(The following story by Alfonso A. Castillo appeared on the Newsday website on March 19, 2009.)
NEW YORK — No matter how much worse the MTA’s financial situation gets, the Long Island Rail Road’s project to remedy dangerous gaps between trains and station platforms “will continue forward until it’s completed,” Metropolitan Transportation Authority and LIRR officials said yesterday.
“The president of the railroad and I both agree this is too important. It’s a physical safety issue,” said MTA board member Mitch Pally of Stony Brook, who also is commissioner of the board’s Long Island Committee. “This is not going to be affected.”
The vow came following a committee meeting in Manhattan at which LIRR president Helena Williams released updated figures on the agency’s progress in its $20.7-million effort to shrink gaps systemwide. The new numbers included a 33-percent reduction in gap-related accidents between 2007 and 2008.
The LIRR began its effort after a Newsday investigation found there were more than 800 gap accidents from 1995 to early 2007.
The investigation was spurred by the August 2006 death of Natalie Smead, 18, of Northfield, Minn., who fell into a gap at the Woodside station and after walking under the platform was hit by a train.
The project includes extending platforms by attaching 1-inch-wide boards and installing 4,560 metal threshold plates on the doors of passenger cars in the LIRR’s fleet. Officials say they expect to complete the project by January 2011.
Williams said yesterday that the LIRR installed 41,610 linear feet of 1-inch edgeboard to platforms last year and plans to add another 55,743 linear feet of the edgeboard this year.
The LIRR also adjusted platform heights at 26 platform edges in 2008 to reduce vertical gaps, and installed the 2-inch metal threshold plates on 86 of its “M-7” train cars. It has a goal of installing the plates on 672 cars this year.
Williams lauded the LIRR’s public awareness efforts as helping to reduce gap accidents. There were 117 such accidents in 2008, compared with 175 in 2007.
“We still have a long way to go in terms of educating the public,” Williams said. “We’re very proud of the reduction. We’d like to bring that down some more.”
Garden City attorney Bob Sullivan, who represents Smead’s family in a pending lawsuit against the LIRR, applauded the agency’s efforts in addressing the gap problem and commended officials for their commitment to seeing the project through.
“In this case – in my opinion – they completely lived up to their word,” Sullivan said. “While nothing makes up for the death of Natalie, clearly, they have done everything that they could do to alleviate this problem.”
Williams acknowledged that the 2008 drop in accidents followed a year in which there was a higher-than-usual number of reported incidents because of the attention drawn to the issue. In 2006, the year in which Newsday began its investigation, there were 129 gap accidents.
Through 2008, the LIRR spent $12.2 million on its gap-remediation project, including $9.9 million in operating funds and $2.3 million in capital funds. It has set aside another $11.3 million in operating funds and $3 million from its capital budget to continue those efforts this year.
Williams said she expects the bulk of the project to be completed by the end of this year. The entire project is scheduled for completion by January 2011.
Gap projects by the numbers
Gap-related accidents in 2008: 117
Gap-related accidents in 2007: 175
Gap-related accidents in 2006: 129
Total cost of LIRR’s gap-remediation project: $20.7 million
Spent so far: $12.2 million
Train cars fitted with metal “threshold plates” to bridge gaps in 2008: 86
Train cars to be fitted with “threshold plates” in 2009: 672
Linear feet of 1-inch edgeboard installed on station platforms in 2008: 41,610
Linear feet of 1-inch edgeboard to be installed on station platforms in 2009: 55,743