Metro GM gives behind-the-scenes look at progress of SafeTrack maintenance

Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld gave news cameras a behind-the-scenes look at the transit system's SafeTrack maintenance projects on Monday.

FOX 5's Bob Barnard rode along with him as he boarded a shuttle bus to the Crystal City station then rode the system's Orange and Blue lines along parts of the track that are currently impacted by SafeTrack work.

Wiedefeld said the ride-along was designed to show the maintenance being done and to give an experience of an actual commute.

He told Barnard that the current SafeTrack Surge is the ninth of fifteen expected maintenance projects and that work was going well. He said that at the end of the SafeTrack work he expects Metro to be in a position where they can maintain safe and reliable travel.

"All of these systems will always have issues," Wiedefeld told Barnard. "There's no doubt about it - just like on a highway system -there's things that come up. But what we want to do is just reduce the odds of that happening - and by getting ahead of this - that's how we'll do that. Things will occur. There's no doubt about it. You look at any system in the world - things occur. But you can reduce the amount of that and the duration of that by getting on top of this work."

The final SafeTrack Surge is planned for late March and April of next year.

Here is a full schedule of SafeTrack work: http://www.wmata.com/rail/safetrack.cfm