WMATA suspends automatic door-opening rollout

Rail News Home Passenger Rail 7/15/2019 Rail News: Passenger Rail
Unintended door-closings were reported during WMATA's rollout of an automatic door-opening feature on Red Line trains.Photo – WMATA

The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) last week suspended an automatic door-opening feature two days after launching it on the Red Line trains.

Part of the Metrorail’s original design, the feature was launched July 7 to open doors more quickly and stop doors from opening on the wrong side of the platform as a result of operator error. During the rollout, operators remained responsible for manual door closings to ensure safe boardings.

However, the rollout was “temporarily paused” on July 9, with no timeline for reinstatement, after six isolated reports that doors were closing automatically without operator approval.

“While automatic door closing is a feature of the system, it is not one that we want active,” a WMATA representative said in an email last week.

Now, all door operations have been put back in manual mode as engineers look into the issue, the WMATA representative said.