Agency board approves $212 million contract for new technology
San Francisco Muni has approved a contract that will replace the train control system for the Market Street Subway (highlighted in yellow), which currently has a system using disk drive. San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency
SAN FRANCISCO — The floppy-disk era is nearing an end on the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.
KGO-TV reports that the Muni board has approved a $212 million contract with Hitachi Rail for a train control system that will replace the more than 30-year-old system that still runs on outdated floppy-disk technology.
The Automatic Train Control system remains in place on the 3-mile, seven-station Market Street Subway. Installed in 1998, its software must be loaded with obsolete 5¼-inch flppy disks each morning. As KGO reported earlier this year, the system is past its expected lifespan, and requires finding programmers with out-of-date job skills [see “San Francisco train control project seeks to retire system …,” Trains News Wire, April 7, 2024].
The system in use on the Market Street Subway will be replaced as part of a project to update the entire Muni system with Communications-Based Train Control. That project is projected to take until 2029; the subway portion could be done in late 2027 or early 2028.
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