr. Catoe.

Mr. CATOE. Mr. Chairman, since I am next in order, I will go.

The first response and use of moneys will be to respond to the

recommendations of the National Transportation Board regarding

this accident. That is the first commitment this agency will make

in spending its dollars. Any future recommendations concerning

our system, we need to have moneys to respond to those.

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placed. And, as our chairman, Mr. Graham, has said, we have had

the RFP and we are ready to go; all we need is the funding to do

that.

Third, as I have mentioned many times, Metro has an urgent

need of additional capital funds to maintain its infrastructure in a

state of good repair. And that would be the third step.

So, first, safety from the requirements of this accident, any other

safety needs, the replacement of the 1000-series cars, and continuous work on the aging infrastructure of the system.

Mr. ROGOFF. As far as priorities for our role in the FTA, I think

our highest priority right now is to get a reform plan developed

under Deputy Secretary Porcari and get that plan to Congress.

We have a number of concerns as we look at statutory authorities before us, the inspection resources that Mr. Madison and the

other SSOs do not have, and the authorities that we do not have

within the FTA to mandate adequate resources. And that is what

we are doing, as it relates to developing reform plans.

As it relates to specifically the needs of WMATA, I think the

most important thing is that we not prejudge the outcome of the

investigation; that we keep our mind open in terms of what is the

highest and most important capital need for those matching dollars

that, at least as an interim step, seem to be coming forward from

Congress.

Because railcars, while important, are really our last line of defense in an accident. The most important thing we always must be

focused on is avoiding the accident and collision entirely, as Mr.

Catoe has been very articulate about. You are not going to develop

a railcar that is going to leave passengers harmless if they are colliding at 59 miles per hour.

So we really need to be focused on capital investments that avoid

that incident and similar incidents, and develop a capital plan

around those safety assessments.

Ms. NORTON [presiding]. Mr. Madison.

Mr. MADISON. Our first priority is to continue working with

WMATA and the NTSB on the investigation and to implement the

recommendations that come out of the final report.

Our next priority would be to work on improved legislation for

the SSOs that give us greater authority to actually make some serious recommendations and to have those rules be taken seriously.

And I guess our last priority is increased funding that would also

help with continued training for SSOs and also for staffing.

Ms. NORTON. Ms. Hersman, did you have a list of priorities?

Ms. HERSMAN. I would say the NTSB’s first priority is to get to

the bottom of what has happened in this accident investigation,

and then we can make appropriate recommendations to WMATA

and others who may need to be the recipients of those recommendations. We have already begun that, working with the others, issuing an urgent recommendation yesterday.

With respect to the priorities for WMATA, FTA, and others, it is

very encouraging to hear their responses to the question about

what their priorities are. I think we would say, from the Safety

Board, our priorities would be for them to implement the safety

recommendations that we have issued in the past. And what I

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heard from many of the responses here was that was what they

were going to be looking at doing.

We have now 11 open recommendations to WMATA, with the 1

we issued yesterday. And some of those are in open status; two of

them are in an unacceptable status. We were very pleased with the

quick response that we received from FTA and WMATA yesterday

when we issued our recommendation, that they are beginning to

work on it immediately.

So I think, going forward, we’d like to see implementation of our

recommendations.

Thank you.

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Graham.

Mr. GRAHAM. Madam Chair, may I add something about the

probable cause issue because we are extraordinarily concerned

about this. We are very respectful of the NTSB’s pronouncements

and all of the work that they are doing, some of which is central,

some of which is peripheral, but let me make some basic points

here.

On June 17th, this signal device—let me call it a device, because

it has various component parts—which has become the focus of

suspicion about the probable cause of this accident, was replaced

in the course of routine scheduled maintenance. There was no indication, to our knowledge, of any problem relating to the functioning

of this device.

On June 22nd, of course we had this horrendous accident. And

thereafter we went back, and we saw that, in a subsequent review

of this device functioning, there was this fluttering, so that at one

point it was signaling the presence of a train and at another point

it wasn’t, which was obviously a very substantial problem.

But what happened was we replaced the device. And this is a

very important point, Madam Chair. We replaced the device. You

would think that would remedy the issue, that with a new device

there might be some technical or other problem with the old device,

that we would have solved the problem insofar as this particular

situation. In fact, Madam Chair, the new device that was replaced

continued the same fluttering as the former device.

And so we are left—and I am making this point, Madam Chair,

very intentionally. The Metro board and the Metro management

have issued a statement on this. We are left with a very compelling

mystery as to what is going on here. And we have to focus all of

our energies in determining just what is wrong.

And let me say there is another significance to this, and the

other significance is that, for those who are concerned about the

slow movement of our trains and the fact that we are on manual

operation, I think with this mystery outstanding it is very important that we do just that until we figure out what happened. This

is a probable cause situation, we believe, where the answers and

the solutions are not immediately apparent.

Thank you.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much, Mr. Graham.

Indeed, that segues into one of my questions. Mr. Catoe initially

thought this was a ‘‘freak occurrence’’ with the flickering on the

track circuit. You indicate, Mr. Graham, the flickering continues.

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I believe that you are now testing on a daily basis, and I must

ask you, was there any reason why more frequent testing was not

done before?

Mr. CATOE. I can sit here today and look back and say, was the

testing that we did on a monthly basis insufficient? You know, to

go back in time and to make a conscious decision to look forward

at the degree of testing, our testing for 30 years served us well. But

something——

Ms. NORTON. Is this a new device of a kind you never used before?

Mr. CATOE. No, this is not a new device of the kind we have

never used before.

Ms. NORTON. So you have been running this device all along,

and, despite tests and changes, you have never seen the flickering

before?

Mr. CATOE. I am not aware of flickering as a result of this device.

And when I say ‘‘I am not aware,’’ I have not personally found that

in any of the records, of that occurring. The investigation is still

under way, and I think we will continue to investigate and review

our records to determine if that is the case.

But the question has been with change processes. In the urgent

recommendation from the NTSB yesterday, they thought that was

a good first step, but we are required to do more, and, as a result

of that, we are going to be doing more.

Ms. NORTON. And I repeat, this hearing is not about assigning

cause. We don’t have the slightest idea. Nobody could possibly

know. This hearing is being held because the public needs to know

what you know now.

Mr. CATOE. Right.

Ms. NORTON. And we are very pleased that, as the information

develops, you are making that information public and transparent.

Mr. Catoe, I would like to ask about the recent decision to put

the 1000-series trains in the middle, with presumably more crashworthy trains at either end.

First, did the union recommend that, as I believe the union has

indicated? And has it been done elsewhere? We are stuck with 30

percent of your fleet this way.

Mr. CATOE. Let me answer the second part first because that is

the easiest. I am not aware of it being done elsewhere. The cars

are specifically placed based upon some decisions of crashworthiness.

Ms. NORTON. Did it occur to no one at WMATA, given the fact

that you were stuck with these trains because Congress had not

come forward with money and there is no other way to raise it,

that perhaps that would have been the better thing to do?

And, Ms. Hersman, did you ever recommend that?

Mr. CATOE. WMATA and myself were focused on making sure

that crashes did not take place. As mentioned before, at 59 miles

per hour, you might have vehicles that will not so-called ‘‘telescope’’

as much, but you are going to have severe damage. Our focus was

keeping the system safe and to prevent accidents from occurring.

Ms. NORTON. Well, Ms. Hersman, you are the expert, or at least

the Transportation Board is the national expert. You know these

people cannot replace these cars. And you have done your duty

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over and over again and said, ‘‘Replace those cars.’’ That message

needed to come here, and of course it wasn’t heard in time.

Why did you not recommend what looks like a common-sense recommendation that doesn’t require a bunch of experts: ‘‘Hey, at

least don’t make the crash occur in the front end or the back end?’’

And that is where crashes are first felt. ‘‘Take these 1000-series

cars and don’t line them all up like sitting ducks,’’ the way they

were on June 22nd. Why did you not recommend that?

Ms. HERSMAN. Ms. Norton, we recommended after the Shady

Grove accident in 1996 that Metro look at all of their fleet, in consultation with some engineering experts, to determine what needed

to be done to improve the crashworthiness of their entire fleet,

whether it was retrofitting, making those cars more robust——

Ms. NORTON. But that is not my question, Ms. Hersman. These

people are not the crash experts. And my question is very specific:

Did it occur to anybody at NTSB what, I must tell you, was the

first thing to occur to know-nothing me and, I suspect, to many

people in the region? Because I was on washingtonpost.com for an

hour right after the accident. And somebody wrote in, ‘‘Why didn’t

they just put one of the better cars at each end?’’ I said, ‘‘You have

read my mind. I’ll make sure I will ask that question of Mr. Catoe

and the experts.’’

My question is very simple. You knew these people could not possibly replace the trains. Over and over again, you said, ‘‘Do the impossible.’’ Absent any way for them to possibly replace 30 percent

of their fleet—you didn’t recommend that they take them out of

service—why did the Transportation Board not at least recommend

this rather, low-tech, low-cost step? I mean, was there a technical

reason why? Is it just so in-your-face that even the experts didn’t

see it?

Ms. HERSMAN. Well, I think the challenge here is, because there

are no standards and there is not crash testing done, that we don’t

have the engineering data to necessarily support the placement——

Ms. NORTON. Well, in that case, should they do this or not, Ms.

Hersman? We don’t know anything, according to the prior testimony, about crashworthy standards, thanks to the Federal Government and Mr. Rogoff’s agency particularly because we have disallowed you.

So I am asking, is what they did the right thing to do? Or now,

in hindsight, would you say that doesn’t make a lot of difference?

Ms. HERSMAN. I think the Safety Board has not taken a position

on whether or not putting the cars in the center was the right

thing to do. We did ask them to look at the evaluation of these cars

in a scientific way——

Ms. NORTON. I must tell you, Ms. Hersman, that falls short.

Even if we give Mr. Rogoff the kind of perhaps authority he ought

to have, I can tell you without fear of contradiction—leave aside

the recession we are in, let’s suppose we are in the false boom economy we just came out of—that there is no transit system in the

United States that isn’t operating with old cars and cannot replace

them quickly.

Therefore, in this hearing, we are really looking for answers. It

is real easy to say, ‘‘Spend a billion dollars, and you will be safe,’’

but I have to ask you whether you are prepared, at least in the fuVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:02 Oct 27, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00108 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\52712.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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ture, to look at interim possibilities when the only answer the

NTSB has been able to come up with since 2004 is ‘‘spend some

money.’’

The public needs to know, short of spending money, do the experts have a response that can increase our feeling of safety when

we get aboard the Red Line that we have no alternative but to

board?

Could you consider that, in the event your recommendation costs

a lot of money, and given what you know about resources, would

you consider offering recommendations short of spending the

money that could increase safety?

Ms. HERSMAN. Ms. Norton, it is completely up to the recipients

who are the experts in their——

Ms. NORTON. It was up to the recipients——

Ms. HERSMAN [continuing]. To respond to us——

Ms. NORTON. Ms. Hersman, I am not going to let you get away

with that.

Ms. HERSMAN [continuing]. To respond to us with alternative——

Ms. NORTON. No. That is just not fair. It was up to the recipients

to buy new cars. You had no hesitation two or three times telling

them, when they rolled back, when they rolled forward, to change

the cars. That, you didn’t mince your words on.

We are dealing with millions of people who get on these trains,

including people who visit the city. We are trying to learn whether

or not there is anybody interested in doing what seemed to us to

be minimally necessary.

If you do not have the money, what do the experts have to say

to the system about interim steps? I think that is a fair question,

and you either are prepared to look into that or not.

And I want to know if you are prepared to look into interim

steps, such as Mr. Catoe has now taken, such as the union apparently advised, neither of which is presumed to have the background

and expertise you do. Are you prepared to consider interim steps

when the funds are not available to do what you think is the best

thing to do, yes or no?

Ms. HERSMAN. Yes. And we often consider interim steps.

Ms. NORTON. That is all I need to know. We are not trying to

second-guess anyone. We are trying to be forehanded. We are really

not blaming anyone for anything. We think that this accident was

so unforeseeable that our only duty here is to say, what little

things can we do to make sure this doesn’t happen again?

Frankly, I think that the victims and the public is entitled to

hear any interim step we can take, however minor, besides saying

‘‘spend a gazillion dollars,’’ which everybody knows WMATA doesn’t

have, and, Ms. Hersman, we don’t have it either.

I have to ask you, Mr. Rogoff, the region met House and Senate

Members, and the first thing we thought of was, goodness, where

are the Feds, or you, more specifically. And you say in your testimony that the FTA is prevented by law from establishing safety

standards, requiring inspections of the kind that are required on

other common carriers, etc.

What Federal law prohibits you from acting?

Mr. ROGOFF. That specifically——

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Ms. NORTON. What Federal law prevents you from acting? And

do you believe that there is at least a minimum obligation on the

part of Federal authorities to adopt minimum standards that perhaps States and cities can go beyond, but minimum standards, so

that Ms. Hersman knows, minimally, what is required, so that the

operators know? Would that not be a reasonable thing for the Congress to do?

Mr. ROGOFF. Well, we certainly think so.

I want to answer both parts of your question.

The language that has been both litigated and found by the

courts to be most limiting to us is Section 5334(B)(i) of Title 49.

And I am just going to read it, because it is short enough. ‘‘Except

for purposes of national defense or in the event of a national or regional emergency, the Secretary may not regulate the operation

routes or schedules of public transportation systems.’’

Ms. NORTON. What is the date on that, please?

Mr. ROGOFF. This has been in law, really, from the beginning of

the Urban Mass Transportation Act, going back a great many

years.

Ms. NORTON. What was the reason, do you believe, we prohibited

ourselves from providing for the safety of the public and rapid transit the way we do in other common carriers?

Mr. ROGOFF. I think it is twofold, Mrs. Norton.

One, from the birthing of these agencies, going back to the birthing of DOT in 1966, UMTA grew up as part of the Urban Renewal

and Urban Redevelopment Agenda in the Johnson administration.

And it was thought to be a grantmaking agency and persisted as

a grantmaking agency——

Ms. NORTON. So should some other Federal agency have been

charged as more and more cities and States developed mass transit

systems?

Mr. ROGOFF. Well, you know, what has developed is somewhat

of a hodgepodge system where we do have commuter rail operations under the Federal Railroad Administration, with hundreds

of Federal inspectors across the country.

Ms. NORTON. So the problem was the transit systems weren’t

under the usual regulatory agency, the Federal Railroad Administration?

Mr. ROGOFF. Well, those that are said to be off the National Railroad System, which is to say they are in a closed system. So you

even have some operators that run both closed systems, like the

MTA in New York runs the New York City Subway. They also run

the Long Island Railroad in Metro North. Long Island Railroad and

Metro North are inspected by the FRA; the subway is not.

Ms. NORTON. So typically, there must be dozens of subway systems across the Nation that are by the seat of their own pants.

Mr. ROGOFF. Well, 48 systems, to be exact, in about 28 States.

And to the extent that they are regulated, they are regulated by

these State organizations, such as Mr. Madison speaks. And as you

heard me and Mr. Madison say, Mr. Madison is concerned that

they don’t have enough authority in their legal statute, and we

don’t have the ability even to set minimum standards for them. We

can set minimum program requirements, but that gets into the

issue of available funding.

107

I mean, one of the great concerns that we are looking at as part

of our process as we look at this, is the scant funding and the scant

staffing of those organizations.

Now, I would like to use that just for a second to segue into an

issue that Mr. Mica raised, because it is a source of considerable

confusion and concern. Mr. Mica is asking the question, ‘‘Well,

FTA, why don’t you let your grantees use their Federal money to

provide grants to the SSOs, the State safety organizations?’’

Our simple and first answer to that is that it is a conflict of interest that we don’t think should abide. We do not believe that we

would ever want to have a situation where the grantee is using

their funds, whether it is through a Federal grant or other grants,

to pay for the operating costs of their regulators.

Ms. NORTON. Now, that parallels the Federal Railroad

Administration——

Mr. ROGOFF. Exactly. In fact, there used to be rail safety user

fees that went into a fund, and those fees were repealed by the

Congress because they did not want the users to be paying the operating costs of their regulators and inspectors.

You know, we just had a Southwest flight land with a hole in it

about the size of a football, about 12 by 18, last night. It lost compression. The FAA has dozens of inspectors that inspect nothing

but Southwest Airlines aircraft. We would never want Southwest

Airlines to be paying the salaries of those inspectors. And I don’t

think we should necessarily——

Ms. NORTON. So you don’t think you are the people who ought

to be regulating?

Mr. ROGOFF. What I am saying is we are not comfortable having

our grantees use their moneys to pay for their inspectors. We think

they should be paid for adequately, robustly, but by someone else.

Ms. NORTON. Again, as the money was in our court, I think this

issue is in our court. I needed your testimony on the record, however, because if we want to really do something besides put up the

money in the future, considering that what happened here could

happen in 48 systems, we have an obligation now, now that we

know from this experience here.

Mr. Madison, my staff was charged with researching issues about

this crash, and they inform me that they couldn’t even find a Web

site for your agency, the Tri-State Oversight Committee that has

the jurisdiction that I understand how minimal it is—Mr. Rogoff

does not have.

Why is there such a lack even of public information letting the

public know what it is you do?

Mr. MADISON. The Tri-State Oversight Committee is formed up

of members from each of the three jurisdictions. In relation to the

question about the Web site, we have had some discussion about

that because we are not really sure who would maintain the Web

site and what information we would have on there.

Ms. NORTON. Well, I mean, you would maintain it. Do you have

any staff?

Mr. MADISON. No, I mean, our staff. If it would be——

Ms. NORTON. How many staff do you have?

Mr. MADISON. We currently have eight staff members.

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Ms. NORTON. Well, couldn’t you just say, ‘‘You will maintain the

Web site?’’

Mr. MADISON. But the staff are in three different jurisdictions,

and we work out of different agencies.

Ms. NORTON. I see. ‘‘All right, you, D.C., will do it this year. You,

Virginia, will do it next year.’’ I mean, why is that so difficult to

just have a Web site at least so people can understand what, I will

confess, I did not even know existed? I didn’t know we had a regional safety organization.

Mr. MADISON. Well, we weren’t sure if it was difficult or not. It

was something that we hadn’t considered.

Ms. NORTON. Well, would you consider putting up a Web site and

assigning each jurisdiction around a duty with respect to that? I

understand you are sparsely funded.

That guess back to the jurisdictions, Mr. Graham. I mean, I

know what you have had to go through just to get the funds that

are necessary in order for us to release the funds. So I won’t say

how come you haven’t been pouring money on this board, particularly since I can’t believe people seek to find out that there has any

such board, as it is, particularly well-funded. Given the lack of

oversight from the transportation administration, I am sure that

people decide to put their money elsewhere.

Do you have regulations, Mr. Madison? Are they codified anywhere?

Mr. MADISON. Yes.

Ms. NORTON. What power do you have, if you are the only agency

that can look at safety?

Mr. MADISON. Yes, in Part 659, there is a stipulation that the

State safety oversight agency has to develop what is called a program standards and procedures. The Tri-State Oversight Committee does have a document called the ‘‘Program Standard and Procedures.’’

Ms. NORTON. Is that an enforceable document?

Mr. MADISON. No. Really what it is is it’s a document that lays

out how the TOC is executed, but also——

Ms. NORTON. So you don’t have any enforcement authority, is

that right? You can’t tell them to do anything.

Mr. MADISON. No, ma’am.

Ms. NORTON. Well, I can understand your frustration, but apparently, you recommended that the FTA withhold 5 percent of Federal grants when WMATA was noncompliant, although you know

full well that WMATA didn’t have any way to get the money.

Wasn’t that counterproductive, to say, ‘‘OK, take away their

money,’’ when they don’t have any money? Wouldn’t it be better to

make some other kind of recommendation?

Mr. MADISON. Actually, the TOC hasn’t made a recommendation

to withhold funding to WMATA, because we understand that——

Ms. NORTON. You can do that, is that——

Mr. MADISON. Yeah, we can do that.

Ms. NORTON. OK. And you have not done that?

Mr. MADISON. No, we have not.

Ms. NORTON. Because you recognize that if that is all they are

giving you, they are not giving you any tools. If all they can give

you is to recommend that Federal funds be withheld, they haven’t

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given you anything to work with. I understand that. Nor can the

local agencies.

So, as a practical matter, the reason I haven’t much heard and

the public hasn’t much heard of your board is not that you don’t

desire to do regulation, but you don’t have any authority to do any

regulation, to maintain the safety of the system, or to enforce it,

do you?

Mr. MADISON. No, we do not.

Ms. NORTON. I have to ask Mr. Catoe to comment on what we

have read, indeed, what we have heard here in the Congress, unrelated to this accident, about lease-backs.

Now, first let me say that, particularly because this hearing isn’t

about ‘‘why didn’t you do what you should have done,’’ but about

trying to explain why some things which may seem strange perhaps aren’t, or certainly to give you the opportunity to explain

them. Therefore, I preface this question by saying, you have been

operating with no way to do capital costs, and the only system with

no dedicated funding.

So somebody, some smart financial person did what has been

done all over the country; it may, indeed, have gotten us in this

fix. We have been working with you to say take advantage of the

fact that if you go to the banks to own the cars, they will have an

incentive to buy the cars. Because, unlike you, Mr. Catoe, you will

explain why, they can depreciate cars as they age because they can

take the customary loss and write off taxes.

So the notion occurs that the longer you keep the cars, from the

point of view of banks, the better for them. And this arrangement

apparently goes until 2014. And we are informed that if somehow

these cars are retired before 2014, it’s a straight-out money deal,

it’s not a safety deal, but a desperate transit authority with no way

to get the money.

But, correct me if I am wrong on this, that if you retire these

cars before 2014, that the system would have to pay a $250 million

penalty.

Now, we have a 2006 letter after the NTSB recommendation that

Metro replace these cars, where you say WMATA is constrained by

tax advantage leases which require that WMATA keep the 1000-

series cars in service at least until 2014.

Were these cars in service for tax reasons because you were constrained by the way in which you had to finance the new cars, or,

for that matter, what cars you had bought?

Mr. CATOE. Well, let me go a little bit into the discussion. In the

late 1980’s, early 1990’s, transit agencies, as well as other municipalities such as water districts, were able to basically sell their

equipment, like rail cars, and receive a sum of moneys for doing

that. They took some of the moneys and invested those dollars into

their systems. A portion of the moneys they set aside to make payments, those lease payments back over the number of years that

agreement was in place. That was an agreement that at the time

was considered legal, and it was encouraged in certain corridors.

Since that time, that type of arrangement has been determined to

not be legal.

Ms. NORTON [presiding]. Yes. I want that on the record.

110

At the time that you would have engaged in this, there was no

indication from the IRS or Federal authorities that this should not

be done?

Mr. CATOE. No. There was no indication.

Ms. NORTON. Indeed, the financial incentive was, in fact, to do

this.

Mr. CATOE. It was a financial incentive for transit agencies and,

again, other municipal operations, not just transit, to be able to do

that.

But to get to your question—and there is many pieces to that—

of the 2006 letter in response to the NTSB recommendations on the

replacement of rail cars, while 2014 was the coverage date under

the agreement that we had with various banks on the 1000-series

cars, the agreement did allow substitutions. For an example, if we

decided to replace the 1000-series cars, we could use a newer car

to substitute for the time period remaining under that agreement.

So the letter sent in 2006 had an error in it. It was an interpretation.

Ms. NORTON. So you weren’t constrained, though, from replacing the cars. You would not suffer a $250 million penalty?

Mr. CATOE. So long as we have a substitution, no.

Ms. NORTON. Do you have a substitution?

Mr. CATOE. Yes, we have a substitution.

So even though that is what the letter said at the time, since

that period of time, WMATA has been in the process of replacing

those vehicles, of identifying funding sources as well as developing

the specifications for a new series of rail vehicles, which several

months ago we did put out the bid, and we have received new bids

on those vehicles. If we could replace those cars today, I would replace them and substitute another car until the agreement of 2014

has arrived.

So, yes, we could; we could substitute other vehicles.

Mr. ROGOFF. Ms. Norton, I just think it’s important to point out,

for people who may not be familiar with these transactions, this is

not a transaction that’s unique to WMATA. We’ve got railcar operators across the country that during the same period that WMATA

entered into these transactions did the same thing in order to leverage some additional dollars out of their rolling stock. I just want

to clarify that, lest anyone think that this is a Washington Metro

unique arrangement.

Ms. NORTON. Indeed. Thank you, Mr. Rogoff. In fact, we are

aware that when WMATA came here, along with virtually every

other transit system that was involved—which is every big transit

system—to get some kind of relief from having to pay essentially

penalties by having the loan called so quickly. Is that still a problem?

Mr. CATOE. Well, yes. Again, let me go back with what happened.

These agreements had to be insured by an insurance company. It

just so happened that the majority of the agreements that we had

were ensured by AIG.

Ms. NORTON. Just your luck, Mr. Catoe.

Mr. CATOE. Yes. It was the perfect storm, so to speak.

When their rating dropped, we were in technical default because

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ing. Well, AIG was not the only one whose ratings dropped. Every

other insurance company in the world, during these bad economic

times, had their ratings dropped. So we and every other transit

agency, as well as municipalities and water districts, were in technical default of our agreements.

Given that the banks could no longer write off a loss because of

an interpretation by the Internal Revenue Service that this transaction was not legal, they came after the various agencies demanding payment, even though we had made every lease payment required over the years.

Ms. NORTON. No missed payments?

Mr. CATOE. No missed payments whatsoever. Transit agencies in

other municipalities were in danger of losing hundreds of millions,

if not several billions of dollars in taxpayer moneys. We came to

Congress, and we also went to Federal court to block the effort of

that bank to do so. We were successful to a certain degree in Federal court, and Congress has also been very supportive.

We’re in the process now, and we have unwind several of these

agreements, and we have unwind those agreements for the moneys

that were set aside for the payments, so no additional cost to the

taxpayers. However, there are still multiple agreements here in

WMATA as well as across the United States that have not been

unwound. And there is congressional action pending to deal with

those issues.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you. I’m very sorry you had to go to court

on this one. It was a terrible situation.

Mr. Chaffetz is back, and I am pleased to ask him if he has any

questions. He’s back in time to ask questions of this panel.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Thank you. My apologies for being away during

the votes. I appreciate your indulgence and your understanding of

my apologies if I’m hitting something that had been addressed

while we were away.

Mr. Catoe, there was a quote in there, a Metro statement that

said ‘‘will devote all of our resources’’ to developing additional protections. Can you give me some reassurances to ‘‘will devote all of

our resources’’ and what that means, specifically?

Mr. CATOE. Well, WMATA has limited capital resources, obviously. Our capital dollars are from Federal 5307 funds, the local jurisdictions’ commit funds, and we have a capital budget. There are

dollars that we have identified for various programs we plan on

doing this year during the budget year. My comment was that if

there is a recommendation that identifies a capital project or need

within the agency to ensure the safety of our system for our customers and our employees, I will reprogram those dollars—or recommend to the board and move to reprogram those dollars to fund

that program.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. So as you get the first tranche of dollars, where

do you anticipate spending that first set of dollars? If you had to

prioritize maybe one, two, or even three, what’s at the top of your

list?

Mr. CATOE. Safety and——

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Can you be more specific than that?

Mr. CATOE. Implementing the recommendations outlined by the

National Transportation Safety Board. That’s No. 1.

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Mr. CHAFFETZ. Now, my understanding from Ms. Hersman—and

correct me if I’m wrong from what I heard—there have been 76 recommendations along the way. How many of those have or have not

been implemented, not just from this incident, but from past incidents?

Mr. CATOE. If I recall, this is off the top of my mind.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Sure.

Mr. CATOE. There are eight recommendations that have not been

implemented, two from an investigation from 1996, and I believe

six from a report in 2006. My numbers might be slightly off, but

I believe there’s 8 out of the 70-some-odd recommendations.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Ms. Hersman, is that your understanding?

Ms. HERSMAN. Over the 7 investigations, we’ve issued 76—and

actually with our work yesterday, 77. And of those, there are only

10 that remain in an open status now. Eight of them Metro is continuing to work to address the concerns that we’ve raised; they address operating issues, track issues, equipment issues. Two of them

are classified in an unacceptable status, and they deal with specific

issues——

Mr. CHAFFETZ. I’m sorry to interrupt you with our limited time,

but just for the clarification of staff and myself and whatnot, can

we get some sort of summary as to which ones have not been implemented and maybe some degree of justification as to why they

were not?

Let me move on in the interest of time here. I know time is

short.

Mr. Catoe, would you encourage riders to record and report negligent behavior? I mean, we’ve had a couple of those reports in the

last couple of weeks. What would you say to riders? Would you encourage that, not encourage that? What should they do or not do?

Mr. CATOE. I have encouraged that since the day I walked in the

door. I would encourage any of our employees or customers who see

an operation that they felt is unsafe or that would hinder the operation of this organization, to report that.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. And how would you assess the morale, and what

are we going to do to help those that are working hard and diligent, and do a good job? Obviously the morale maybe suffers. How

would you assess that, and what can we do?

Mr. CATOE. Well, any time you have an event in an organization

such as occurred on June 22nd, the morale is low, but I can share

with you also that employees that I have had a discussion with

concerning the videos that most of us have seen on TV or YouTube

are angry, angry at those workers because the overwhelming majority of our employees do an outstanding job of providing customer

service. All it takes is one or two or three to ruin the image and

the reputation of the entire agency.

So morale, of course, is impacted by what occurred, but also,

there is an anger of those individuals—those few individuals who

obviously are not following our safety procedures and policies.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. And finally, let me just ask you, one of the general concerns is the idea of implementing best practices. To the degree in which you are communicating with counterparts and others

to implement those best practices and understand what’s working

and not working, but could you maybe address that and what

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you’re doing and not doing in that regard and how we can perhaps

improve that?

Mr. CATOE. If I understand, the general question was the implementation of best practices, and we do. We have a safety officer

that looks at best safety practices. Our operations staff look at best

operations practice as defined by the industry.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. How would you grade yourself on that?

Mr. CATOE. I grade ourselves high. I have not thought about an

A or a B in that regard. But again, I want to clarify the definition

of best practices. One organization might say their practices are

best; I might not agree, and therefore I will not implement those.

But it is the best practices that have been certified through a process. We all move forward and we work toward implementing all of

those if they apply to our type of operation.

Mr. CHAFFETZ. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LYNCH [presiding]. I thank the gentleman.

I want to thank Ms. Holmes Norton for pinch-hitting for me

again. I understand that the Rules Committee is still meeting, so

that means Mr. Van Hollen and Mr. Connolly are both in the Rules

Committee.

However, I wanted to followup on one question. On the 17th,

when the bond in the circuit that was malfunctioning was replaced,

what was done right after that, Mr. Catoe, in terms of making sure

that it was functioning properly? Is there a testing protocol that

has to be implemented? Because it seemed to be at the heart of the

problem.

Mr. CATOE. Yes. The replacement was done on this circuit on

June 17th, and at that time it was tested to ensure that it was

working properly. Our records indicate that it was working properly at that time; the records I have seen.

Again, monthly, we were running this test to determine whether

or not there were problems with any of the circuits in the system.

Postaccident, we did run that test, and it demonstrated that this

particular circuit was fluttering over a period of time up to the accident itself and postaccident.

Mr. LYNCH. Yeah, I’m just wondering what happened immediately after you repaired the system on the 17th. I know you say

your systems indicate that it was acting properly. What do you do

to determine that? Do you run a bunch of test trains? Or tell me

about that.

Mr. CATOE. No. We do not run a bunch of test trains to determine if that particular circuit is running because we have 3,000

circuits in the system, and we were going through a program to replace all of those circuits.

The individual circuit is tested. And again, monthly we test the

whole system. So we were in the process of not just replacing that

circuit but other circuits on that line. And we did a site test on the

circuit to make sure it was receiving the signals and connected

properly.

Mr. LYNCH. And where is that operating from? Is that a manual

test at the junction, or is it back in the operations room?

Mr. CATOE. I believe it’s a manual test at the site, but I am turning around to look at my rail expert to be sure.

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I was correct, it is a manual field test onsite.

Mr. LYNCH. Maybe, Ms. Hersman, you can talk about this as

well: the more reliant we become on technology, I think the more

important it is that we make sure that the technology is operating,

because in this instance there was little indication of a malfunctioning circuit that had very grave circumstances for a lot of people. And this technology, we’re becoming more reliant on it, and

there are no fallback or fail-safe measures by which we can determine whether these things are still operating. You’ve got trains

loaded with people, operating at high speeds, and we can’t have

this level of malfunctioning going on. We just have to be more vigilant about testing these safety systems to make sure they’re working. We see the consequences of this today.

But in retrospect, I’m probably a little surprised we don’t have

these things more often. I think we just take a lot for granted. And

if we’re going to rely on these systems to replace operator ability

to override the system when it becomes necessary, then we have

to make sure these systems work.

Ms. Hersman, are you seeing a lot more of this in other systems

as well? And does the NTSB have recommendations regarding the

routine or the regular scheduling of these inspections?

Ms. HERSMAN. I think the question you’re asking has a lot of answers to it, and so one of the things that I want to make sure that

we cover is, as Chairman Graham talked about, what happened

after we identified that there were some problems. We’ve been

changing out components. That particular impedance bond that

was replaced, we looked at it with a shunt on the track, we looked

at it with an exemplar train on the track, we replaced it with a

brand new impedance bond, we replaced it with the old impedance

bond that was in before. There are still intermittent failures; sometimes it’s working, sometimes it’s not, even with those changes.

We’ve walked back the cable to see if there might be some cabling

issues. There are a lot of challenges here, and we are changing out

some components to identify what the problem is. That’s why the

work is still ongoing.

But with respect to the redundancy, I think that’s what you’re

raising, a vital system that everyone is relying on to perform; that’s

what our recommendation yesterday was about is to have a monitoring system so that you know when something fails. You’ve got

to get an alert when something fails. If people are relying on that

system to be vital, and 100 percent of the time it’s got to be accurate, you’ve got to know when there’s a malfunction or a loss of detection. They can do that now by looking back at their data.

What we want is for there to be a realtime notification when that

happens that there’s an alert. So we’ve seen this on the pipeline

side or on the aviation side. So, for example, if you’re monitoring

a pipeline, and you see a loss of pressure, the person who’s monitoring that pipeline gives an immediate alert that is aggressive,

and it grabs their attention so they can start shutting that pipeline

down if they’re having a leak.

Air traffic control. If they have aircraft that are coming too close

to the ground, they get a low altitude or alert on their scope. Those

air traffic controllers are compelled then to tell the pilot, ‘‘you need

to pull up, you’re getting low, there’s terrain there.’’

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What we want to make sure is that when the system itself isn’t

functioning the way it was intended, that there’s some way to get

notification about that so you can intervene.

Mr. ROGOFF. Mr. Lynch, can I just speak to one element about

it? It doesn’t have to do with the specific elements of the technology

here, but it’s really a more macro observation. Earlier, Mr. Davis talked about and identified $6 billion in deferred maintenance on the WMATA system. Nationally we just

completed a study for just the seven largest rail transit operators,

including the T in Boston, which indicates we have a $50 billion

deferred maintenance backlog. That’s just the seven largest systems. We’re updating that study to even incorporate a larger universe of systems.

But this is really a more macro issue for reauthorization because

one of the things obviously we see in these studies, Metrorail is a

comparatively young system, but the Red Line is the oldest segment. It’s 33 years old. Even the newer systems are starting to age.

And it makes the need to face the deferred maintenance issue sort

of head on, because, as we can say generically, not in the context

of this particular accident or any other one, but deferred maintenance issues, if deferred long enough, become safety issues. And

that’s an issue that the administration and the Congress is going

to have to take on more broadly.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you.

I’m sure we didn’t exhaust the full menu of questions to all of

you today, but if there are some issues that you wish to amplify

or hit on that members of the panel here have not asked, I would

like to hear those. And, as I have said with the earlier panel, there

are other Members here: Mr. Connolly, Mr. Van Hollen, Mr.

Cummings, as well as Mr. Bilbray and Mr. Issa may want to submit some questions in writing, and so we would ask that you diligently respond to those questions, if possible.

But I’d like to give you at least a couple of minutes each in closing to hit on the areas that you think are the most important going

forward for the system to operate in a reliable and safe manner the

way we all would like it to.

Mr. Graham, you are recognized for 2 minutes.

Mr. GRAHAM. Well, I would say just very briefly, Mr. Chairman,

that we need to have the probable cause of this accident identified,

and we need to have a preliminary report from the NTSB. If it

doesn’t pinpoint the precise cause of the accident, it should at least

describe the challenges we’re facing because our experience, Mr.

Chairman, is that there’s a great deal of half information, misinformation, misleading information which is in circulation at the

present time. This is why I took Delegate Norton’s time a little bit

to try and focus the issue because if we could just get the public

to understand what it is that we’re wrestling with at this point, I

think that would go a long way in reassuring the public that we

want that manual operation, we want 35-mile-an-hour speed limits

on the Red Line, and it would also better focus the decision of what

we’re dealing with.

Thank you.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you.

Mr. Catoe.

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Mr. CATOE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I believe many of the speakers today really, from a broad perspective, talked about the issues. As we look at public transportation now and into the future, there must be a balance of system

expansion but with that expansion, an assurance that moneys are

there to maintain the system.

When we look at all capital programs, we can’t just look on the

side of what are we going to get new, and what type of celebration

are we going to have because of a new line? But we must also plan

for the maintenance of that line for the next decades into the future. This is a discussion that’s going on within the industry today,

the state of good repair of the organizations and the systems, and

it is something that we must focus on.

And finally, in talking about the aspect of oversight, oversight

sometimes might be difficult because it takes time. But if oversight

is focused on the safety of a system to ensure the safety of our customers, then I welcome that, and also to provide the necessary authority on the part of the agencies that have that responsibility to

take action.

Mr. LYNCH. All right.

Ms. Hersman.

Ms. HERSMAN. I’ve heard many of the concerns that were raised

here today by Congresswoman Norton and Chairman Graham. I

will definitely take those back and take them to heart.

We make many recommendations based on what we think is

best. We don’t have to consider cost-benefit analysis when we make

our recommendations. And today we held a board meeting to determine the probable cause of an accident that occurred up on the

Green Line in Newton, Massachusetts. We had an operator that

was killed up there last year. We made a recommendation in that

board meeting this morning for the Federal Transit Administration

and for NBTA to look at putting positive train control on that line.

We understand that’s a cost constraint for them. The Green Line

is the only line that doesn’t have a form of positive train control

on it. We know it’s their oldest line up there, too, and that will be

a significant cost to them, but we do believe that’s what’s needed

to save lives.

So we do make recommendations, Ms. Norton, and we don’t have

to pay for them. And so I do recognize the frustration, but our

charge is not to do that part of it; our charge is to recommend what

we think is in the best interests for the safety community. We are

the conscience and the compass of the transportation industry, and

they get to decide if or how they implement it.

With respect to Chairman Graham’s concerns, we do have a

number of rail investigations that are pending, about 16. We will

work very hard to get the cause of this determined. We have another NBTA accident. I was up on Mother’s Day for another Green

Line accident, and so we have many in the queue. But even if we

don’t complete a final report on the Metro accident, we will do as

we did yesterday. When we identify safety issues that are acute in

nature, we will issue recommendations to address whatever improvements we think need to take place.

And so we recognize everyone would like us to determine the

probable cause of the accident yesterday. We will work to do it as

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quickly as we can, but in the meantime, we will put out recommendations to address the issues we think we need to look at.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you.

Mr. Rogoff.

Mr. ROGOFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I will certainly echo what Mr. Catoe said about the state of good

repair. Ironically enough, both the FTA and WMATA had a scheduled roundtable for the whole Nation for transit operators on the

state of good repair, which was planned several months before the

accident, and we hosted it together just last week.

I’m glad Member Hersman raised the issue of the Back Bay recommendation, because it’s very telling on this whole issue about

whether we need to reform the legal authorities as it relates to

safety enforcement.

The Board’s recommendations to the FTA is to facilitate the installation of positive train control. The reason why it says ‘‘facilitate’’ is because we are not allowed, by law, to mandate it. At the

very same time, the Federal Railroad Administration is moving a

regulation to mandate positive train control on the rail operators

on the systems that they inspect and they have a legal authority

over. So, it really brings to a head the legal issues we’re raising

here.

Now, we talked a lot here about the FTA model versus the FRA

model. And I want to emphasize that there are other models out

there that may be appropriate for a reformed Federal Transit Administration. Within the Federal Motor Carrier System, the Motor

Carrier Safety Administration, within pipeline safety, we provide

Federal funds to State enforcement agents so they will be adequately resourced to not only enforce State regulation, but also

Federal regulation.

So we recognize the need to take a hard and fresh look at these

legal authorities, but we don’t want to just run out and say, we

need to Federalize this right away. We will be back to Congress in

a few weeks with a reform plan that tries to capture the best model

for this particular industry that works with our State partners as

best we can.

Thank you.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Mr. Rogoff.

Mr. Madison.

Mr. MADISON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would just reiterate from the SSO standpoint the need for funding and legislation that actually gives the SSO some authority.

There are currently 27 SSOs throughout the country. I’ve met

most of them, and they’re really good people. We don’t want to

imply by anything that has been said today that the lack of authority means that there is a lack of effort on the part of the people

who work in the SSOs. They work very hard with the resources

that they have, and we try to make our systems as safe as possible.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you. I want to thank you for your willingness

to come before this committee and offer your testimony to help us.

Just in closing, we all have a special responsibility here. Running

a public transit authority is a very serious responsibility. We had

nine people who went out to work one evering, like we all do every

day, got on the Metro, and put their trust in the system, probably

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not giving it a second thought because of the level of trust that was

built up in that system over the years. Because of failure in the

system, members of the public were killed. Those families are dealing with those consequences, and there were dozens of riders that

were hurt that day and still have not recovered. Those are very serious consequences when we don’t run a system as well as we

should.

And so I think that everyone’s heart and mind is in the right

place on this, but it is a serious business. Hopefully, with the injection of resources brought in by Ms. Norton, by Mr. Connolly, Mr.

Van Hollen, Mr. Hoyer, Mr. Cummings, and others, some of those

needs will be met. But it will require our diligence to make sure

that money is spent properly and that our priorities are what they

should be.

And we thank you all for the role in this that you play in making

it safer for the riding public. We will just continue to work with

you as we move forward and try to improve the system for everyone.

Thank you very much. I appreciate your testimony today. And we

bid you good day.

[Whereupon, at 5:35 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

[The prepared statements of Hon. Jason Chaffetz, Hon. Eleanor

Holmes Norton, and Hon. Gerald E. Connolly, and additional information submitted for the hearing record follow:]

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