The MBTA has until Monday to submit an updated plan for improving employee safety and preventing trains from striking workers after federal overseers, who still aren’t satisfied with the T’s staffing levels, deemed their initial proposal “insufficient.”
With a scathing report from federal safety investigators now in hand, where does the MBTA – and the business community – go from here?
Citing a “continued failure” to prevent runaway trains despite past warnings, federal overseers Friday ordered the MBTA to conduct a new series of safety briefings for workers and produce new documentation putting necessary inspection steps on the record.
Finger-pointing and debating who is time blame is tempting but won’t move the MBTA out of its state of crisis fast enough.
Less than a week after federal overseers ordered immediate action to fix glaring safety deficiencies at the MBTA, lawmakers charted a response plan that pins blame on the Baker administration and puts hundreds of millions of dollars on the table.
The Federal Transit Administration is ordering the MBTA to make immediate changes due to ongoing safety concerns.
The MBTA plans to slash subway service dramatically starting June 20 until it can hire enough dispatchers to resume normal service in line with Federal Transit Agency safety directives.
A command center where some train dispatchers get only four hours off after 20-hour shifts. Hundreds of workers with lapsed safety certifications. Tracks dangerously unmaintained. Federal officials are forcing the T to immediately fix these issues and more.
Federal transit overseers will wrap up their on-site inspections of the MBTA this week, and they have already flagged a quartet of major safety issue areas they want the agency to address quickly, the T’s top safety official said Monday.
