http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/tech/ctg355.htm

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), October 13, 1999

Answers

[Fair Use: For Educational/Research Purposes Only]

10/07/99- Updated 10:37 AM ET

Mass transit faces real-time Y2K test

WASHINGTON (AP) - Transportation officials are uneasy about the readiness of mass transit systems for the year 2000, because huge New Year's Eve celebrations will send thousands of revelers toward public transportation just minutes after computers make the date change.

If a Y2K bug paralyzes subway nervous systems or the electrical supply that runs trains in cities such as Boston, New York and Washington, operators will have virtually no time to make repairs or warn incoming riders.

French officials will stop all trains and subway cars in France between 11:55 p.m. and 12:15 a.m. to ''respond to the anxiety'' of passengers, said a statement issued Monday by SNCF, the national train company.

Some U.S. operators, such as the Chicago Transit Authority, will conduct similar pauses. Federal officials think it's a prudent step.

''Rather than take any risk, they feel five minutes out of their schedule, with each train stopping in the station, would be a useful precaution,'' Mortimer Downey, deputy transportation secretary, said last week at a congressional hearing about the readiness of transportation systems for millennium change.

The so-called Year 2000 problem poses a special problem for mass transit because it will strike at the intersection of two unavoidable realities: the test of Y2K computer fixes at precisely the moment some transportation systems will be taxed by larger-than-usual crowds.

Some older computers were programmed to recognize dates in two-digit format, so the question emerges what will happen when 1999 -- recognized by those computers as simply ''99'' -- changes to 2000. Computers may malfunction and think the clock has been set back to 1900 instead of forward to 2000.

At that moment, New Year's Eve parties will be reaching their climax. Crowds urged to use public transportation as a way to avoid traffic will head for the nearest bus, subway station or railroad terminal.

Washington officials expect up to 800,000 riders that night on their Metro subway system, many of them attracted to the Lincoln Memorial for a millennium party hosted by entertainer Will Smith.

Boston is expecting 2 million for its First Night celebration, an increase of 500,000 people from a normal year, while Times Square in New York is expected to be a mecca for millennium buffs.

A Federal Transit Administration survey found that of 550 federally funded operators -- including bus, subway and commuter rail providers -- all but four said they are either Y2K compliant or have contingency plans. The remaining four, all in Puerto Rico, either did not respond or responded incorrectly.

Major subway operators insist they and their equipment suppliers have done all the tests they can do. Privately, some say they're not sure about the reliability of their electricity suppliers.

''We will have a number of technical people available. However, we've been assured by our contractors and subcontractors that they have met all the challenges to ensure a smooth transition,'' said Tom Kelly, spokesman for New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

''We came through the 9-9-99 with no problem, and people said that might be an issue,'' said Cheryl Johnson, a Washington Metro spokeswoman. Analysts had feared that Sept. 9, with its lineup of 9's, would seize computer brains.

Amtrak and commuter railroads also insist their trains are ready, but many have their own Achilles heel: they operate on tracks owned by freight railroads. The four largest freight lines in the country -- Burlington Northern Santa Fe, CSX, Norfolk Southern and Union Pacific -- won't report their Y2K readiness until next week.

Rail experts say the public should not worry, since older subway cars and many locomotives are not computerized. Equipment such as grade crossing signals is tripped not by time and date information but by mechanical switches thrown by an approaching train.

Yet last month, Washingtonians got a hint of their subway's vulnerability. For the first time in 20 years, a computer that monitors every train in the Metro system froze just before the start of the morning rush hour. It caused delays of up to 50 minutes.

Metro officials said the problem was not Y2K-related.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), October 13, 1999.

Definition of anxiety: Being on a TGV (French high-speed train) as the clock passes through 0000z JAN 1/2000. But they have fail-safe brakes, don't they?

-- profit_of_doom (doom@helltopay.ca), October 13, 1999.

Mobs of drunk revelers
stranded downtown
pissed

did they rent enough porta-potties?

-- traffic jam (of@the.millennium), October 13, 1999.