Supervisors at the D.C. Metro are encouraging workers to violate procedures and actively ignore safety threats on the tracks and in the tunnels of the transit system.
Front-line employees of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) allege upper management pressures them into regularly flouting safety standards in an effort to keep the public happy. This results in trains running on potentially dangerous tracks and numerous breakdowns that end up crippling the system, reports WTOP.
“WMATA is terrified of pissing the public off, but I’m more concerned with making sure they don’t die!” Antonio Ross, a Metro employee, wrote in prepared remarks. “The public will get over being mad – they can’t get over dying.”
Metro employees and representatives of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689 are presenting their testimony to the Metro Board of Directors Thursday. The union wants better coordination between upper management and front-line workers. The Metro workers also allege in testimony that supervisors want to deal with these issues by leveling harsher punishments on workers who violate procedures.
“If I, as a front-line employee, am not willing to say the track is safe, and it’s not ready to have regular train service running on it, managers shouldn’t pressure me to say it is,” Ross’s, a seven-year veteran of the agency, writes in his statement. “But they do.”
Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld said he understands the relationship between upper management and employees can often be rocky, but says he remains concerned with worker errors, such as regular reports of operators running red signals.
Union leaders and employees warn that Wiedefeld risks losing employee trust if he moves forward with tough disciplinary measures.
“Mr. Wiedefeld, if you believe threatening and scaring employees into doing the right thing is the best way to manage this system, then you will never have a workforce that trusts you or anyone in management,” Ross’s statement says, according to WTOP.
Officials confirmed Wednesday that an operator pulled a train into the Fort Totten station Sunday and then left the train sitting at the platform. The train was out of service and not carrying passengers at the time but riders were waiting on the platform for more than 10 minutes for trains behind it. Witnesses say Metro employees were speaking to each other about service schedules when the operator announced his shift was over and walked off down the platform.
Wiedefeld expressed frustration over the incident and said his workers need to do more to actively reform the safety culture at WMATA. A Metro spokesman said Wednesday “appropriate action will be taken” against the operator.
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