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Sharon Yetman's Subway Safety Plan (Better barrier for subways 'an obsession')

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Better barrier for subways 'an obsession'
Inspired by news report, small-town inventor pitches her idea to any civic official who'll listen
Published On Wed Nov 04 2009

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/transportation/article/720810--better-barrier-for-subways-an-obsession

Sharon Yetman totes a reusable grocery bag of props through a day of meetings that would wear on a seasoned executive.

The Sundridge, Ont., hockey mom, who works the phones and Internet constantly, spent three days last month in Toronto calling on any civic official willing to hear the pitch she makes Wednesday night on CBC's Dragon's Den.

Based on a brief news report about 18 months ago, Yetman set to work designing and patenting a subway barrier system she claims would perform the double function of crowd control and blocking access to the tracks.

The TTC has taken a pass on her idea, but she is not discouraged.

"This has become an obsession, because when you know you are onto something important you can't stay silent," she said of her mission.

Rather than the de rigueur PowerPoint, Yetman uses her interactive, homemade model to demonstrate how a series of gates and designated platform waiting areas would prevent the chaotic rush-hour collision of TTC riders entering and exiting trains.

To simulate the crowds of commuters in her model, she has borrowed the figurines from a decorative Victorian Christmas village.

More importantly, she says her system would save lives by barring access to the tracks.

"There are several designs," she said. "You can use basic railings, you can use a lift-arm gate, you can use automatic glass doors – your traditional grocery store. It can be as simple as a dog fence. Anything's better than nothing."

Yetman suggests motorized screens could run all along the yellow line of the platform, ascending only when the train is in the station. The cost she estimates at about $500,000 per station is a far cry from the TTC's rough estimate of $5 million per station for glass platform-edge doors. The high-tech gates rely on a computerized signalling system, already being installed on the TTC, to line up precisely with the train doors.

TTC officials believe Yetman has grasped the problem and the principle of a solution they are already investigating.

"Ms. Yetman is on the right track with respect to crowd control but the solution she brings doesn't quite meet our needs and standards with respect to engineering," said TTC spokesman Brad Ross.

As she demonstrates her design for a reporter, a piece of wire falls off the model. Turns out it's a piece of hamster cage that the determined inventor has pressed into service to simulate a gate that swings open to let riders board a train once everyone has exited in the station.

A companion binder carries dozens of letters from people who have heard Yetman's pitch. There's also a photograph of her in the life-sized simulation she made in her Sundridge basement recreation room.

Inevitably there have been some brush-offs. But, she said, "If I can save hundreds of millions of dollars for a city it's worth being hurt."

When she contacted an official at the U.S. Department of Transportation, Yetman said, "I blew him away. All he could say is, 'Wow, wow, wow.' "

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/transportation/article/720810--better-barrier-for-subways-an-obsession
 
From the Dragon's Den website:
http://www.cbc.ca/dragonsden/pitches/platformtechnology.html
platformtechnology-product.jpg


The explanation of the product should prove interesting.
 
When was this on?

Are those tubes supposed to represent the barrier, or is that part of the set? Surely if anything was put in place that looked like that kind railing, it would be a major safety hazzard ... I can just see people leaning against it, and children playing on it ...
 
Does the subway actually need barriers? Are the barriers meant to stop people from accidentally falling onto the tracks (does this happen?), feed into the hysteria of 'people being pushed onto the tracks' (does this happen?), or stop concerted suicide attempts?

Did the Bloor Viaduct's suicide barriers do much beyond moving people over to the Leaside bridge?

Is this really the best use of the TTC's time and money? Whether it's $5m or $.5m per station?
 
Are the barriers meant to stop people from accidentally falling onto the tracks (does this happen?)

Yes

'people being pushed onto the tracks' (does this happen?)

Yes

or stop concerted suicide attempts?

Yes

Did the Bloor Viaduct's suicide barriers do much beyond moving people over to the Leaside bridge?

Yes.

http://www.bridgerail.org/pdf/Barrier_effectiveness_web.pdf

From the article:

O’Carroll et al. (1994) reported the effect of the construction of barriers on the Ellington Bridge in Washington D.C. According to the report:
– Prior to installation of barriers, an average of four people a year died by jumping from the bridge.
– In the five years following installation of barriers, there was only one suicide from the Ellington Bridge.
– The number of suicides from nearby Taft Bridge, where no barriers had been installed, remained the same.

Interestingly, when suicide barriers are erected, it seems there is not a corresponding rise in the number of suicides on nearby structures. This has been shown almost everywhere it's been studied.

Suicide barriers are in use at other bridges around the world and data shows corresponding reductions in the number of suicides although
comparative studies have not occurred.
– Jacques Cartier Bridge (Montreal, Canada)
– Bloor Street Viaduct, (Toronto, Canada)
– Sydney Harbor Bridge (Sydney, Australia)
Mental health experts and suicidologists cite impulsivity associated with jumping from bridges as one of the primary factors that contributes to
the effectiveness of physical barriers.
 
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I can't think of the last time I heard about jumpers, pushers, or stumblers. How many people are killed this way in the city?



Well, it's nice to see that they work, but what strikes me is the numbers we're talking about. There aren't that many suicides in the first place...

My point, which I guess is still unchallenged, is whether this is actually the big deal we make it out to be, and (in the context of a funding challenged public transit system) whether it's an appropriate expenditure.
 
I think quite a few kill themselves on the subway. Numbers for this sort of thing aren't published, though. Most suicides aren't talked about in the news, either.

I also get the impression that a good number of people offed themselves from the viaduct.

Two 15 year old boys were pushed onto the tracks just this year.

http://topnews.us/content/23564-two-toronto-teens-pushed-subway-tracks-manage-dodge-train

On October 4th of this year, a man lay down on the tracks and died.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/10/04/toronto-dewees.html

Is it worth it? I'd say probably. Is it a huge priority during a belt tightening phase? No.
 
I can't think of the last time I heard about jumpers, pushers, or stumblers.

that's because the media doesn't report it.

Is this really the best use of the TTC's time and money? Whether it's $5m or $.5m per station?

Were the $300.00 bike racks on each bus good use of money?
 
Since delays due to an incident at track level are quite common, I'd say suicides happen fairly regularly on the subway.

Doors seem like an obvious safety measure - I just wish the money could come from a higher provincial or federal agency as opposed to eating into the TTC's already tight budget.
 
that's because the media doesn't report it.

Well, the number has to exist somewhere. Otherwise we're just arguing unfounded assumptions.


Were the $300.00 bike racks on each bus good use of money?

I think they serve a logical public transit purpose, and are connected to public transit in a way that suicide barriers are not.
 
These barriers are all pointless until the TTC can have automated train control. Until then we can't have any barriers as drivers would find it difficult to stop the train in the exact position to match the barrier openings.

I think the TTC rightly rejected this and other technologies. Barriers are expensive and are not a priority to be installed. A higher priority should be to reduce the crowding on stations by expanding the system, and focusing energies on improving the station look, and cleanliness rather than wasting money on these barriers.
 
Is it worth it? I'd say probably. Is it a huge priority during a belt tightening phase? No.

Aside from the requirement of ATO being in place, as mentioned by a previous poster, the question of 'is it worth it' needs to be looked at in the context of most bang for the buck.

If the point is to reduce suicides by physically preventing the suicidals from accessing track level, then would society be better spending $Xmillion per station (times Y stations) or spending a fraction of that total amount addressing mental health issues so that those individuals never get to the suicidal state in the first place?

The choice seems to be: big expense to address one symptom or reduced expense to address underlying cause.
 
These barriers are all pointless until the TTC can have automated train control. Until then we can't have any barriers as drivers would find it difficult to stop the train in the exact position to match the barrier openings.
How do you conclude that? The whole point with these particular barriers, according to the article, is that you don't need automated train control. For what reason do you reject that notion?
 
How do you conclude that? The whole point with these particular barriers, according to the article, is that you don't need automated train control. For what reason do you reject that notion?

Where did you conclude that? The point of these barriers is that it's a Soccer Mom's $0.5m solution to an otherwise $5m projected cost, not that it doesn't require the "computerized signalling system, already being installed on the TTC, to line up precisely with the train doors."

Without the train stopping in the same place each time, how is she going to install these gates:

platformtechnology-product.jpg


Will they move along the platform and meet the train?
 
From August:

I missed it by five or ten seconds, but there was a jumper at the north end of the southbound platform at Yonge and Bloor last night, just before eight. I came down the stairs and heard a girl scream, saw lots of agitated people, and a train stopped just inside the station with the doors closed. "What happened?" asked the woman in the lottery ticket booth. Thought at first some crazy person was on the loose, attacking people, so I moved away. But the girl was unharmed, comforted by her friend. Someone rushed over to the TTC control room and banged on the door. Uniformed security rushed out and over to the train. A TTC employee ushered another crying woman into the office.

Knew I shouldn't have taken that route home.

Strangely enough, about a week later TTC general manager Gary Webster and another suited transit official strode onto the subway train I was on and chatted to the driver near where I sat. I mentioned the idea that the trains should slow down as they entered stations to avoid possible fatalities from jumpers. He said they were looking at installing barriers.
 
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