As part of a team with Rail Safety Consulting, TRA helped to orchestrate, plan, and execute several on-site safety audits of NJT’s commuter rail operations and maintenance. The overall project goal was to recreate a Federal Railroad Administration-style Deep Dive audit, similar to what the FRA conducted at Metro North Railroad.
The audit areas included rail operations, dispatching, and training; track, systems, stations, and structures inspections, maintenance, and training; and railroad-wide areas such as roadway worker protection and blue signal protection. All audit areas were reviewed within the context of both FRA regulations and industry best practices.
TRA’s personnel were responsible for scheduling, completing, and reporting on audit areas including blue signal protection, bridges and structures inspections and maintenance, stations inspections and maintenance, and signals testing and maintenance.
TRA personnel also contributed to the project’s audits in areas including train operations and crews, roadway worker protection, mechanical (vehicle) maintenance, and operations (Engineer) training. TRA was also responsible for making a final presentation to the NJT Board on behalf of the project team.
