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Openings and Construction Starts Planned for 2023

Last year, three lines Americans have been waiting on for decades—the Green Line extension in Boston, the Crenshaw Line in Los Angeles, and the Silver Line to Dulles Airport outside Washington—finally opened. Though they took years to be completed, they were greeted enthusiastically by riders and political officials content to bring better service to more people.

Similar reception greeted new rail and bus lines opening in Athens, Cairo, Guadalajara, Helsinki, Paris, and dozens of other cities around the world. And much more is planned for 2023: Finally, Long Island Rail Road service will reach the sub-sub-sub-basement of Grand Central Terminal. Toronto’s Eglinton light rail line will connect the city crosstown. And Honolulu, Gebze, Riyadh, Tel Aviv, and Thessaloniki will get their first metro services.

This year, I leveraged data assembled in the Transit Explorer database to identify which projects opened in 2022, which are planned for opening in 2023, and which will be under construction this year—for a later opening date.

On separate posts, I analyzed trends in transit investments around the world and examined accessibility to transit stations in the US versus Canada, England, and France.

London’s Crossrail project opened in 2022, providing new cross-city connections across the capital. Credit: Geoff Henson on Flickr (cc).

The Transit Explorer database now includes all fixed–guideway urban transit systems (meaning rail and bus rapid transit) across North America, South America, Africa, and nine Western European countries, plus metro systems throughout Europe and in parts of the Middle East. Transit Explorer now includes about 29,200 urban transit stations and about 6,700 urban transit lines (covering 78,000 kilometers). (It also includes some intercity rail systems.) These are the geographies for which I provide details about transit line openings below.

Istanbul’s metro network—spanning continents—is becoming one of the world’s largest.
Bogota is a bus rapid transit haven—but a new metro system is planned.

Data can be viewed freely on Transit Explorer or purchased for non-commercial use in Shapefile, GeoJSON, and CSV formats for those who would like to use the data for research or other uses, such as in Excel, R, ArcGIS, or QGIS.

DOWNLOAD TRANSIT EXPLORER DATA

Previous compilations of new and planned transit projects on The Transport Politic can be found here: 2009 | 2010 | 2011  | 2012  | 2013  | 2014  | 2015  | 2016  | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022

New transit investments completed in 2022

Overall, 517 kilometers of new fixed-guideway urban transit services opened in 2022 across the countries covered by the Transit Explorer database. Of these, the countries with the largest increases in kilometers were the United States (196 kilometers); Egypt (77 kilometers); Mexico (60 kilometers); France (39 kilometers); and the United Kingdom (34 kilometers).

Azerbaijan

  • Baku: 2 km Purple Line metro extension from Avtovagzal to Khojasan

Canada

  • Montreal: Creation of 11 km SRB Pie-IX bus rapid transit route through the east side of the city

Denmark

Egypt

  • Cairo:
    • Line 3 metro extension west to Kit Kat (4 km)
    • Creation of 72 km Cairo Light Rail system (really a metro system) heading east into the new capital area

Finland

  • Helsinki: 7 km extension of the M1 metro line

France

  • Paris:
  • Rennes: Creation of new 13 km Line B automated light metro
  • Toulouse: Creation of 3 km Teleo aerial tram line

Greece

Italy

  • Milan: Opening of the first phase of automated M4 light metro, 5.5 km from the airport into the city

Israel

  • Haifa: Creation of Rakavlit aerial tram line (4 km)

Luxembourg

  • Luxembourg: Extension of T1 tramway by 1.2 km to the south

Mauritius

  • Port Louis: 10 km extension of the Metro Express light rail system to the south

Mexico

  • Guadalajara: Creation of 41.5 km Mi Macro Periferico bus rapid transit line, a circumferential route around the city
  • Mexico: 18 km extension of Mexibus Linea 1 bus rapid transit line in the northern suburbs

Poland

  • Warsaw: Extension of M2 metro line west and east, totaling 6 km

Spain

Turkiye

  • Bursa: Creation of 8 km T2 tramway line
  • Istanbul:
    • 8 km extension of M4 to Asian-side airport
    • 1.5 km extension of M7
    • Creation of F4 funicular system, a 1 km line

United Kingdom

United States

Planned 2023 openings

Almost 1,100 kilometers of fixed-guideway urban transit is planned to open in 2023 in the parts of the world covered by Transit Explorer. Of these, about half will be in the form of metro rail services. The countries with the largest expansions planned for opening are the United States (242 kilometers); Saudi Arabia (169 kilometers); Turkiye (127 kilometers); Mexico (98 kilometers); and Canada (78 kilometers). That said, all investments aren’t equal: 57 percent of new US route kilometers will be bus rapid transit or arterial rapid transit. In many other countries, new kilometers are much more likely to be metro rail or light rail services: Saudi Arabia (100 percent); Turkiye (83 percent); and Canada (93 percent).

Brasil

  • Rio de Janeiro: TransBrasil, 32 km bus rapid transit route

Canada

Chile

  • Santiago:
    • Line 2, extension to El Pino, 5 km
    • Line 3, extension to Plaza de Quilicura, 3 km
    • Creation of Teleferico Bicentenario, 3 km aerial tram

Egypt

  • Cairo
    • Line 3, 6 km extension to Cairo University
    • Line 3, 7 km extension to Rod el-Farag

France

Greece

Israel

  • Tel Aviv: Creation of 24 km Red Line light rail corridor, which includes some subway segments through the city

Italy

  • Catania: 3 km extensions of the Metropolitana system
  • Genova: 0.9 km extension of the automated light metro Metropolitana to Canepari
  • Milan: Extension of M4 9 km into the city center
  • Naples: 3.5 km extension of Line 6 light metro line

Mexico

Netherlands

  • Rotterdam: Extension of Line B metro to Hoek van Holland, 2 km

Nigeria

Panama

  • Panama: Line 2, 2 km extension to the airport

Russia

  • Moscow
    • Extension of metro line 8A, 5 km
    • Extension of metro line 10, 6 km
    • Extensions of metro line 11, 19 km
    • Creation of metro line 16, 15 km line

Saudi Arabia

Senegal

  • Dakar: Extension of the Train express régional commuter rail to AIBD, 19 km

Spain

Turkiye

  • Ankara: 3.5 km extension of M4 metro to 15 Temmuz Kizilay Milli Irade
  • Gebze: Creation of 16 km M1 metro
  • Istanbul:
    • M3 extensions to Barkirkoy IDO (8.5 km) and Kayasehir Merkez (6 km)
    • M5 extension to Sancaktepe Sehir Hastanesi (3 km)
    • Creation of M8 metro, 14 km
    • M9 extension to Atakoy, 11 km
    • M11 extensions to Gayrettepe (3 km) and Halkali (33 km)
    • Tramway T5 extension to Eminonu, 1 km
    • Creation of T6 tramway, 8.5 km
  • Izmir:
    • M1 metro extension to Kaymakamlik hatti, 7 km
    • T1 tramway extension, 1.5 km
    • Creation of T3 tramway, 10 km

United Kingdom

United States

Under construction in 2023

Among the countries in the Transit Explorer database, there will be roughly 1,900 kilometers of new fixed–guideway urban transit projects under construction in 2023, but planned to be opened after 2023. About 43 percent of those kilometers will be in the form of metro services. 554 kilometers will be under construction in the United States, 305 kilometers in France, and 172 kilometers in Canada.

Algeria

Argentina

  • Buenos Aires: Belgrano Sur commuter rail line, 4 km extension

Austria

Azerbaijan

  • Baku:
    • Green Line metro extension to Mohammed Hadi, 10 km
    • Purple Line metro extension to B-4 station, 1 km

Belarus

  • Minsk: Zelenaluzhskaya Line metro extension to Slutsk Gastinets, 4 km, opening 2024

Belgium

  • Antwerpen: Antwerpse premetro Kerkstraat route, 2 km, opening 2026
  • Brussels: T10 tram, linking Rogier to Neder-Over-Heembeek, opening 2024
  • Charleroi: Metro Châtelet Branch (light rail), 4 km, opening 2026
  • Liège: New tramway, 12 km, opening 2024

Brasil

  • Curitiba: Linha Verde bus rapid transit, 5.5 km
  • Fortaleza: Linha Leste metro, 6 km, opening 2024
  • Rio de Janeiro: Line 4 extensions, 3 km
  • Salvador:
  • Sao Paulo:
    • Line 2 metro extension, 9 km, opening 2026
    • Line 6 metro new line creation, 16 km, opening 2026
    • Line 17 monorail project, 8.5 km, opening 2024
    • Line 9 Mendes-Varginha commuter rail line extension, 2.5 km

Bulgaria

  • Sofia: M3 metro extension to Vladimir Vazov, 4 km

Canada

Chile

  • Santiago:
    • Line 6 metro extension to Isidora Goyenechea, 1 km, opening 2027
    • Line 7 creation of new metro line, 29 km, opening 2027

Colombia

  • Bogota:
    • Line 1 metro new line, 24 km, opening 2028
    • RegioTram de Occidente new regional rail line, 40 km, opening 2024
    • Avenida 68 bus rapid transit route, 17 km, opening 2026
    • NQS Sur bus rapid transit extension, 4.5 km
  • Medellin: Calle 12 Sur bus rapid transit extension, 1.5 km

Czechia

  • Prague: Line D metro extension, 1.5 km, opening 2029

Denmark

Egypt

  • Cairo: Cairo Light Rail Transit (metro) extensions, 22 km

France

Germany

Greece

Israel

  • Jerusalem:
    • Red Line tramway extensions to Neve Yaakov and Hadassah, 7 km, opening 2025
    • Green Line new tramway line, 22 km, opening 2025
  • Tel Aviv:
    • Purple Line new light rail line, 30 km, opening 2028
    • Green Line new light rail line, 40 km, opening 2028

Italy

  • Bologna: Line 1 tramway new line, 23 km, opening 2026
  • Cagliari: Line 1 tramway extension to FS station, 3 km, opening 2024
  • Florence: T2 tramway extension, 3 km
  • Genova: Metropolitana automated light metro extension to Martinez, 1 km, opening 2024
  • Milan: M1 metro extension to Monza Bettola, 2 km, opening 2024
  • Naples:
    • Line 1 metro extensions, 10.5 km, opening 2024
    • Line 7 metro, 6 km
    • Line 10 automated light metro, 14 km
    • Linea 11 metro to Giugliano-Aversa, 15 km
  • Rome: C automated light metro extension to Fori Imperiali, 4 km, opening 2024
  • Turin
    • Line 1 automated light metro extension to Cascine Vica, 5 km, opening 2024
    • Line 3 commuter rail connection to Caselle Aeroporto, 2 km
    • Alba-Ceres commuter rail connection, 4 km

Ivory Coast

  • Abidjan: Metro, 36 km, opening 2025

Luxembourg

Mexico

Morocco

Netherlands

  • Amsterdam: Tramway extension, 1 km

Norway

Panama

Peru

  • Lima:
    • Line 2 new line, 27 km, opening 2024
    • Line 4 metro to Gambetta, 8 km

Portugal

Romania

  • Bucarest: M2 metro extension to Tudor Arghezi, 2 km

South Africa

Spain

Sweden

Turkiye

  • Ankara: Ankaray metro extension to Sogutozu, 1 km
  • Bursa: BursaRay light rail extension to Sehir Hastanesi, 5.5 km, opening 2024
  • Istanbul:
    • M1B metro extension to Halkali, 11 km, opening 2024
    • M4 metro extension to Icemeler, 9 km
    • M5 metro extension to Sultanbeyli, 9 km, opening 2024
    • M7 metro extension to Kabatas, 4 km, opening 2024
    • M7 metro extension to Hastane, 9 km, opening 2025
    • M7 metro extension to Esenyurt Meydan, 14 km, opening 2029
    • M10 metro extension to Pendik Center, 5 km
    • M12 metro new line, 15 km, opening 2024
  • Izmir: M2 metro new line, 15 km, opening 2026
  • Mersin: M1 metro new line, 15.5 km, opening 2026

Ukraine

  • Dnipro: Dnipro Metro extension, 6 km, opening 2024
  • Kyiv: M3 metro extension to Marshala Hrechka, 6.5 km

United Kingdom

United States

Venezuela

  • Caracas:
    • Line 5 metro, 9.5 km
    • MetroCable La Dolorita aerial tram, 4 km
    • Metro de Los Teques Line 2 extension, 10 km
  • Valencia: Line 2 light rail extension, 2.5 km
Categories
Infrastructure Metro Rail New York Stations

The case of the missing platform doors

» Platform screen doors could save lives, reduce trash on the tracks, and improve the customer experience. Yet they’ve been repeatedly pushed back as a solution in cities like New York. At fault: A bureaucracy that isn’t able to plan for technological change and is unresponsive even to its own board members.

Charles Moerdler wants to make the New York City Subway better for its passengers, but he keeps getting blown off. His story is parochial in that it is relevant directly to New York, but it is also generalizable—representative in its own way of how American transit agencies respond to the availability of new technologies, even when those new technologies can save lives and improve operations.

Moerdler may be one of the most prominent, if unrecognized (perhaps even by himself), advocates of what are known as platform screen doors. These glass doors, which line the edge of train platforms and prevent people from jumping, falling, or being pushed onto the tracks, are installed on rapid transit systems all over the world. They are aligned with a train’s own doors and are designed to open when a train pulls up. They can play an important role in improving transit safety, in many cases literally saving lives, and they can prevent people from throwing trash onto the tracks, a typical cause of system-disrupting track fires.

Yet they’re also virtually non-existent on rapid transit systems in the U.S. Why is that?

I’ll return to Moerdler in a second, but suffice it to say that his advocacy has been repeatedly and condescendingly rebuffed—I document the instances below—by leadership at the agency that runs the Subway, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), where he is a board member. Partly as a consequence, like many other systems, the New York City Subway remains dangerously susceptible to people getting hit by trains and service disruptions. No progress, at least in the public eye, has been made on addressing this problem. This public bureaucracy seems incapable of adjusting to technological change.

Platform screen doors: A worldwide phenomenon for rapid transit, except in the U.S.

Platform screen doors may be familiar to anyone who has used an automated people mover at airports from Chicago O’Hare to New York JFK, and they have a number of benefits. They allow platforms to act as insulated rooms, physically stopping people from jumping or falling onto the tracks—a particular plus for blind people. They prevent people from trashing the tracks—a major cause of subway delays. They allow trains to enter stations at higher speeds, and they make it far more feasible to air condition those stops.

Doors can be installed at full heights, completely isolating the platform from the tracks, or they can be installed more cheaply at a lower height. They can be installed at all stations along a line, or just some of them. They can be added on lines that are automated, and on others that are not.

The doors aren’t free. Costs may vary from about €2.6 million per station for a project now underway in Paris to about $10 million per station, according to an estimate for Montréal.

The MTA suggests that platform doors could require platform edge reinforcement, electrical upgrades, and a new interface between trains and signals. So determining the relative importance of lives saved and reduced trash fires resulting from platform doors, compared to other potential investments, is needed for any system considering their implementation.

Clearly, many cities have decided they’re worth the cost. The below map illustrates all of the rapid transit systems around the world—excluding airport people movers—noting in yellow and green those systems with platform screen doors at at least some of their stations (click to expand).

As the map shows, none of the major rapid transit systems in the U.S. include such doors—not New York, but also not Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Los Angeles, Miami, Philadelphia, San Francisco, or Washington. Only Las Vegas’ monorail, a tourist attraction, and Honolulu’s line, now under construction, include them.

In Europe and Asia, however, platform screen doors are quite common. They’ve been installed on new systems in cities as disparate as Bangkok, Chengdu, Copenhagen, Dubai, Singapore, Toulouse, and Turin. They’ve been added to existing lines in places from Beijing to London and Paris. And many cities are installing them now.

In South Korea, there have been particularly significant efforts to incorporate platform doors at existing stations. In Japan, the government has recommended their installation at every station with at least 100,000 daily commuters and identified a significant reduction in accidents following their addition. The doors are common on every rail system in China.

In other words, the doors are ubiquitous for new rapid transit lines in the wealthier parts of the world. Except for in the U.S.

Return to New York

One explanation for the difference may be the manner in which American transit agencies approach technological change. Which brings us back to Charles Moerdler.

Don’t feel bad for Chuck. He’s a partner in a major law firm. Despite being yelled at by the current MTA chair, Moerdler feels empowered in his job as an MTA board member.

Yet my examination of MTA board minutes suggests that he’s been given misleading answers to his queries about the possibilities of such doors at least eight times, by a panoply of different officials, over the past five years.

To rehash:

  • In March 2012, then-MTA President Tom Prendergast told Moerdler that platform doors were being considered for installation, and he said they could improve safety, comfort, and timeliness of trains. Then- and now-MTA chairman Joe Lhota said “we will look at” the doors, though he suggested “it’s not something I think we’ll see, quite honestly, in your lifetime or my lifetime.”
  • In January 2013, an MTA Senior Vice President said the agency was considering the possible use of platform door barriers and other mechanisms to check for intrusions on the track.
  • In May 2014, Moerdler generated discussion among board members about the potential for platform doors to address safety and operational issues, to no real response from MTA officials.
  • In June 2014, then-New York City Transit President Carmen Bianco suggested that two initiatives, including intrusion detection and the feasibility of platform doors, “are ongoing.”
  • In November 2016, then-New York City Transit President Veronique Hakim “agreed to look into the feasibility of a pilot program for the installation of platform doors,” according to the minutes. Another board member noted that the agency needed a study to examine the issue.
  • In February 2017, Subways Senior Vice President Wynton Habersham said that the issue of platform doors “is currently under consideration, and agreed to get back to [board] Members with further information at a future date.” He agreed to produce a report on the cost and feasibility of platform doors in New York.
  • In March 2017, Habersham “agreed to consider the use of platform doors,” and the agency suggested a “comprehensive study” was being explored at that moment.
  • In September 2017, Moerdler was again promised by agency officials that platform doors were possible, and the idea had not been abandoned.

The MTA has never produced a comprehensive analysis of the potential for such doors, nor has it committed seriously to installing them. The way in which Moerdler has been treated is indicative of the agency’s unwillingness to invest in new technologies. For years, the agency has been responding to him as if the public is on the cusp of learning about the potential for platform doors, and yet responses over the years collectively indicate little progress.

Perhaps the MTA does, in fact, have something forthcoming. And the fact is that there has been repeated evidence that the MTA is at least minimally interested in investing in such technologies. In 2007, agency officials suggested that the Second Avenue Subway could include such doors. Board members designated $2.4 million in funds for platform doors in the 2010-to-2014 capital plan; this expenditure was delayed and supposed to be completed in December 2016 (it wasn’t). The agency complained about the difficulty of implementation in early 2013, noting that door installation would be costly, have to respond to varying train lengths, door placements, and differences in station designs. In February 2016, the MTA suggested it would put platform doors at the L train’s 6th Avenue station. By November last year, the agency noted that the S shuttle from Times Square to Grand Central might be a better option.*

All along, people kept getting hurt and, in some cases, dying. Just last year 102 people were accidentally hit by trains at stations, and another 51 allegedly or definitely attempted suicide by jumping in front of trains.

The agency’s response to Moerdler isn’t just evidence of an embarrassingly inappropriate relationship with board members. It’s also a disappointment for riders.

To be fair, I would be remiss to avoid mentioning the challenges the MTA would face if it were to attempt the installation of platform screen doors. The doors generally require several basic features to work: Trains that stop in the almost-exact same place every time; level and even platforms; and train doors that are always located in the same place.**

Stopping trains in the same place each time they arrive at stations typically requires advanced signaling, a feature that New York’s Subway is notoriously lacking. Level platforms require renovations. Train doors being located in the same place is difficult to achieve with a mixed fleet of trains featuring doors in different locations. Achieving any of these features would not be simple, and it would require MTA dedicate new funds to be accomplished.

Yet there are MTA services that are already practically ready for the installation of such doors. The L train has advanced, CBTC signaling that is similar to automation and can guarantee reliable stopping. It also has a train fleet whose doors are all located in the same place. Once the 7 train’s CBTC renovation is completed, it too will have those two features. So, interestingly, does the Q train’s just-opened portion under Second Avenue in Manhattan. The first two feature congested platforms where the dangers of falling in front of a train are real. And all three need to keep the tracks clear of trash to maintain appropriate operations.

But, at least as of now, the MTA has no plans to add platform doors to any of the lines. One explanation may be that the agency wants to hold off for a future in which it changes the location of train doors.

Promoting technological change

It’s hard to understand why, exactly, the management of American transit agencies act in the manner that they do. While they could use more funds in many cases, the biggest agencies work with billions of dollars of capital and operating funds, more than most agencies in Europe or Asia. While they’re public sector bureaucracies, so is virtually every other transit agency in the world. While agency leadership keeps changing, many staff members have remained there for years. While boards aren’t particularly responsive from a democratic perspective, neither are the heads of transit agencies in most other countries—and, even if they were, it’s hard to believe that issues like platform screen doors will ever rise to the top of issues relating to popular protest.

The best explanation I have is that management is simply uninterested in making the decisions necessary to bring their technologies up to speed. Given their (real or imagined) sense of being constantly under siege, transit agency leadership would prefer to just keep the existing system working as it does today: Better safe than sorry. And the repeated complaints of one board member, not backed by others and not likely to raise the concerns of the political official who appointed him (the governor), simply doesn’t matter enough.

It is also undoubtedly true that the fact that platform doors can, for now, only be installed at some stations, on some lines, poses a political challenge to doing it anywhere. Yet that hasn’t prevented the improvement of service in some places over others. And in the places where it is possible, the primary problem is a lack of foresight and coordination. If, when the MTA had begun renovations on the L or the 7, it had committed to platform doors, it could have simply incorporated their installation into the overall renovation plan, as have other cities. Including them now wouldn’t represent such a struggle. Comprehensive planning about multiple elements of a project clearly is not the agency’s high point.

There are reasons for hope, however. About two years ago, I wrote about the complete failure of American transit agencies to purchase open-gangway trains, which increase capacity by allowing people to walk between cars—a failure that could not be attributable to technology or cost and that was degrading customer service. Agencies offered surface-level, unreasonable excuses for their approach.

But in January 2016 (surely not just, if at all, as a consequence of my article), the MTA announced it would purchase an open-gangway train, and a portion of a prototype has been built.

It will take decades for the full fleet to be converted, but the decision signals that there is a willingness, somewhere deep in the heart of American transit bureaucracy, for change.

* Philadelphia, among other cities, has also considered platform doors.

** There are some inventive approaches to handling situations with doors in different locations using ropes, but these seem unlikely to be feasible in a rapid-transit context.