Metro tests new railcar designs

WMATA press releases:

Two railcars feature resilient flooring, bench seating, leaning pads, grab "straps"

Metro tests new railcar designs
Two railcars feature resilient flooring, bench seating, leaning pads, grab "straps"
For immediate release: December 4, 2007

The first WMATA press releases has a link to a 02:04 4.85 MB Windows Media video of the new seating car that was shot while on display in the pocket track at National Airport..

Accompanying Washington Post Story

Metro Tests Bench Seats, Carpetless Cars

By Lena H. Sun
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 5, 2007

There's a couple of the Washington Post's panorama photographs of the interiors of the cars. The carpet-less car was photographed while on display in the pocket track at National Airport. The new seating car was photographed at U Street.

I think the switch to carpetless flooring looks pretty good and actually is a good idea to save Metro money. They use the vinyl type flooring in the LRV trains in my hometown and they hold up extremely well. As for the new seating arrangement...only time will tell.

I saw the funny seating car, I think it was on the Yellow/Green line about a month ago. It was on the yellow, and I was waiting for a green, so I didn't get a good look or think much of it at the time.

As crowded as some of the trains are, I'm all for ripping ALL the seating out of some of the cars, so there's more space around.

3283 was on the Yellow Line last night...

Wow, they've come up with a seating arrangement like New York's PATH trains had in the late 1960's, and grab straps that NYC subways had since the 1930's, which were eliminated in the "modern" era. Congratulations to WMATA for re-inventing the wheel. And yes, the more things change, the more they stay the same, etc,etc........

The leaning pads are interesting though..............

Caught a ride on one of the cars with the non-carpet floor (6105, iirc) on the green line.

It looked much nicer, and very easy to keep clean - there were a couple of confused looks from people, but the general reaction seemed to be positive.

I caught 6105 on Sunday 12/21/07 on the Green Line out of Greenbelt. I have to say, I think I was halfway into town before I even realized that the carpet wasn't there. The car certainly looked nice, and seemed to ride pretty well. I also caught my first trip on a CAF 5000-car on the way home, and was amazed at what to me seemed like a rough ride, and the forward most passenger doors on the lead car (where we rode) seemed to rattle incessantly at speed.

Over all, I'd say the no-carpet is a good move. As for the pictures of the bench seating, I think as long as they continue to use the same grade of seats as Metrorail cars always have, putting some (but not 100%) bench seating is is a fine move. The other thing that struck me on both 6105 and the CAF was how you just can't settle into and get comfortable on most subway systems like you can on the Metro.

I think the bench seating in the concept car looks kinda out of place. I would be more with the idea if they matched the other seats.

As for the flooring, no carpet is fine but I think one of the things that makes Metro so different from any other subway is the carpet. Can you think of any other subway with that?

Head-End,

I don't know if I could be right, but these new WMATA car designs with more longiitudonal seats and carpetless surfaces combined look more like NYCTA's R44 & R46 cars, especially since these WMATA units are also 75' long and thecolor of the carpetless surface are the same as the R44/46 combo.

Looks like Grab Handles on a quarter of all cars by Dec. 2008; Bench seating gets ditched :

http://www.wtopnews.com/?nid=30&sid=1356100

I've ridden in both "test" cars (3282/3283), on the Red and Green lines, and each time I felt like I was on a bus.