Metro to close four rail stations over Memorial Day weekend for repairs

Metro officials are making an aggressive push to repair the transit system’s rails and stations, and this weekend four stations will be closed through Memorial Day so crews can work around the clock.

The shutdowns are an extreme Metro has used with more frequency to catch up on a backlog of repairs and maintenance across the aging rail network, much of which turned 35 this year.

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General Manager of Metro Richard Sarles discusses why track work is necessary on holiday weekends.

Metro has launched a $5 billion capital improvement effort, but it leaves riders with late-night delays and longer weekend waits.

“The system wasn’t maintained the way it should be, and we have to make up for that now,” said Richard Sarles, Metro’s general manager and chief executive. “That’s why we’re doing this intensive work.”

Overall plans call for replacing ventilation and exhaust fans; repairing platforms; redoing elevators, escalators and tiles at stations; fixing cracks in tunnels; and repairing signals, circuits and equipment along tracks.

Unlike other systems, which have multiple tracks and can often isolate their work, Metro has only two tracks, so it often has to do single-tracking to complete work. At times, it’s easiest to shut down stations on weekends to do the more complex jobs, officials said. Metrorail registers about 750,000 rider trips on weekdays, but the number drops by more than half on weekends.

Crews also work three-day weekends because it allows them more time to move heavy equipment into stations, officials said.

This weekend, more than 1,100 Metro employees and contractors are scheduled to work on repairs and maintenance. Metro is shutting down four stations on the Orange Line, including the one closest to RFK Stadium, which is the site of a four-day motorcycle festival.

The closure of Capitol South, Eastern Market, Potomac Avenue and Stadium-Armory stations will also affect access to restaurants, hotels, monuments and other Memorial Day weekend attractions. Metro is offering free bus shuttles for riders to navigate among the closed stations.

Officials said Metro is also trying to move faster on implementing recommendations from the National Transportation Safety Board, which has sharply criticized the system for its poor safety record.

Last year, the investigative agency said Metro wasn’t moving fast enough on replacing some track switches, which guide trains from one track to another. Metro officials promised to replace 178 switches by the middle of 2012. Crews have completed 148. To meet the goal, Sarles said, “requires us to take advantage of every one of these three-day weekends.”

Work delays riders

Doing the work is no easy task.

“You have to go in the tunnels, disconnect everything, bring in cranes, take out all the electrical, all the switches, put in a new set of equipment and put it all back in, plus get it tested” all between the Friday night shutdown and the system’s opening Tuesday, Sarles said.

“We’re trying to meet the safety recommendations, and we’re trying to get this operation back to where it operates reliably and it is more comfortable,” he said.

For riders, weekend work has meant more headaches.