More MARTA Escalators Offline Than Last Week

By Jim Burress

Atlanta, GA – The majority of MARTA's escalators remained down Friday afternoon, more than a week after MARTA shut them down to due safety concerns. In fact, even more are now out of service than were down last week. WABE's Jim Burress reports.

Late last Thursday MARTA took 100 of its 149 escalators out of service. The move came after a whistleblower indicated a contractor had intentionally bypassed safety mechanisms at at least one MARTA station.

Today, even fewer just 25-are in operation.

MARTA spokesman Lyle Harris says that's because each escalator has to be inspected twice.

"We are leaving no stone unturned. We have hired an escalator inspector to go over every piece of equipment in the system, but then we're actually having our people go back and double-check to make sure everything's alright."

Harris said more escalators are expected to come online even by the end of today.

So far, criminal charges have not been filed against the contractor who MARTA says breached the safety system.

Jim Burress, WABE News.