When Metro launched, officials decided to put carpeting in the rail cars to give the system more of a “commuter train feel,” Richard Sarles, the transit agency’s general manager told the D.C. Council last week. Carpet, after all, is a bit more inviting than the cold linoleum that lines most intracity rail cars around the country.
The thing about carpet, though, is that it’s tough to clean, especially when subjected to an almost endless barrage of dirt, mud, spilled liquids, chewing gum, and who knows what else left by the drunken masses who take the Yellow Line home at 2 a.m. on Sundays. So, today’s Metro officials are thinking about tearing out the rugs.
The Washington Examiner reports that the carpet would be replaced by a hard surface treated to be waterproof and much easier to keep clean. Metro started testing rubber-floor cars in November 2007, and a rail car with rubber flooring occasionally rolls up, but the introduction has never proceeded en masse. Metro spokesman Dan Stessel writes in an email that at least two of the system’s 6000-series cars feature non-carpet flooring.
But while Metro officials weigh a wholesale reflooring of the current fleet, they won’t have to worry about the forthcoming 7000-series cars. Those cars, scheduled to be introduced in 2015, feature slip-proof rubber floors.
