Professional Documents
Culture Documents
of the Technical Committee (TC) to provide you with my personal opinion; it should also be known that my
opinion does not necessarily represent the position of the TC or the Association (NFPA) and may not be
considered to be or relied upon as such. Reprinted with permission from the revision of the 2017 NFPA
130, copyright 2016 national Fire Protection Association. This material has been submitted for the NFPA
Standards development process, it has not yet and may not be incorporated in the next edition of NFPA
130.
TOPICS
Introduction Who am I?
Committee Scope
Description of NFPA 130 and its Background
Enhancements to the 2017 Edition
Plans for the Next Edition
Introduction Who am I?
I am Harold L. Levitt
Chairperson of NFPA 130 Technical Committee 2010 and 2014
Editions, Member of 130 for 16 years.
Manager PATH Capital Projects for Port Authority TransHudson Corporation (PATH) 30 years
Former Director of Safety & Acting Director of Security for the
cancelled Access To The Regions Core (ARC) Project, a joint
venture between the PANYNJ, NJ Transit and the FTA, cancelled
in 2010.
COMMITTEE SCOPE
This Committee shall have primary responsibility for documents
pertaining to fire safety requirements for underground, surface, and
elevated fixed guideway transit and passenger rail systems including
stations, train-ways, emergency ventilation systems, vehicles,
emergency procedures, communications and control systems and for
life safety from fire and fire protection in stations, train-ways, and
vehicles. Stations shall pertain to stations accommodating occupants
of the fixed guideway transit and passenger rail systems and
incidental occupancies in the stations.
2.
List of Applicable Standards and Code editions were updated and some were
removed if no longer applicable or added new ones if required. Updated and/or
clarified some critical definitions.
3.
4.
Added sound level requirements revolving around emergency communications for 1st
Responders.
Some organizations as part of annual refresher for responders, test
their communications equipment in the environment in proximity to fan
intake/discharge portals where high sound levels can prevent needed conversation.
6.
7.
8.
Annex H only contains a portion of the required changes for Fire Scenarios and
Profiles Even though we fell within the parameters of introducing new information
we made some changes that the committee needed time to analyze. This new
language caused a vote for the new changes to be held to the next edition.
For the Next Edition the Committee Should Include But Not Be Limited to
Additional Key Issues as They Present Themselves Throughout the Course of
Development:
There is a Need to Explore additional methods for safe egress from deep
stations;
The Committee will Need to Further Develop Methods for Incorporating onboard fire suppression systems onto vehicles (concept- just 2 examples of
many) another method would be to mount tanks vertically at car ends:
The Committee will Need to Explore additional methods for safe egress from
deep stations: (This is just one Example)
The Committee will Need to Further Develop and Decide how to incorporate
measures into the standard for acoustics by working with 1st Responders to
ensure that directions can be heard:
Fan
Silencers
Typical Fan Installation Can be
vertical or Horizontal (An Example)
WMATA
YOU WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT LAST YEARS INCIDENT
HOWEVER,
I CAN ONLY DISCUSS WHAT HAS BEEN IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
Your Presenter
Harold L. LevittPATH/The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey
e-Mail address - hlevitt@panynj.gov
&
When I retire at the end of September My e-Mail address will be
bigtough50@aol.com
so PLEASE keep in touch.