Transparent Commute on the PATH—NY Sun

Transparent Commute on the PATH
By BRADLEY HOPE - Special to the Sun February 3, 2006

New York SunStarting Monday, commuters at one PATH train station in Jersey City will encounter airport-like security as part of a pilot program headed up by the Department of Homeland Security.

They won't, however, have to take off their shoes or empty their pockets: The X-ray equipment and metal detectors have been calibrated to identify amounts of metal similar to what was used in the London and Madrid bombings. During a test demonstration this week, a police officer was able to walk through with a Glock handgun without setting off the alarms, a Department of Homeland Security spokesman, Larry Orluskie, said. "That's not the threat we are looking for" in the testing, he said.

The first phase of the program will last three weeks at the Exchange Place station in Jersey City, ending on March 1. During this time, a team of federally trained screeners from San Francisco will man the equipment at the entrance to the station, Mr. Orluskie said. The goal of the first phase is to get information on how heightened security measures can work in a railway environment, he said.

Exchange Place station is the sixth busiest PATH station, with about 15,000 people going through turnstiles a day. The station is already outfitted with the screening technology, as well as sensors and cameras for analysts to watch the flow of traffic during offpeak and peak hours. The project will cost $10 million, Mr. Orluskie said. Screeners have been ordered to stop scanning people if traffic gets to busy. "We want to make sure we don't infringe on the flow of traffic," he said.

In fact, the scanning is voluntary. If PATH train users don't want to go through the security, they can enter the station through a side entrance or the elevator. "This is a pilot test, a science project, to gather information to better understand what our technology is capable of and what modifications are necessary for the future," a spokesman with Northwest Pacific National Laboratory, Peter Bengston, said. The laboratory is heading up the technical part of the test.

When phase two of the project starts, the Department of Homeland Security will begin testing some of the most state-of-the-art security technology available to see if it can be implemented in train stations. The purpose is to develop the most sophisticated nonintrusive technologies possible to keep traffic flowing through stations while detecting contraband and weapons be fore they enter the railways.

Infrared and milliwave detectors are two technologies being considered for testing, Mr. Bengston said.

A spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Tom Kelly, said there are no plans for a similar program in New York City subways.

www.nysun.com/article/27023

www.hudsoncity.net/tubes/security-explace-2.html

WABC By Ken Rosato (Jersey City-WABC, February 6, 2006)

- Beginning this morning, thousands of commuters will be screened, scanned, and in some cases swiped for explosive residue. The Department of Homeland security is turning the path station at Exchange Place into a test case.

Eyewitness News reporter Ken Rosato is live at Exchange Place in Jersey City.

The Port Authority says the screening will add one minute to your commute but you don't even have to put up with that if you don't want to- at least for now. For the 15,000 riders who use the path station at exchange place this is all voluntary. The screening will be similar to what we've seen at airports since '9/11'.

This screening is a ten million dollar test program running just three weeks. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security needs real-world data to develop the technology to screen for explosives at a distance. That's become a priority since the Madrid bombings in 2004 and last summer's subway attack in London. This scanning will be done by screeners brought in from San Francisco International Airport.

PATH train passenger: "I think it's good it makes me feel safer."

Screeners have been told to stop scanning people if the foot traffic gets too busy. And if you want to skip the whole thing, you can ignore the turnstiles and use the elevator or the side entrance to avoid the screeners. This voluntary phase one, of course, leads to phase two. Infrared and milliwave detectors will be tried. The technology will be state-of-the-art but still non-intrusive.

New York City, by the way, has no plans for any kind of similar system.

(Copyright 2006 WABC-TV)

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?secti ... id=3879842

http://www.hudsoncity.net/tubes/gatewaytubepage.html

U.S. Tests Its Bomb Checks on PATH Riders and Bags
By PATRICK McGEEHAN

JERSEY CITY, Feb. 7 — Some Manhattan-bound commuters were surprised yesterday to become part of the federal government's latest experiment in preventing terrorism on the nation's rail network.

Shortly after 10 a.m., the Department of Homeland Security started selectively screening passengers and their bags for explosives as they entered the PATH station at Exchange Place in Jersey City. A team of 11 screeners flown in from California asked commuters to walk through metal detectors and pass their briefcases and backpacks through scanning machines, just as they would at an airport.

Unlike airline passengers, the PATH riders did not have to empty their pockets or remove their shoes, leaving most of them grinning rather than grousing about erosion of civil liberties. "Thankfully, my materials didn't get tossed," said Bernard McGovern, a human-resources manager from Caldwell, N.J. He was delayed less than a minute before being grilled about the experience by reporters, but said he doubted that regular screening would always be so quick. "I can't see it not being a delay," Mr. McGovern said.

The screening, which will continue for three weeks, is part of a test of how technology can be used to head off bombings like those in the London subway last summer and on commuter trains in Madrid in March 2004. A second phase of the study, which will involve methods of screening passengers from a distance, possibly using infrared scanners, is scheduled for later this year, but a location has not been chosen, said Larry Orluskie, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security.

The department expects to spend $10 million on the entire project. Its purpose, Mr. Orluskie said, is "looking at this technology and how this technology works in this environment without hindering traffic flow." He said he was not aware of any other use of airport-style screening in train or subway stations in the country. To speed commuters through the process, the metal detectors have been set to be less sensitive than those in airports, Mr. Orluskie said. "You can walk through with scissors, pocket knives, that sort of thing, and it does not go off, because that's not what they're looking for," he said.

During rush hours, the screeners choose subjects at a predetermined rate, maybe every eighth passenger. At slower times, they may switch to screening all of them or all of those with larger bags, officials said. Riders who decline to participate in the test will be free to walk away unless one of the two Port Authority police officers standing by considers their behavior suspicious, said an official overseeing the test.

James Simpson, 53, a courier from Harlem whose messenger bag passed through an X-ray machine yesterday morning, said the whole idea was suspect. "I don't think this is going to do anything," he said. "This is just to make people feel better." In his case, mission not accomplished.

www.nytimes.com/2006/02/08/nyregion/08path.html

I have to agree that the screening does not make me feel any safer. First of all, it's a three week test, how does that help us now? Second, if you can choose not to be screened then I would say that just defeats the entire purpose of screening anyone. I know that you will not be able to go around the screeners if this were to be implemented permanently, but it just makes you wonder what people are thinking when they say that this makes them feel safer.

I also don't see how this will allow them to find bombs. Does a bomb have to have metal in it? I doubt it...and that's what the metal detectors are searching for . I think this is a waste of money, maybe the second phase will be something better. In any case, rapid transit can not be rapid with things like this in place.