WMATA 2000 series

[Martin Baumann]

How many have been retired so far and when will they be completely retired?

[Sand Box John]

Martin Baumann

How many have been retired so far and when will they be completely retired?

They will be retired when WMATA awards a contract to replace them.

According to wikipedia 76 were procured 1983–1984, Midlife rehabilitation 2002–2004 2 have been removed service, as I recall, because of damage cause by hard coupling in Falls Church Yard in the early 2000s, though that number is likely now 4.

Crash worthiness improvements were made to the 2 and 3k cars during midlife rehabilitation. The 2, 3 and 4k cars were structurally similar to the 1k cars when new but somewhat more rigid.

[davinp]

As you know, the 1000 series telescoped in a crash as Metro did not retrofit them.
The 2000/3000 series have protection installed on.

Once Metro gets the 8000 series cars, the 2000/3000 series will be retired from service. This probably won't happen until 2022 at the earliest.
Metro should now wait for railcars to be 40 years old to retire them. They should retire them sooner.
Metro should have started the 8000 series procurement a few years ago instead of waiting until 2019 to do it.

According to this Wikipedia page, 74 2K series cars are in service. 2 are used for the Money train

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washingto ... ling_stock

[Sand Box John]

davinp

Metro should now wait for railcars to be 40 years old to retire them. They should retire them sooner.

40 years is pretty much industry standard for the service life of a transit car. There are quite a few agencies in North America that are still running cars that are beyond 40.

If the car bodies show no signs of structural fatigue they can last nearly indefinitely. Only the consumables need be replaced and or upgraded.

The mentality concerning WMATA's aluminum stock is crash worthiness. I believe that mentality should be direct to achieving the goal of preventing wrecks making crash worthiness of less importance.