'Substantial risk of death': Feds order MTA to improve safety standards for NYC subway

Federal regulators on Wednesday ordered the MTA to improve its safety protocols in the subways, citing a troubling rise in the number of incidents where transit workers and riders were nearly struck by trains last year.

A set of directives from the Federal Transit Administration noted that there were 38 “near-miss” events where MTA workers were close to being struck by moving subway trains in 2023, a 65% increase from 2021. The notices also state that there were 228 close calls that “could have resulted in a customer injury or property damage” last year, up 46% from two years prior.

The regulators “determined that a combination of unsafe conditions and practices exists such that there is a substantial risk of death or personal injury,” FTA Executive Director Matthew Welbes wrote.

The notices were sent to New York state’s Public Transportation Safety Board, which is responsible for monitoring the MTA’s safety standards. They require the board to work with the transit agency to overhaul its safety training and protocols for near-miss events.

The directives come as the National Transportation Safety Board continues to investigate the death of an MTA track worker who was fatally struck by a subway train last November and a train derailment on the Upper West Side in January . Another track worker was critically injured after being struck by a train in June, the FTA notices state.

“The federal directives make it clear that MTA boss Janno Lieber and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul are asleep at the wheel as the agencies they control are doing nothing to address safety concerns for workers and the traveling public,” TWU International President John Samuelsen wrote in a statement. “Instead, the bosses resort to blaming workers when safety issues arise rather than addressing their poor management of the system.”

MTA officials disputed the findings and said they planned to file an appeal. They argued that the incidents where workers were nearly struck by a train last year paled in comparison to the number of times their employees made it home safely.

“We will be interested to learn if FTA has established a standard in excess of this 99.97% safety record,” NYC Transit's interim President Demetrius Crichlow wrote in a letter to the FTA.

Crichlow wrote that any instance of a close call with a moving train is “thoroughly investigated to determine cause, so we can implement new or strengthen existing mitigations to prevent future incidents.”