“If NYCT fails to meet these deadlines and produce an adequate SRA (Safety Risk Assessment) to address the safety risks to its track workers, FTA may take prompt enforcement actions against NYCT in accordance with federal law,” the FTA said. “This includes directing NYCT to use Federal financial assistance to correct safety deficiencies, withholding up to 25% of financial assistance and issuing restrictions or prohibitions as necessary and appropriate to address unsafe conditions or practices that present a substantial risk of death or personal injury.”
The FTA noted that Special Directive 24-6 (download below) was issued in August 2024 “after the transit agency failed to strengthen safety measures between the November 2023 death of a track maintenance employee and a second serious injury to an employee in June 2024.” It followed the FTA’s June 2024 audit of the New York Public Transportation Safety Board’s (PTSB) State Safety Oversight (SSO) program, the agency designated by the State of New York to provide safety oversight for the NYCT rail transit system.
“During that audit, FTA identified significant safety deficiencies in NYCT’s Rail Transit Roadway Worker Protection (RWP) program and a noted increase in near-miss events involving transit workers reflecting a combination of unsafe conditions and practices,” FTA reported. “FTA issued a Special Directive 24-7 to the PTSB to perform additional oversight activities to address an escalating pattern of safety incidents and concerns affecting transit workers at NYCT.
“All total, NYCT experienced 38 potential employee-near misses in calendar year 2023, a 58% increase from 24 incidents in 2022 and a 65% increase from 23 events in calendar year 2021.
“In the past year, FTA has communicated to NYCT the need to conduct a comprehensive risk assessment of its RWP program, including information from recent safety events. After two tries FTA has determined that NYCT’s SRAs failed to adequately account for a rise in risk levels and excluded critical data. Specifically, several track worker events occurred from calendar years 2021-2023, representing an incident rate approximately 3.4 times higher than the preceding eight-year period, calendar years 2013-2020.”
The FTA on Aug. 19, 2025, issued a letter to NYCT (download below) requiring the transit agency to submit an updated revised safety risk assessment within 30 calendar days.
The SRA, the FTA said, must address the following:
- “Incorporation of recent risk trends: The revised SRA must incorporate and analyze the demonstrated acceleration in worker contact incidents, including CY 2024 incident and near miss data.
- “Application of appropriate exposure measures: Risk calculations must be based on measures that accurately reflect actual worker risk exposure.
- “Alignment of probability classification with operational reality: The likelihood rating must be revised to ensure it accurately reflects NYCT’s documented operational experience of recurring worker-train contact events and near misses.”
FTA noted that it will “not afford NYCT an opportunity to submit a fourth SRA.”
Editor’s Comment: The FTA issued a press release about the above directive quoting Administrator Marc Molinaro as saying: “Let me be very clear: We will not accept being jerked around on safety and security issues any longer. By anyone, anywhere.” We wonder why the FTA Administrator would choose to make public statements using “street“ language one would expect to hear outside an Italian social club in Little Italy. On the other hand, he is a “lifelong New Yorker,” as his FTA bio describes him. Frankly, we can understand him sounding like one. Yo! Fuggedaboudit! No problemo! But why issue a press release at all? I think its sole purpose is political: Paint NYCT as the bad guy to embarrass the MTA and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, who in so many words told SECDOT Duffy, “mettilo dove non splende il sole” when he ordered congestion pricing shut down. MTA Chief of Policy and External Relations John McCarthy told local news media that the FTA’s “concerns were answered seven months ago,” saying the POTUS 47 Administration’s opposition to congestion pricing was behind the letter. McCarthy added the MTA is reviewing the letter “to determine any appropriate legal action.” – William C. Vantuono (a fellow Italian from Newark, New Joisey)
