Metro News Release

For immediate release: June 10, 2005

Metro holds elocution training in an effort to improve station announcements

Metro riders will soon be able to hear announcements in stations and on trains more clearly.

Some Metro employees, who make station and train announcements are learning how to improve the sound, wording and overall quality of their announcements. The transit agency has turned to former New York and Washington, D.C., television and radio anchor Doris McMillon, who is passing on her expertise of communicating with the public.

McMillon has been teaching 20 Metro employees the tips that professional broadcasters use in an effort to improve the pronunciation, tone, pace, volume and language of announcements made on trains and in stations.

Improving station announcements is part of the ’Back to Basics’ initiatives announced by Metro officials in November to improve customer service, reliability, safety and cleanliness. Station announcements prerecorded by a Metro employee who was a former radio announcer, began playing in stations in December.

Recently, employees have been attending two-day workshops. Some work in the operations control center who make system announcements on train delays and escalator and elevator outages. Others are train operator trainers who will incorporate their elocution lessons into their programs.

"Elocution training is one of the things we can do to improve announcements, but employees making them still face the challenge of using an old and technologically outdated PA system," said Leona Agouridis, assistant general manager of customer communications.

Metro’s public address system in some stations is nearly 30 years old. Transit agency officials are planning to replace the outdated technology with state-of-the-art equipment and additional speakers will be installed closer to the riders to improve the sound quality.

News release issued on June 10, 2005.