A high-tech 'Keep Out'. Wayward SUV no match for security at MBTA tunnel

[Ian David]

By Megan Tench, Globe Staff | April 14, 2007

It was a little after 10 p.m. Thursday when the late model Jeep Cherokee burst through the yellow gate marking the bus entrance of the Silver Line portal in South Boston.

And then it happened.

The ground in front of the wayward SUV started to rise, and a metal barricade was suddenly blocking passage through the tunnel, protecting the portal, which allows buses to enter and exit South Station.

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"Theoretically the car could go all the way to the South Station underground," said Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority general manager Daniel A. Grabauskas. "But the metal plate in the floor lifts itself up as a wall before anything gets through there. The folks that designed it said you could drive a tank at 40 miles per hour" and not be able to break through the barrier.

When the SUV arrived at the yellow gate, the system immediately recognized it as an unauthorized vehicle, Grabauskas said. And when it entered the tunnel, which is 1.1 miles long, Grabauskas said, alarms alerted the transit police.

More:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/04/14/a_high_tech_keep_out/?rss_id=Boston+Globe+--+City%2FRegion+News


See also:

Driver trapped in lockdown after security breach on the Silver Line

BOSTON -- A driver was stopped in their tracks after it bypassed MBTA security on Thursday night.

"I don't know," Dan Grabauskas, General Manager of the MBTA, said. "Maybe the person was lost. Maybe they had too much to drink. Obviously they weren't completely doing what they should be doing.

The driver of the car broke through a security arm in front of the Silver Line tunnel at the World Trade Center MBTA station, but luckily there was a second line of defense. Metal plates that come up from the ground, acting like a wall, are deployed when any vehicle other than the Silver Line buses enter the tunnel. The plates are essential because the tunnel empties into South Station.

"Presumably, if a terrorist is coming down there in a van loaded with explosives, if it works and it stops it, that would be very nice," Jim Craver, Silver Line passenger, said.



More:
http://www1.whdh.com/news/articles/local/BO48997/

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