"Special" Trains

[strench707]

Hey Guys,

I was in L'Enfant this afternoon around 430ish on the Org/Bl platform when I saw a train (VA bound) honking its horn and rolling in with the designation sign marked as "Special." There was no line color indication on the train. On the next train display board the whole thing was just hyphens (-) for that train, no color, car count, or designation. There were people on it but despite the crowds not many were on it and not many got on, The operator made some lengthy announcement about the disabled and thanking for cooperation. I could not however tell whether the announcement had anything to do with the train's "special" status or not. Following on the next train board there was a Blue to Franconia and then below that (next) was another hyphen train, presumably another "Special." My train into the city from New Carrollton was terminating at EFC due to Silver Line work but was designated "East Falls Church," not special, so I can rule out "special" having anything to do with Silver line construction truncated service.

Very confused, any insight is greatly appreciated!

Davis

[SchuminWeb]

I saw the "-- - TRAIN" designation on the Vienna side at Metro Center, and figured it was the case that those were the Orange trains. Didn't see any "E Fls Ch" designations on the PIDS, though. Didn't see any Orange Line trains going that way, though, because the Blue Line train I needed came first.

[jkovach]

I have seen the "SPECIAL" destination sign used on Red Line trains that are truncated due to track work. However, other times I have seen the actual destination on the sign ("NEW YORK AVE", "MEDICAL CENTER", etc.). My guess is that there is some obscure technical reason for this - maybe some destinations can be displayed on the signs and others cannot, or it might be due to old vs. new equipment.

[SchuminWeb]

I believe it depends on the destination code. WMATA trains get where they're going via destination codes, i.e. one two-digit code determines color, displayed destination, and routing. Here's a list of destination codes as of February 28, 2004:

http://talk.nycsubway.org/perl/read?subtalk=666158

This list may have changed a little bit since then, but basically, stations with their own destination code display their names when set that way. Thus why New York Avenue and Medical Center display their names on the train, while Friendship Heights and Judiciary Square are signed as "SPECIAL", because there are no destination codes for those locations, and thus it can't display what it's not programmed to display.

There is also a way to manually set the destination to "SPECIAL" regardless of the destination code. It's a switch on the wall next to the operator's console that has three positions. There's "AUTO", which displays the destination as determined by the destination code. "NO PASSENGERS" is for when the train goes out of service, and sets the signs to "NO PASSENGERS". Then the third position is "SPECIAL", which sets the train with the "SPECIAL" signage. I've seen this last one used in cases where the train is using a different destination code than the one where it's actually terminating. For instance, there was a case in 2004 where the destination code on an eastbound Red Line train was set to Union Station, but they were terminating at Judiciary Square due to track work. The train was signed "SPECIAL" and the operator announced Judiciary Square as the destination, but PIDS displayed Union Station for that train. Another instance of this was in 2005 when most southbound Yellow Line trains were terminating at Pentagon City due to track work around Braddock Road. In that instance, all southbound trains had their destination codes set as Huntington (as indicated on PIDS) and were manually set to "SPECIAL" and announced as Pentagon City trains. Only one Yellow Line train was doing the full run to Huntington that evening, since trains couldn't switch back to their normal track until they were at Huntington.

I believe that there may be more codes now, and that the system may allow for programming the names of stations in for PIDS, since (A) I have seen Friendship Heights and Judiciary Square displayed on PIDS screens, and (B) looking at photos taken during a major weekend track project, I saw trains displaying Pentagon City on their signage rather than "SPECIAL".

Hopefully this explains?

[strench707]

Very thorough answer and thanks for the link to your page, very informative.

Thanks man!

Davis

[Sand Box John]

The table of destination codes at the link provided by Ben I believe are the codes being used today. Codes 80 > 99 are non revenue code used to route trains through yard leads, tail tracks, connector track and pocket tracks.

I will also add to Bens explanation, every interlocking has a code to allow the routing of trains through an interlocking along a route other then the normal route. Some of those coded are among the unassigned codes from 51 to 99. A number of those code are recognized by multiple interlockings on different routes. As an example code XX will route a train through an interlocking along the revere route at an A route interlocking and route a train through an interlocking along the revere route at a K route interlocking.

[Robert Paniagua]

The "Special Trains" could also be Run as Directed trains for extra or emergency service. They do that in New York a lot and in Boston's Red, Green (light rail trolleys), Orange and Blue Lines.

[voldermort1993]

SPECIAL are for the drivers that A) lack the destination code of Friendship Heights or Judiciary Square or those that neglect to change it. Once there was track work on the Red Line and trains were going between New York Ave and Friendship Heights and the train going to Friendship Heights said "NO PASSENGERS". I asked the driver and she told me oh I do not know how to do it. WOW!

[SchuminWeb]

SPECIAL are for the drivers that A) lack the destination code of Friendship Heights or Judiciary Square or those that neglect to change it. Once there was track work on the Red Line and trains were going between New York Ave and Friendship Heights and the train going to Friendship Heights said "NO PASSENGERS". I asked the driver and she told me oh I do not know how to do it. WOW!

That's bordering on lame right there on the part of the train operator. There's a toggle switch on the right side wall in the cab that goes in three positions. Refer to this photo, where the toggle switch in question is at left in the "MANUAL TRAIN IDENTITY CONTROL" box. The top position is "AUTO", which means it goes based on the destination code. The bottom position overrides the destination code's sign information to display "NO PASSENGERS", and the middle position overrides the destination code to display "SPECIAL". Thus one can always override whatever the destination code wants the train to say on the screen, and it's literally right there next to the train operator all the time...

[Sand Box John]

I think I might have solved the use of SPECIAL on train destination signs mystery.

The new table of destination codes has codes that will display SPECIAL on the signs that are scattered throughout the table that are not linked to any particular destination be it a revenue or non revenue destination. As mentioned in my post of 03 29 2011 some codes can select a revere route at multiple interlockings. What I believe WMATA has done is use the codes that can select revere routes at multiple interlockings for use on trains that have to do short turns to accommodate "system rebuilding" segment shutdowns.