on the

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

MTA New York City Transit's ambitious maintenance program — FASTRACK — continued its second round on the Lexington Avenue line from Grand Central-42 St to Atlantic Avenue-Barclays Ctr., Brooklyn. The FASTRACK program entails the partial closure of a subway line to train service on four consecutive nights for seven continuous hours (10 p.m. to 5 a.m.). This round of FASTRACK on the lines runs each weeknight this week through 5 a.m. Friday, June 15. Because no trains are running along the line segment, workers can work on and near the tracks without having to stop work every few minutes while a train moves through the area. This is a safer and more efficient way to maintain and clean the massive New York City subway—a system that runs around the clock.

With no trains running along the Lexington Avenue line last night, more than 800 Transit workers were able to inspect and perform maintenance work on signals, switches and associated components. Workers were able to replace rails and cross ties and scrape track floors, thereby removing muck and debris. In subway stations, paintable areas not reachable during normal train operation were scraped, primed and painted. Maintenance crews also took the opportunity to clean lighting fixtures, change bulbs and repair platform edges while performing high-intensity station cleaning. These maintenance activities improve train performance and efficiency while also providing a pleasant station environment.

Major accomplishments from last night's maintenance effort include servicing nine switches, 22 signal timers, replacing air lines for two stop arms and replacing one signal head. A gap filler at 14 St-Union Sq was also serviced and 290 tunnel lights were replaced. In track maintenance, work crews removed 3,128 bags of debris (10,100 pounds), installed 38 running rails (sections of track), 536 track tie plates, 30 tie blocks and 191 friction pads. In addition, 40 linear feet of handrail was installed, 40 leaks were sealed, and 2,000 linear feet of drains were successfully cleaned. Maintenance personnel also corrected 445 third rail defects and scraped and cleaned 805 feet of track under and around the third rail.

For an aesthetically-pleasing station environment, 7,400 square feet of paintable surface was scraped, 8,500 square feet was primed and 5,900 square feet was painted. With customer convenience in mind, 10 platform edge signs were replaced, and 45 square feet of concrete was repaired. People moving equipment is also part of this maintenance effort as subway maintenance workers performed preventative maintenance on elevators at Canal Street, Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall, and Bowling Green stations.

With a goal of improved customer safety, eight cameras and 11 monitors on Closed Circuit Television systems received maintenance and one camera was replaced. At 14 St-Union Sq, a CCTV monitor glass was replaced and the picture was optimized or adjusted for clarity on four cameras and four monitors.

How this impacts service?

Reliable service - service you can depend on to get you to where you need to go when you need to get there – requires regularly scheduled maintenance to critical components you never see. Pumps, signals, track, and power are just some of the vital system equipment we are focusing on so that we can continue providing our riders with train service that is safe and reliable.

Accomplishments:

Tuesday, June 12, 2012