Results tagged “safety>”

When it comes to deciphering news about Metro -- or pretty much of anything in this crazy town -- I've found that it helps to simply boil things down to real-life versions of popular Simpsons gags. (But, you know, nothing after season eight.) Take, for instance, this morning's Washington Post report about a kinda-sorta shake-up involving WMATA safety chief Alexa Dupigny-Samuels, which is a lot more digestible through the lens of a classic bit from "Treehouse of Horror III." Observe:

The authors (and dare we say, the readers) of this web site often get pretty exercised over pedestrian and cyclist safety issues, especially when so many of these kinds of accidents seem to involve city bus drivers. But a new study of relative pedestrian safety finds that D.C. is actually one of the safer cities in the country to be traveling through without an automobile. According to Transportation for America, a transportation advocacy group, walking in Washington is less dangerous than in 31 other metro areas in the U.S.

Members of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689 are encouraging their members who operate Metrobuses to do every single little thing by the book this week. The push comes in the wake of two recent incidents which saw bus drivers plow down pedestrians in the District. Unsuck DC Metro got the ball rolling on this story yesterday, and the Post's Lena Sun later followed up with a story of her own.

Head over to why.i.hate.dc for a photo and update on the 22 ghost bikes that were placed all around the intersection of Connecticut and R NW a week ago. Looks like someone decided to let activist Legba Carrefour know they aren't fond of his bikes.

All of the remaining ghost bikes near Connecticut and R have been piled up at two locations, outside of the Cosi and at the site of the original ghost bike. It's a mess, and the pile near the Cosi is blocking the crosswalk. It appears as though some of the bikes that had been locked are in the pile or missing, as well. It's unclear who may have done this, but I would imagine DPW will be removing the bikes very soon given the state of the street. I urge Legba Carrefour or the Washington Area Bicyclist Association to clean this up as soon as possible. This is no longer a tribute to Alice Swanson or bicycle safety.

It was just earlier this week that Prince George's County was warning its residents of a marked increase in rabid bat activity, and now the District of Columbia Department of Health is following suit. The rabid bat menace has reached D.C.'s borders.

Written by DCist Contributor Lauren Evans

Two Metro workers were injured Wednesday evening after two rail cars hit each other in the rail yard at West Falls Church, the Post is reporting. Thankfully, the two employees suffered injuries that are being described as "non-life threatening," though they were transported for treatment to Inova Fairfax Hospital.

In the wake of several recent high profile shenanigans on the part of Metro employees, including one Metrobus driver who was fired after being charged with kidnapping, and another who turned out to have a suspended license, WMATA today announced that it has implemented some new hiring standards.

In case you missed this nugget in Sunday's Examiner, Kytja Weir reports that the Tri-State Oversight Committee responsible for oversight of WMATA would like to see some proof that Metro's decision to move its older, 1000-series rail cars to the middle of its trains is really making things any safer. The newspaper got hold of a letter sent to Metro on Friday which noted that the committee had previously requested that the agency perform a study to determine whether moving the older rail cars would be prudent way back in November, long before the June 22 crash, but WMATA failed to act on the request. Since no formal study on the effectiveness of moving the rail cars has yet to be performed, the committee is scolding WMATA for going ahead with the plan without enough information.

Greater Greater Washington reports that DDOT has at last installed "quick curbs" at one corner of the intersection of 15th and W Streets NW, where a pedestrian was killed in May. The intersection is famously dangerous and confusing for pedestrians and drivers alike, as it also meets Florida Ave. in a jumble of diverging one-way traffic patterns. The "quick curbs" are plastic markers designed to steer traffic farther away from pedestrians. Other work that's been completed at the intersection includes a "Turn on Green Arrow Only" sign to prevent drivers from turning right on red onto W Street. GGW also says DDOT tells them that more quick curbs for the remainder of the intersection are scheduled to be installed, as are signal improvements for pedestrians.

The National Transportation Safety Board today issued what it's calling an "urgent safety recommendation" to the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, based on the preliminary findings of its investigation into the fatal June 22 Red Line crash. Despite the fact that the investigation has not yet concluded and the NTSB has yet to say officially what they believe was the cause of the accident, they have gone ahead and told WMATA that the transit agency needs to adopt "enhanced safety redundancy" of its train control system. Here's what they said:

A recent accident on the Metrorail's Red Line between the Fort Totten and Takoma stations has shown that WMATA's train control system is susceptible to a single point failure because it did not fail safe and stop a train when detection of a preceding train was lost. The urgent safety recommendation issued today calls for WMATA to evaluate track occupancy data on a real-time basis in order to detect losses in track occupancy and automatically generate alerts to prompt such actions as immediately stopping train movements or implementing appropriate speed restrictions to prevent collisions.

Continue reading "WMATA: Trains Will Operate in Manual Mode For a Long Time"

The Washington Area Bicyclist Association and the District Department of Transportation will be handing out free bike lights to cyclists again tonight, just like they did last year. The giveaway is part of the “Got Lights?” bicycle safety and education campaign that coincides with the time of year when it begins to get darker out much earlier.

   

An anonymous reader sent DCist a series of photos of a D.C. Department of Public Works garbage truck driving through a recreation field in Rose Park in Georgetown last Saturday. The tipster described the truck as having hopped the curb to gain access to the "grass of a children's play area" in the park, and wondered whether this was safe. No one was injured, but a baby carriage in the foreground of the images certainly drives the point home: should city garbage trucks really be driving across recreation areas where children might be running around, not paying attention?

The Department of Consumer & Regulatory Affairs is officially launching a new blog next week associated with its Collegiate Off-Campus Housing Initiative, called ThisShouldBeIllegal.com. The basic idea of the web-based program, according to DCRA spokesperson Michael Rupert, is "to try and get college kids to make sure they are being rented to legally." Under D.C. law, your landlord is required to have a business license, and the process of obtaining one prompts an automatic safety inspection to check for things like working smoke detectors and fire exits.

The District Department of Transportation is hosting a city-wide public meeting tonight on the final draft of the District Draft Pedestrian Master Plan. If you still haven't had a gander at the plan itself, you can read it here.

Mayor Adrian Fenty held a news conference yesterday to announce his support for emergency legislation that would ban the sale and use of all consumer fireworks in the District. The bill is set to be introduced to the D.C. Council on Tuesday.

It started with the ping pong table outside Comet. Then it was the benches and patio table outside Marvelous Market. Now venerable local bookstore Politics and Prose has been dragged into the ongoing saga of ANC 3F04 Commissioner Frank Winstead's war against there being any reason for people to congregate on the sidewalk along a stretch of upper Connecticut Ave. NW.

The Post digs in to the D.C. Department of Transportation's plans to unveil a new pedestrian strategy today that aims to reduce accidents and injuries in the city's most dangerous intersections and crosswalks.

Last summer we posted this video, which was put together by ANC 3F04 Commissioner Frank Winstead in an attempt to frighten his upper Northwest neighbors into doing something about the terrible scourge of the outdoor ping-pong table at Comet Ping Pong on Connecticut Ave. Many of our commenters laughed off Winstead's scaremongering, wondering why an ANC commissioner would want to come down hard on one of the only interesting new businesses to open in the neighborhood in some time.

The Post's Clarence Williams alerts us to the new ad campaign from the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments's Street Smart program, which aims to scare the bejeezus out of drivers and pedestrians in the hopes that we'll all be a lot more careful out on the road. A new study shows that on average more than 80 people die and 2,000 people are injured a year in pedestrian accidents in the Washington region.

Yesterday we briefly mentioned some new figures from Metro showing a big increase in assaults on Metrobus drivers. The number of assaults has risen from 36 in 2002 to 84 in 2007. Of the assaults last year, 56 were in the District, 21 were in Maryland and seven were in Virginia.

After a fire gutted Eastern Market last April, the stretch of 7th Street SE adjacent to the market building was closed off on weekends to accommodate vendors, construction of the temporary East Hall and reconstruction of the South Hall. In an interview on WTOP (link to audiostream) last week, Ward 6 Council member Tommy Wells said he wants to keep 7th Street that way. The Hill picked up the story on Wednesday, and the Hilleast...

Yesterday, I found it difficult to write about Washington's loss over the weekend to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. It had nothing to do with the play on the field, which amounted to a carbon copy of the previous week's loss. Jason Campbell strove mightily to lead the team past their mistakes, only to be done in by mistakes of his own. A game changing moment came when the offense failed to obtain some badly needed...

After what was thought to be a succesful surgery, Redskins safety Sean Taylor died earlier this morning in Florida. His wounds -- a gunshot to his femoral artery, causing significant blood loss -- proved to be too much for his body to recover from. He was shot in what police are calling a home invasion on Monday. In a statement posted on the team's website, owner Dan Snyder said, "This is the worst imagineable tragedy....

Good morning, Washington. It's news of the weird day today on DCist, as the Post tells the bizarre story of two 2nd-year engineering students from U-Va. who have been charged with the kidnapping of a man in Tysons Corner and demanding $500,000 in ransom. Both the two kidnappers and the victim are Chinese nationals who had been living with host families in Virginia while attending college. Police arrested Guanyu Lu and Baichuan Shu, both 19,...

It appears that tragedy has struck the Redskins. Emerging reports indicate that Washington Redskins Safety Sean Taylor has been shot in an apparent burglary attempt on his home, with one source claiming that Taylor is "fighting for his life". The Redskins have just released a statement confirming the shooting.Ashburn, VA - The Washington Redskins became aware of a situation this morning in which safety Sean Taylor was the victim of a shooting at his residence...

Good morning, Washington, and welcome back to what will be a rather short work week for most of us. While airports and train stations are sure to be jammed with holiday travelers this week, the city's roads and metro system should be a little less crowded than normal as folks head out of town early to celebrate Thanksgiving. Less congestion may not make much of a difference in road safety, however, if a new survey...

Good morning, Washington. Recent increases in gun-related crime in the city seems to be today's main topic of news, just as the Supreme Court may announce today whether it intends to take another look at D.C.'s handgun ban. D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty has scheduled a press conference this morning to address the District's position on its gun safety law, but in the meantime the Washington Post is questioning the law's effectiveness and just last...

What's That You Say? is our roundup of the best comments from last week's posts. So help us out and keep saying funny, interesting, and weird stuff. We know you can. ------ Speaking of weird, in regards to the manhole fire post, Jeffrey has this to say about the Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers in our city: If I've said it once, I've said it thousand times: this city needs to launch a fire safety...

Commenter Nate asked if we would look into what's been happening on the Red line lately, which he describes as having been suffering from "morning and/or afternoon delays every day for nearly two weeks now." Indeed, we've heard others grumbling about the Red line of late, which is usually one of Metro's speediest rush hour options. WMATA explains that the current Red line delays are due to ongoing work needed to replace pieces of...