Photo by : rebecca :.

Unlike the tipsters at mass transit whistle-blowing blog Unsuck DC Metro, DCist’s tipsters didn’t spend the New Year’s weekend sifting through a recent inspector general’s report. Bunch of slackers, the whole lot of you! (I kid, I kid — we love you all.) It’s a shame, though, since this revelation would have made for some interesting conversation over brunch this weekend:

I.4 Use of pocket tracks as a lavatory presents safety and health risks.
Participants voiced concerns that employees use the pocket tracks (an area where the train can park and permit the train operator to reverse ends and travel in the opposite direction) as a lavatory at Mount Vernon Square, Southern Avenue, and Grosvenor. This safety and health hazard is the result of inadequate time being allowed at the end of the line for train operators to have bathroom breaks. This practice causes delays in performing maintenance inspections on some ATC equipment.

Why, yes, that does mean that Metro employees — at three different stations, no less! — are defecating and/or urinating inside Metro tunnels. Yeah, gross. Excuse me for a moment, as I think back to every time a noxious scent hit my nose inside a Metro station and think about what I was actually smelling.