There could be several reasons for this. Often it's to reset a door that was held open by someone until it 'gave up' and stays open until reset.
It could also be that there was a report of something on the train (fighting, injury or illness, something like that) and the operator has been asked to go check it out.
It may be that the operator received a call on the emergency intercom from a passenger, can't understand what the situation is, and has asked permission to go back and take a look.
It could even be that the operator has been asked to look through the train for an article of lost and found that someone left on the train. More than likely luggage going to or from the airport.
Rail operators come from Metro Transit. Bus drivers are recruited to go to rail. The requirements are pretty minimal and the seniority situation at rail has made rail a place that highly experienced, high seniority bus drivers want nothing to do with it. There’s a good chance that your rail operator never drove a bus full time coming to rail directly from part time bus driving.
Rail supervisors can come from anywhere. And I mean anywhere. If you think that rail would prefer to promote rail operators from within to become supervisors, you would be wrong.
Highly qualified, experienced, senior rail operators are passed over in order to promote supervisors from bus drivers and other areas of King County employ. In fact, the most recent rail supervisor recruitment was open to the general public. So take note bus drivers, if you want to be promoted at rail, you stand a better chance not being a rail operator.
There is a reasonable chance that the rail supervisor you see never operated a train before being hired as a supervisor, or was an operator for a very brief period. The deck is stacked against rail operators in lots of ways, and it shows in the poor morale of operators in general regarding management.
Supervisors at Metro Transit (buses) are there to help the operators (drivers) do a difficult job. Supervisors at rail don’t have that mindset generally. Helping an operator is a burden, and it’s way more fun to catch them doing something wrong rather than guide them into not doing it in the first place.
Supervisors who work Link Control Center are also a mixed bag. Some are helpful and understanding, while others bait operators into making critical errors. You know, for fun.
Recently, King County has begun hiring Light Rail Operators 'off the street', meaning that they do not need to be current King County employees, or bus drivers.
This means that such hires have none of the knowledge that comes from driving a bus for King County, such as how dispatching works or how work is assigned or how work picks operate.
You might think that the department responsible for training Light Rail Operators would make the classes more stringent in order to make sure these new hires are up to the task, but you'd be wrong.
They made the class far easier to pass. There are things that used to get you booted out of the class if you did them just once. Now, you can do them three times before you're out. In the near future, it's entirely possible that the person operating your train screwed up twice in a big way while learning and still passed.
Also, some of the people responsible for training the new operators had to be trained to operate themselves as they never had. So trainers with no operating experience training operators with no transit experience. What could possibly go wrong?
It was explained to us like this: When rail was new, some high senority operators went, but most thought of it like a new iPhone. Let someone else work out the kinks, then we'll go. So in the meantime, they had to bring over lower seniority operators. Pretty soon the lower seniority operators (one in particular) started getting upset that they were helping train new operators that were going above them in seniority. So they got together, went to a union meeting and proposed that rail have it's own seniority pool seperate and apart from bus seniority.
Our understanding is that this has been tried at several other properties around the nation, and it went over like a lead ballon. But here it passed. And because the union is mostly bus drivers that don't care about rail, don't understand how it affects them and don't even think of rail operators as union brothers, they won't vote to repeal it. Basically out of apathy.
And so rail is now populated with operators with low or even part time bus seniority because high seniority operators won't go there due to losing their seniority.
Apparently, a rail operator doesn't lose their bus seniority while being at rail. If they go back to driving the bus, they go back exactly where they were. And while driving the bus again, they don't lose any rail seniority either. If they go back to rail at some point, they go back in right where they were. Weird.
At the last recruitment for Rail Supervisors, something .. interesting happened. There is a written test given to the cadidates. You would think that the test would be for learning ability, memory, problem solving, etc. but you'd be wrong. The test is about things that they are supposed to be taught during their year of training. ( Wait, what? )
This last time there were several different test groups, and during one group someone had a cough. One person in that group waited until the test was over, then complained about the person coughing "that they couldn't focus". This person failed the test. Many in that group passed the test and some even said they never noticed anyone coughing.
The complaint went to H.R., and in their 'infinite wisdom' they made everyone retake the test, even those who were in different testing groups that had no coughing persons. Even those that had already passed it.
The person complaining ... failed again.
This web site is not owned by, supported by, endorsed by, affiliated with or in any other way connected to Sound Transit, King County, or any government agency or department.
All content is the opinion of the website owners.
Content is for entertainment purposes only.