Local

Should driverless trains be in our future?

Riding in the front of Vancouver's SkyTrain, there's an unobstructed view out a window looking forward.

The best seat in the house is not the driver's, because there is no driver.

Vancouver's SkyTrain debuted driverless 30 years ago for Expo '86, a World's Fair focused on transportation.

Today, it is the longest train network in the world with no worker up front.

"Basically, the system runs itself," said SkyTrain Director of Operations John Wollenzin, in the operations center where a few employees operate up to 67 trains at a time.

"Any train can be re-routed with the click of a mouse," Wollenzin said.

With the computer doing the driving, Vancouver's trains safely run close together, which means they come often.

During the morning rush, trains are scheduled as close as 2 minutes 13 seconds apart.

In some cases, they arrive every 1 minute 15 seconds.

"What this really means is you're not running for a train," said Chris Morris, director of engineering for SkyTrain.

By contrast, light rail trains in Seattle currently arrive every six minutes in peak hours.

Transit expert Jarrett Walker said driverless systems are expensive to build, but transit agencies can save on labor expenses.

“Most of the cost of running transit service is the cost of labor so if you carry more people per driver you have more abundant service," Walker said.

SkyTrain officials say their only crashes have been in the maintenance yard, mostly with a driver using the backup system.

Driverless trains work well in Vancouver because they run above the street or underground, where there's nothing to hit.

Last week, a Sound Transit Link light rail train hit and killed a pedestrian in Seattle's Rainier Valley who crossed the tracks illegally.

"The No. 1 issue you want to consider when you're taking operators out of the picture is safety," said Sound Transit CEO Peter Rogoff.

Rogoff said operators prevent crashes and help passengers in emergencies.

But, is there a place for driverless trains in Sound Transit 3, the voter-approved 6-mile light rail expansion?

Rail advocates at Seattle Subway think so.

"We're fully in favor of that. If you look at the line from West Seattle to Everett, there's no street intersections," said Jonathan Hopkins in a late 2016 interview when he served as spokesperson for the group.

In August 2016, KIRO 7 asked Sound Transit's Rogoff about driverless trains in ST3.

He said it isn't something the agency would look at right away.

But he also said: "Let's remember that we're talking about a 25-year plan and this is something we can and probably will look at in the future."

In a new interview this week, Rogoff told KIRO 7 the agency's thinking has evolved.

"The more we looked into this it's very hard to imagine that we'll ever have driverless trains on the Sound Transit network," Rogoff said.

Rogoff said Sound Transit has money to expand service but not to retrofit with expensive automation.

And he doesn't want driverless trains on only one part of the system.

"We want our trains to be interoperable, we want every train to be able to run on every segment of the rail network," Rogoff said.

Sound Transit plans to increase the frequency of trains in the years ahead, moving to every four minutes in 2023.

Over the long term, when ST3 service begins, stations in the center of the network served by two lines will get service every three minutes.