Soul of a New System

Metro's line managers must deal with everything from the threat of terrorism to the lack of public bathrooms -- which can sometimes seem just as urgent

SITTING IN HIS OFFICE NEAR THE NEW CARROLLTON METRO STATION on a Monday morning, Charlie Dziduch scrutinizes a report showing all of the weekend's snags on his segment of Washington's subway.

A couple of mechanical problems on trains caused minor delays. Passengers were inconvenienced, which bothers Charlie, but at least no one's safety was jeopardized. That wasn't the case on Saturday, however, when an Orange Line train blew through the Landover Station, failing to brake properly. When it finally stopped, three doors hung beyond the platform. The train had to back up slowly before letting people on and off. It was a hassle for customers, and, even worse, says Charlie, it was the kind of safety violation that he often rails against in weekly memos to employees. In 1996, he sometimes reminds them, an operator was killed when his train badly overran the Shady Grove Station, slamming into another train in a nearby rail yard.

On this morning in mid-May, Charlie's safety sermons feel tragically relevant. Less than 24 hours before, a Red Line train struck and killed a 49-year-old track worker named Jong Won Lee. Metro's central control called Charlie to deliver the news. He was visiting his 78-year-old mother at the time and says he was horrified to learn of Lee's death, the second workplace fatality at Metro in seven months. "I didn't know him," Charlie says. "But it's like a big family here, and losing one of your own, that hurts."

Charlie doesn't know yet how Lee got killed, only that Metro's safety regimen somehow failed. And this realization lends new urgency to his work as manager of Metro's Orange and Blue lines. At 46, Charlie supervises 660 employees, oversees a $56 million budget and manages 32 Metro stations. The Orange and Blue lines carry more than 300,000 riders each workday -- roughly the number of daily passengers on the entire San Francisco Bay area subway system.

"Anything that moves, acts, wiggles or snakes on the Blue and Orange, that's Charlie's responsibility," explains Steven Feil, Metro's chief operating officer for rail.

Metro created Charlie's job last year -- along with counterparts for the Red Line and the Yellow and Green lines -- as part of an effort to bring accountability to a transit authority that, in recent years, has appeared aloof, even hostile toward riders. But, as transit system critics are quick to point out, making Metro more accountable is easier said than done. Some regard hiring line managers as a public relations ploy rather than a real commitment to changing the way Metro operates.

"As much as I like Charlie and respect him, there are just a whole lot of problems at Metro that he can't do anything about," says Marlene McGuirl, who retired from her job as a legal researcher at the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority two years ago and often criticizes her former employer in online chat rooms. "The fact, for example, that escalators often aren't working and that there are too few rail cars: Those problems are insurmountable for him."

Nevertheless, if riders have a gripe about lousy service, there's no misunderstanding who's in charge. Large posters with Charlie's smiling picture hang above the kiosks of Orange and Blue line stations, along with a phone number, e-mail address and a pledge that Charlie scripted: "Our goal is to give you a great experience on our system."

But, as following Charlie for a week vividly demonstrates, his $113,000-a-year job grows harder by the day. Clogged roads, $3-a-gallon gas and a booming regional economy are adding tens of thousand of new riders to an overstressed system. Seven of Metro's 10 all-time busiest days have occurred since March. Historically, days of huge ridership have coincided with important national events. The busiest day ever, for example, was Ronald Reagan's state funeral on June 9, 2004, with 850,636 riders. But ordinary weekdays have been cracking the top 10 list recently.

Charlie knows his performance is being watched not just by Metro's critics but also by the transit system's overseers and customers. "I'd be foolish to believe that a couple of major mistakes wouldn't put me in hot water," he says. "You're responsible for carrying over 300,000 people a day, and if they're unsatisfied . . . then you've got to pay a consequence."

As trains rumble by his office window, Charlie hunches over his computer, pulling up the safety record of the man who overran the Landover Station over the weekend. The train operator is guilty of at least three station overruns in the past year. Charlie frowns and reaches a swift verdict. That operator is going to be suspended. Or, in Charlie's words, "given a day in the street."

"There's two things that drive me nuts," Charlie later explains. "When an employee's rude and discourteous to a customer or when there's unsafe behavior."