Night and day, mechanics keep buses and trains tuned up
Largely unseen by the public, Metro Transit’s mechanics play a key role
From the time he was 10 years old, Rick Carey knew he wanted to be a mechanic.
“My ma used to get so mad — I’d take my Christmas presents apart and couldn’t always get them back together,” he remembered, smiling. “I had to learn.”
Today, Carey — a 25-year employee of Metro Transit — is highly skilled at diagnosing and repairing light-rail cars. Like many long-time employees, Carey started out cleaning buses, then fueling them. Trained as a mechanic at a vocational school, he waited patiently at Metro Transit for five years during a downsizing phase until a mechanic’s position opened up. He repaired buses for more than 15 years when, in 2003, the opportunity to train as a rail mechanic came along. Carey jumped aboard.
“I like a challenge,” he said. “It’s really interesting to learn something brand new.” In March, Carey was promoted and will no longer be wielding tools on a daily basis, but will train and supervise other mechanics.
Rail cars are guided into one of eight bays for inspection and repair.
Metro Transit mechanic Laurie Novak measures the pressure in the bus air-conditioning system.
In total, Metro Transit employs about 460 bus and rail mechanics, track maintainers, cleaners, fuelers and their supervisors who collectively work 24/7, 365 days a year to keep Metro Transit’s buses and rail cars clean, fueled and running smoothly.
Technology has evolved
“Thirty years ago, anyone who was slightly mechanically inclined could fix a bus using a few tools,” asserted Lenny Pawelk. He is manager of 80 mechanics, cleaners and helpers working on 227 buses that pull out of Metro Transit’s Heywood facility on the northern edge of downtown Minneapolis every weekday. “Now all the buses are computerized, so you’ve gotta be a pretty good ace.”
The typical mechanic hired today by Metro Transit has a minimum of two years training at a vo-tech school as well as on-the-job experience. Many recent hires are former airline mechanics.
What makes a good mechanic?
A few Metro Transit veterans offer these ideas:
- Ability to see different ways of doing things
- Fearlessness about getting dirty
- Comfort with computers
- Open-minded enough to listen to other people’s ideas
- Self-motivated
- Thorough
- Pride in your work
One of the mechanics who gets lots of praise from colleagues is Laurie Novak, who works the third shift at Heywood. She started as a driver in 1986, and after about 10 years she bid on and landed a job as a mechanic. She is one of only three women currently repairing buses at Metro Transit.
Novak was among the first of the entire agency’s mechanics to pass all four mechanical certification tests, first offered in 2005. Taking the tests is optional, but those who do get a small raise for each passing score.
“I feel a real sense of craft about this work,” Novak said. “I don’t think of myself as artistic, but when it comes to fabricating solutions, I seem to have a creative knack for it.”
Renewed focus on reliability
This year Metro Transit is putting renewed emphasis on reliability in order to further improve its performance for customers, said Rob Milleson, acting director of bus maintenance. One area of focus is communications about bus breakdowns: making sure those buses are worked on immediately and that the repairs are effective.
“Maintenance employees have been instrumental in this effort and have reduced our repeat breakdowns considerably,” Milleson said. Each garage has a monthly goal measured in miles-per-road-call, and reports reflecting their performance are shared daily. So far in 2006, the combined monthly goals for road calls have been met.
“Everything we do needs to lead to increased reliability,” Milleson said.