News

Signals Training Consortium Successfully Pilots Two New Courses

Posted August 2015

It’s been a busy summer for the Signals Training Consortium.  Since June, the consortium has completed three more instruction-ready courses:
*  Course 105: Introduction and Overview to Cab & Wayside Signaling
*  Course 106: Introduction and Overview to Interlockings
*  Course 301: Troubleshooting Track Circuits

To date, two of the three have been piloted by partner locations.  On July 14, Metro-North Railroad piloted course 301: Troubleshooting Track Circuits.  This was the first troubleshooting course to be piloted by the consortium.  As all troubleshooting courses in this suite do, Course 301 starts with an overview to general troubleshooting procedures and strategies.  Then equipment specific common failures and causes are explained.  Lastly, participants are given scenarios built off of real world examples to which they must apply their knowledge and troubleshooting approaches to find the root cause of the problem.  Metro-North trainer Daniel Arritt was impressed with the flow of the course and had very minimal edits.

Last week starting on August 4, Denver RTD piloted course 105: Introduction and Overview to Cab and Wayside Signaling with two new hires (employed for less than four months).  Pre and post test scores with these new hires shows nearly a 200% knowledge gain.  As per the goal of piloting courseware, both Metro-North and Denver RTD have submitted suggested edits to strengthen the courseware.  Center staff will make these updates before courseware is finalized.

To see samples of the training materials developed by the signals training consortium visit Transit Training Network.  For more information on the consortium, contact project manager Mark Dysart.