'Troubling' SkyTrain safety statistics renew focus on need for platform screen doors | Daily Hive

Platform screen doors at Central Station on the new Sydney Metro. (Kenneth Chan)

Editor’s note: This article contains statistics regarding suicide. If you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health crisis, support is available 24/7. Call or text 9-8-8 to reach the Suicide Crisis Helpline.

For the first time, TransLink is sharing more details about its ongoing in-depth study into the feasibility of installing platform screen doors at SkyTrain stations.

Platform screen doors create a physical barrier between the tracks and the passenger waiting area. The most common designs use automatic sliding glass doors that open and close in synchronization with the train doors, operating much like elevator doors.

This technology is widely used on airport people mover systems, metro networks across Asia, and newly built metro systems in Europe, Australia, and Canada. Some notable North American examples include Montreal’s newly-built REM, with platform screen doors also planned for Toronto’s future Ontario Line.

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In 2023, Daily Hive Urbanized first reported that TransLink had begun reassessing the feasibility of platform screen doors.

Historically, a major technical obstacle on the Expo and Millennium lines has been the variety of trains operating on the network: the Mark I, Mark II, and Mark III, and, most recently, the new generation Mark V. Differences in door spacing between these models significantly complicate the installation of platform screen doors.

However, the fleet is set to become much more standardized over the coming years. TransLink is already replacing all 150 Mark I cars with Mark V trains, with the last Mark I cars expected to be retired in 2027/2028. The public transit authority also plans to retire all 108 Mark II cars in the 2030s.

By later in the 2030s, the Expo and Millennium line fleets are expected to consist entirely of Mark III and Mark V trains, with additional orders of Mark V trains replacing the Mark II fleet. The Mark V design is essentially a substantially upgraded version of the Mark III, with only minor differences in door spacing.

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Mark V train at SkyTrain’s Stadium-Chinatown Station. (Kenneth Chan)

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Platform screen doors at Clarke Quay Station on Singapore’s MRT metro system. (Kenneth Chan)

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Platform screen doors at Barangaroo Station on the new Sydney Metro. (Kenneth Chan)

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Platform screen doors at Central Station on the new Sydney Metro. (Kenneth Chan)

Platform screen doors are the optimal global standard

This gradual standardization creates an opportunity for TransLink to revisit platform screen doors.

The public transit authority is also examining whether newer door technologies could overcome some of the earlier challenges and work within the existing SkyTrain infrastructure.

Platform screen doors can help prevent accidental deaths, suicides, and passengers being intentionally pushed onto the tracks, while greatly improving service reliability — eliminating lengthy service disruptions when major incidents occur — and reducing the risk of psychological trauma for staff, first responders, and passenger witnesses. Based on global precedents, they would also increase usable waiting space on the floor area of a platform — enabling passengers to stand closer to the edge, against the glass walls — and give passengers a greater sense of safety.

But door spacing is only one consideration. Other challenges include whether station platform edges can support the additional weight of glass walls and mechanical equipment, how the space needed for the barriers would affect passenger waiting space and circulation, and their implications for passenger evacuations, air temperature, and ventilation, particularly in underground stations.

Moreover, retrofitting a busy, operating metro system with platform screen doors is considerably more challenging and costly than installing them on a new system before it opens to passengers — especially when a project is accompanied with a mandate to limit service impacts. However, retrofits at existing stations in London, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Singapore, and Japan demonstrate that it is technically possible. Similar upgrades have also been proposed for some old subway stations in Toronto and New York City.

Some newer glass-sliding platform screen door technologies can accommodate more variations in train door spacings.

As well, there are ample examples of glass-sliding platform screen doors that are not fully enclosed by not touch the ceiling for ventilation purposes, with some being taller than most people and others being much shorter at neck/shoulder height. In Japan, some stations also have cable-based platform screen barriers that rise up and down.

While shorter glass platform screen doors and cable-based barriers may help prevent accidental falls onto the tracks, they may be less effective at preventing suicides.

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Platform screen doors at Chatswood Station on the new Sydney Metro. (Kenneth Chan)

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Platform screen doors at a train station in Tokyo. (Kenneth Chan)

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Platform screen doors at a train station in Tokyo. (Kenneth Chan)

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Platform screen doors at a train station in Tokyo. (Kenneth Chan)

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Cable-based platform barriers at a train station in Tokyo. (Kenneth Chan)

“Troubling” statistics on platform/guideway safety incidents

Technical Safety BC’s newly released analysis and its accompanying joint announcement with TransLink do not provide further details on technical feasibility, potential designs, an installation timetable, or a budget. TransLink is still a long ways away from deciding on whether platform screen doors will be installed, which is also dependent on significant funding. However, the findings highlight the value of such barriers, showing that incidents involving people coming into physical contact with trains have become more frequent relative to ridership on the Expo and Millennium lines than before the pandemic.

The independent safety regulator for British Columbia reviewed 122 incidents on the Expo and Millennium lines between 2016 and 2025, covering cases spanning 10 years on station platforms and in the guideway, which is the area containing the tracks. The Canada Line was not a part of this analysis.

For the Expo and Millennium lines, the average incident rate between 2023 and 2025 was approximately twice the rate recorded between 2016 and 2019, after accounting for the number of passenger boardings.

The regulator found that SkyTrain’s safety systems functioned as intended in all 122 cases reviewed. These include equipment that detects when a person or object enters the track area and triggers emergency braking.

Older sections of the Expo Line use pressure-sensitive plates installed within the guideway alongside station platforms to detect people and objects on the tracks. Sections originally built for the Millennium Line, along with the Canada Line, use infrared optical sensors that monitor the track area and create an invisible detection fence along the platform edge. Although these safety systems — critical for a fully-automated metro — save lives, they are also prone to false intrusion alarms, which can disrupt service while SkyTrain staff investigate and confirm the tracks are clear.

“Our safety data shows a troubling increase in incidents where individuals have come into contact with a SkyTrain,” said Derek Patterson, the vice president of regulatory leadership and corporate secretary for Technical Safety BC, in a statement.

The review recorded an average of 12.2 incidents annually over the decade, consisting of 7.7 in the guideway and 4.5 on platforms.

However, the annual figures fluctuated considerably. There were seven incidents in 2016, nine in 2017, six in 2018, and 10 in 2019. That was followed by 12 incidents in 2020, 16 in 2021, 13 in 2022, and 11 in 2023.

The highest annual total was 25 in 2024, comprising 12 guideway incidents and 13 platform incidents. Both categories reached their highest counts of the decade that year.

The total subsequently fell to 13 incidents in 2025, including 10 in the guideway and three on platforms.

The pattern looks different when incidents are measured against passenger volumes. On the Expo and Millennium lines, the incident rates were highest during the pandemic, when ridership plunged but the number of incidents did not fall proportionately.

Although those rates have since declined, they remain above the pre-pandemic baseline. The report specifically identifies an approximately twofold increase in the average guideway incident rate between 2023 and 2025 compared with 2016 to 2019, with a similar pattern for platform incidents.

Across the full review, 77 incidents (63 per cent) occurred in the guideway, while 45 (37 per cent) occurred on platforms.

The consequences were generally much more serious in the track area. Of the 77 guideway incidents, 36 were fatal (47 per cent) while six (eight per cent) resulted in severe injuries. Another 13 incidents involved major injuries and 10 involved moderate injuries. Nine incidents resulted in minor injuries, and three involved no injuries.

On platforms, 20 incidents resulted in minor injuries, 12 involved no injuries, and two involved injuries classified as insignificant. Seven incidents resulted in moderate injuries, three involved major injuries, and one was fatal.

SkyTrain platform/guideway incidents, 2016-2025. (Technical Safety BC)

The report warns that an incident starting on a platform can also lead to someone falling into the track area, where the potential consequences are more serious.

Most platform incidents appeared to be unintentional. The regulator placed 39 of the 45 cases (87 per cent) in that category, compared with six classified as intentional.

The balance was different in the guideway, where 29 incidents (38 per cent) appeared to be unintentional and 48 were classified as intentional. Nearly 60 per cent of all guideway incidents were associated with suspected suicidal behaviour. About two per cent were described as appearing to involve malicious intent, and those incidents were not fatal.

Technical Safety BC cautions that these assessments of intent have limitations. They rely on observations by SkyTrain staff who witnessed an incident or reviewed available video footage, which cannot always establish whether contact with a train was deliberate.

Unintentional incidents involved circumstances such as people losing their balance, trying to board a departing train, getting a body part or belongings caught, or standing too close to a moving train. The report also identifies unauthorized entry into the track area among the circumstances associated with unintentional contact.

TransLink’s observations suggest that passengers may be unsteady for a range of reasons, including mobility difficulties, neurological disorders, other medical conditions, and intoxication.

Platform screen doors on the REM in Montreal. (Kenneth Chan)

Artistic rendering of the trains and platform screen doors of Toronto’s new Ontario Line. (Metrolinx)

Alongside the public transit authority’s renewed appeal for passengers to take greater care at platforms, TransLink CEO Kevin Quinn says the ongoing feasibility analysis for platform screen doors is centred on improving safety.

“While our systems and procedures are designed to keep people safe, we know these incidents can have devastating impacts on the people involved, their loved ones, our employees and first responders. This work is about continuing to look for every opportunity to reduce those incidents and their impact,” said Quinn.

The public transit authority urges passengers must wait behind the yellow platform line until a train has stopped fully and its doors are open, and let a train depart once its doors begin closing. Using hands, clothing, bags, or other possessions to obstruct the closing doors is strongly discouraged.

Furthermore, anyone who drops an item onto the tracks must stay out of the guideway and ask a SkyTrain attendant for help in retrieving the object.

Passengers are also urged to remain attentive near the platform edge, including avoiding distractions from phones or noise-cancelling headphones.

SkyTrain’s Canada Line, which was not included in Technical Safety BC’s incident analysis, uses a single train model with uniform door spacing. Considering door spacing alone, this would make installing platform screen doors more straightforward than on the Expo and Millennium lines. However, major upgrades are also complicated by how many more of the Canada Line’s stations are underground, long-term capacity expansion considerations, and that it is privately operated, with the contract running until at least 2040.

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