Jobs Are Important, but Safety Comes First : Green Line: The choice of Sumitomo to make automated train cars was not taken lightly.

There has been considerable discussion surrounding decisions by the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission to support automated technology for the Metro Green Line and then to award the contract to build the Green Line vehicles to Sumitomo Corp. of America, whose parent company is in Japan. The Metro Green Line is a 20-mile light-rail system that will run down the median of the I-105 Glenn Anderson Freeway (now under construction) from Norwalk to Los Angeles International Airport, opening in 1995.

It is our intention to build what will become the best and most efficient rail system in the United States in the next 30 years. We began with the highly successful Metro Blue Line running between downtown Los Angeles and Long Beach, and will extend the system to 400 miles. Most of the world’s successful transportation systems involve multiple technologies, including subway, above-ground light rail, commuter rail and, where appropriate, high-speed rail--all interlinked with an efficient bus system. Because we are getting a late start in rebuilding a rail system, we have the opportunity to include the latest available technologies.

It has been stated, inaccurately, that the driverless trains we intend to put into operation on the Green Line are unproven. Such technology has been in operation for the past 5 to 10 years in London, Vancouver and Lille, France. Other systems with fully automated capability are in place or in planning stages in other cities. In December, the county transportation commissioners voted to reaffirm their commitment to automated technology on the Green Line. Given that decision and the highly technical nature of an automated system, the commission’s primary objective was to select the most technically competent firm to perform the work. It is our obligation to the public to build a transit system that works, is safe and will be built on schedule. Because of the nature of automation, we could not take risks in awarding the vehicle contract; we had to select a firm with the right combination of sophistication, experience and capability to perform the work. For reasons of technical superiority, Sumitomo was selected over the Boise, Ida.-based firm, Morrison-Knudsen.

This decision was delayed for one month while an independent panel of technical experts reviewed the bids from both firms. These six experts had no contact with the commission staff while they reviewed all of the factors involved in building vehicles for an automated system. They came back with an even stronger, unanimous recommendation to award the contract to Sumitomo, even though its bid was about $5 million higher than Morrison-Knudsen’s. In saying that it could not technically support the Morrison-Knudsen proposal, the panel of experts stated, “the potential risks . . . are too great to be technically acceptable.” The deciding factors included that Sumitomo had been in business for 96 years and Morrison-Knudsen for only 10. Sumitomo had built and delivered more than 40,000 cars worldwide, while none had yet been completed by Morrison-Knudsen. All of Sumitomo’s contracts were delivered on schedule. The ability of Morrison-Knudsen to meet its projected schedules is as yet unproven.

Long before it became politically expedient to focus attention on our sagging economy, the transportation commission was in the forefront of promoting local and minority involvement in our projects. The commission has approved a local business enterprise policy that will become even stronger when state legislation enables us to provide an advantage to local businesses bidding on our projects. We consider it a part of our mandate to do everything we can to put our considerable funds to use in our own back yard.

We are aggressive and vigilant in our efforts to use our transportation dollars to benefit the local economy and create jobs. For example, the Green Line project alone will create 19,000 local jobs, of which 77% are construction-related. Only 370 of the jobs will come directly and indirectly from the vehicle contract with Sumitomo, which represents just 12% of the total Green Line budget. (The other contractor would have provided 79 more local jobs.)

The combined rail, highway and bus projects we are building in the Los Angeles area will result in the creation of 1.4 million local construction-related jobs over the next 30 years. This will also have a ripple effect in creating jobs and pumping dollars into the five-county region and even the national economy.

We welcome the opportunity to continue playing a major role in boosting the local economy, though we know that our primary charge is to build a transportation system that will get us moving again and at the same time help clean the air.

We have also taken our responsibility for public safety very seriously. We will never make a decision that would be technically unsound for the overall safety and design of a rail system that must remain in operation for decades.