Development of an Automated Emergency Response System (AERS) for Rail Transit Systems

As a result of a fire in 1979 at the Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART), a microprocessor-based information retrieval system was developed to aid in the emergency decision-making process. This system was proposed, designed and programmed by a supervisory controller at BART. In 1982, the Office of Technical Assistance of the Urban Mass Transportation Administration initiated an effort to encourage the installation of similar systems, referred to as Automated Emergency Response System (AERS), at other transit sites. The AERS is a computerized data bank containing equipment and facilities location information and predetermined response actions. Its purpose is to provide controllers, dispatchers and supervisors with a quick and accurate information retrieval system. This report presents the results of an effort to deploy and evaluate AERS at transit sites. It contains a discussion of the deployment of the demonstration of AERS systems at the Washington Metropolitan Aera Transit Authority in Washington, D.C. and the Port Authority Transit Corporation (PATCO) of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The subsequent efforts through September 1983 by the Central Control Supervisory Staffs to extend the demonstration systems into operating systems that meet not only the emergency action requirements of the respective transit systems, but other unique requirements as well, are also discussed.