PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — After a month and a half of round-the-clock inspections, SEPTA said federally mandated safety checks of its Regional Rail cars are finished. However, that doesn’t mean riders will see immediate relief.
Delays and packed trains will continue because about half of the 50-year-old Silverliner IV cars in the fleet are still out of service for repairs.
Last month, the Federal Railroad Administration ordered SEPTA to inspect its rail cars due to several fires earlier in the year. SEPTA was given a deadline extension of Nov. 14.
“We have completed now the point-by-point inspections of our 223 Silverliner IV Regional Rail trains ahead of the deadline set by the Federal Railroad Administration by hours, essentially,” SEPTA General Manager Scott Sauer announced Friday at the Overbrook maintenance yard.
SEPTA expects to return five cars to service each day. Crews are also installing thermal detection systems on the trains to alert operators of fire dangers.
“It will let the crews know that, OK, something has been over-temperature. We can take this car out of service and investigate it,” explained Greg Buzby, SEPTA manager of Regional Rail vehicle engineering.
The new fire detection system has been installed on nearly 70 cars so far. Buzby expects SEPTA will meet the Dec. 5 deadline to install them on all cars.
Still, Sauer said it will be until January before Regional Rail service returns to normal levels.
“It’ll take a little time, but that’s going to gradually add up to create more capacity for our customers and make a significant improvement in reliability,” he said.
He said SEPTA is also seeking a federal loan to buy new rail cars, but it would be the better part of a decade before any new vehicles arrive.