§ 673.27 - Safety Assurance.

§ 673.27 Safety Assurance.

(a) Safety Assurance process. A transit agency must develop and implement a Safety Assurance process, consistent with this subpart. A rail fixed guideway public transportation system, and a recipient or subrecipient of Federal financial assistance under 49 U.S.C. chapter 53 that operates more than one hundred vehicles in peak revenue service, must include in its Safety Assurance process each of the requirements in paragraphs (b), (c), and (d) of this section. A small public transportation provider only must include in its Safety Assurance process the requirements in paragraphs (b) and (d) of this section.

(b) Safety performance monitoring and measurement. A transit agency must establish activities to:

(1) Monitor its system for compliance with, and sufficiency of, the transit agency's procedures for operations and maintenance;

(2) Monitor its operations to identify any safety risk mitigations that may be ineffective, inappropriate, or were not implemented as intended. For large urbanized area providers, these activities must address the role of the transit agency's Safety Committee;

(3) Conduct investigations of safety events to identify causal factors; and

(4) Monitor information reported through any internal safety reporting programs.

(c) Management of change.

(1) A transit agency must establish a process for identifying and assessing changes that may introduce new hazards or impact the transit agency's safety performance.

(2) If a transit agency determines that a change may impact its safety performance, then the transit agency must evaluate the proposed change through its Safety Risk Management process.

(d) Continuous improvement.

(1) A transit agency must establish a process to assess its safety performance annually.

(i) This process must include the identification of deficiencies in the transit agency's SMS and deficiencies in the transit agency's performance against safety performance targets required in § 673.11(a)(3).

(ii) For large urbanized area providers, this process must also address the role of the transit agency's Safety Committee, and include the identification of deficiencies in the transit agency's performance against annual safety performance targets set by the Safety Committee under § 673.19(d)(2) for the safety risk reduction program required in § 673.11(a)(7).

(iii) Rail transit agencies must also address any specific internal safety review requirements established by their State Safety Oversight Agency.

(2) A large urbanized area provider must monitor safety performance against annual safety performance targets set by the Safety Committee under § 673.19(d)(2) for the safety risk reduction program in § 673.11(a)(7).

(3) A large urbanized area provider that does not meet an established annual safety performance target set by the Safety Committee under § 673.19(d)(2) for the safety risk reduction program in § 673.11(a)(7) must:

(i) Assess associated safety risk, using the methods or processes established under § 673.25(c);

(ii) Mitigate associated safety risk based on the results of a safety risk assessment using the methods or processes established under § 673.25(d). The transit agency must include these mitigations in the plan described at § 673.27(d)(4) and in the Agency Safety Plan as described in § 673.25(d)(5); and

(iii) Allocate its safety set-aside in the following fiscal year to safety-related projects eligible under 49 U.S.C. 5307 that are reasonably likely to assist the transit agency in meeting the safety performance target in the future.

(4) A transit agency must develop and carry out, under the direction of the Accountable Executive, a plan to address any deficiencies identified through the safety performance assessment as described in this section.