Gov. Larry Hogan visted Washington Tuesday for talks with U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx about safety issues affecting the Washington Metro subway.
Foxx convened a meeting of Hogan, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe and Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser, whose three jurisdictions collaborate in the governance of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority.
Foxx had expressed concern that WMATA has not done a good job in overseeing safety on the subway system.
In January a woman was killed when smoke filled a tunnel near the L'Enfant Plaza station. In 2009, nine people were killed in a crash on the Red Line near the Fort Totten station. The Washington Metro has been the subject of several critical reports by the National Transportation Safety Board, many of them concerning a string of on-the-job deaths of Metro employees.
The governors of Maryland and Virginia and the mayor of the District of Columbia all appoint members of the WMATA board. The board has been at an impasse of the hiring of a new general manager since early this year.
Hogan spokesman Doug Mayer said after the meeting that it had been "very successful."
"They had a very frank and open discussion about the need to address both the financial and safety issues that the Metro system is currently facing and moving forward with a general manager that can efficiently and effectively find the best solutions in these areas," Mayer said.