Community of Metros News: COMET 2024 Annual Meeting in Singapore, 21-24 October

The TSC was very honoured to participate in the successful COMET 2024 Annual Meeting hosted by Singapore SMRT last week. The event brought together approximately 85 metro leaders from 28 cities around the world. Under the theme of “Building Fundamentals and Resilience”, the event included the CEO / COO Day where metro leaders openly shared their experiences about preparing for future needs relating to service quality, financial sustainability, and staffing.

The delegates had the opportunity to visit SMRT’s Kim Chuan Depot, where SMRT showcased their cutting-edge in-house technology to ensure system safety and reliability. During the event, member metros celebrated COMET’s 30th anniversary together. The remarks from Hong Kong MTR and Buenos Aires EMOVA highlighted the collaboration, benchmarking, and knowledge exchange amongst metro peers in the past three decades.

The TSC is incredibly proud of the partnership with members from the 45 metro organisations around the world. We very much look forward to many more years of collaboration in the future.

Community of Metros News: Chennai Metro Joins COMET

The TSC warmly welcomes Chennai Metro who recently joined COMET to become the third Indian metro in the group after New Delhi and Bengaluru.

Chennai city houses more than one-third of India’s automobile industry and is one of the leading IT hubs in India. Chennai Metro started revenue service in 2015. Currently the system consists of two lines and 41 stations, spanning 54.1 km. The existing ridership is approximately 300,000 a day. Unlike most other Asian metros, Chennai Metro outsources most of its operations and maintenance work.

Research: Congestion Management in Stations and Trains

As passengers continue to return to using metro more frequently post COVID-19, many metros have experienced constraints on train and station capacity. In some cases, this increased congestion can also result in safety issues that can have catastrophic impacts on customers and the reputation of the metros themselves.

This study summarised magnitude and trends in congestion on metro systems, and further looked at the implemented technologies that allow for mitigations to be put in place. It also identified emergency response and congestion management training that is provided to regular station staff and operational staff on trains.

Concerns for congestion on trains

An overview of best practices for managing congestion in stations and on trains is discussed in the report, with a focus on smaller and shorter-term solutions that can be deployed quickly by member metros.

Community of Metros News: Recent Virtual Events

The TSC continues to present key findings of recent studies through webinars to reach a wider audience within the members metros. The Congestion Management Webinar was held in June, looking at best practices to handle congestion both on platforms and trains. It focuses on technology solutions, training, and deployment of staff. Members heard very informative presentations from Seoul Metro, Metro de Santiago, and Taipei TRTC on their challenges and solutions for congestion management.

The Employee Satisfaction Webinar was held in July presenting an insight into several aspects of employee satisfaction in metros, including measuring satisfaction, metro survey results, and implemented initiatives. MRT Jakarta and London Underground shared information on their latest employee satisfaction initiatives as well as the outcomes.

Example slide from Employee Satisfaction Webinar on key drivers of employee satisfaction across the group

In July, members gathered together online for the second Virtual General Meeting of the year. The TSC gave members an update on member participation, ridership recovery, and group development.

In addition, the TSC presented the Data Insight Webinar to members last week sharing the latest data findings from the KPI and daily / monthly data. The highlight of the webinar also includes the results from the 2024 Customer Satisfaction Survey (CSS). There are 30 COMET members participated in the CSS this year, with Atlanta MARTA, Washington WMATA, and Honolulu Skyline taking part for the first time.

Research: Preparing for Extreme Weather and Climate Change

In the last five years, more than half of COMET metros have been impacted by flooding (74%), high winds/storms (62%) and extreme heat (50%), and many have also been impacted by cold weather and snow (45%), drought (22%) and wildfire (16%). Concerningly, three quarters of metros have noticed an increase in weather events impacting metro operations in recent years. These events pose significant risks to metro infrastructure, operations and the safety of passengers and staff.

Factors Making a Metro Vulnerable to Extreme Weather

The latest COMET study on Preparing for Extreme Weather and Climate Change reviews how member metros prepare for and manage upcoming periods of extreme weather and their plans to adapt infrastructure and operations in the longer term to deal with the impacts of climate change.

Community of Metros News: COMET 2024 Western Meeting in Washington DC, 25-28 June

COMET members and the TSC had a very fruitful meeting in June in Washington, DC. Washington WMATA successfully hosted the COMET 2024 Western Meeting, receiving attendees from 20 metros across all regions. The focussed sessions looked at hot topics for the western world, including safety and security, smooth upgrades to fleet and signalling, resilience and fiscal sustainability, and a metro roundtable on workforce development and retention.

Delegates were invited to the technical visit to the new Metro Integrated Command and Communication Centre, where WMATA showed preparations for the upcoming Fourth of July celebrations.

Research: Energy Storage Systems for Regenerative Braking

The study builds on the previous COMET study on Energy Efficiency, which was conducted last year as metros experienced increasing energy costs driven up by the conflict in Ukraine. This study examined how members use recovered braking energy and reviewed the extent and use of energy storage systems amongst members, particularly to increase the efficiency of regenerative braking.

The data shows that the average share of traction energy obtained from regenerative braking is 27% across members, however there are notable differences between fleets and technologies. Key findings of the study cover areas of energy storage systems, relevant technologies, and benefits of using energy storage systems. The report includes several mini-case studies of metros who currently have or are in the advanced stages of implementation of energy storage systems for regenerative braking. These include examples from Washington WMATA, Ottawa OC Transpo, Seoul Metro, and Tokyo Metro.

Community of Metros News: COMET 2024 Eastern Meeting in Jakarta, 14-17 May

The Transport Strategy Centre (TSC) expresses gratitude with much appreciation to MRT Jakarta for successfully hosting the COMET 2024 Eastern Meeting last week. Nine members were in attendance for the three-day event, sharing their experience on the topics of non-fare revenue, congestion management, reliability, and applying technology and innovation. The TSC delivered tailored presentations for the Asian metros to benchmark their Key Performance Indicators and Safety Performance Indicators. The presentations highlighted the exceptional performance of Asian metros, particularly on reliability and safety. The attendees had an opportunity to discuss in detail about the operational environment, challenges, and key trends in metro operations.

During the meeting, MRT Jakarta also welcomed attendees to the Lebak Bulus Depot, Operation Control Centre, and a new TOD site adjacent to Blok M BCA station. Members were also informed of potential collaborations with MRT Jakarta in terms of TOD development and training projects.

Research: Knowledge Management

Many metros are faced with high staff turnover and/or high levels of retirement, highlighting the need to retain institutional knowledge for incoming staff. Simultaneously, metros are undergoing various forms of digital transformation that require upskilling of new and existing staff. This study therefore reviews how metros are retaining and documenting the best practices of the past while preparing for the needs of the future.

Excerpt from Berlin BVG Knowledge Management documents

The study collected information from 24 metros as well as from a Virtual Panel Discussion with inputs from Berlin BVG, MRT Jakarta, Dubai RTA, Washington WMATA, and London Underground. Best practice examples on knowledge retention and development are summarised in the report, with additional information about the future outlook of knowledge management including the application of new technologies and generational changes in the workforce.

Community of Metros News: Recent Virtual Events

The Transport Strategy Centre (TSC) held the first Virtual General Meeting of 2024 in February. Members heard the initial findings of the study on Energy Storage Systems for Regenerative Braking and participated in the metro roundtable presentations on the topic of forecast of future demand. After the meeting, a summary regarding the latest ridership projections and remote working practices which are carried out by COMET metros was circulated.

In March, TSC held the first ever virtual KPI Data Collection Clinic presenting the annual programme of COMET data cycles, latest changes and improvements in data collection process, and responding to the common data queries. TSC received very positive feedback on this event and will work closely with members to hold similar sessions like this one in the future.

Two study webinars were held recently. The Metro Reliability Webinar, held in February, delivered the key finding of the Metro Reliability study with regard to reliability targets, trends, and improvement programmes. Singapore SMRT and New York NYCT shared their reliability journeys and performance improvements.

Example slide from Metro Reliability webinar on influencing factors

Another webinar on Preparing for Extreme Weather Events and Climate Change, held in April, gave members an opportunity to review their own vulnerability and resilience to extreme weather in relation to other metros. Metro highlight presentations were delivered by Sydney Metro and Atlanta MARTA on their preparation for handling extreme weather events.

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