Platform doors – Community of Metros Benchmarking Group

Automation offers potentially transformative benefits to capacity, reliability, safety, energy use, service flexibility, costs and customer experience. Several metros have embarked on transformative brownfield automation projects, upgrading legacy infrastructure to Grade of Automation 4 (GoA4) operations.

Metro de Madrid’s automation project of Line 6

This study considers the current status of automation projects across the group, and how metros prepare for operating automated systems. It compiles experiences of new lines and brownfield system and sub-system upgrades, covering integration and interface management, platform doors and passenger safety infrastructure, staffing, emergency management, pre-operations, and operations strategies.

The report brings together information provided by COMET metros and selected ISBeRG railways through a questionnaire and in-depth discussions, including at the Metro Automation expert workshop held in Madrid in March 2025.

The highest risk area to passenger safety within metro systems is upon entering the track area with an average of one track intrusion per million passenger journeys across CoMET/Nova metros. Platform Doors (PD) remove this risk but their cost, complexity of planning and installation, station design and other challenges constrain their wide-spread installation: 70% of CoMET and Nova members have no or low PD coverage. For many metros, PDs come at the expense of other critical infrastructure projects. This case study explored the best practice on managing platform safety risk without the use of PDs.

On average, 65% of track intrusions for respondent metros are intentional customer actions, requiring mitigation measures to instil a behavioural change. Classified as passive prevention measures, these consist of platform announcements and reminders, poster campaigns and platform-edge markings or lighting.

Beyond these, the study identified active detection methods enacted by staff members or detection and response technologies. Combining Smart CCTV, lasers and microwave frequency was successfully piloted as a means to detecting the presence of any person or object on the track. The use of these technologies has proven effective to increase safety in the absence of PDs.

Research: Metro Automation

Research: Enhancing Platform Safety without Platform Doors