A safe journey?

In the last five years those in charge of public transport have been struck with a difficult conundrum: how do you protect the travelling public from terrorist attacks?

The 11 September 2001 attacks on the US brought about increased security at airports. But the bombings on four Madrid commuter trains in March 2004 in which 192 people died and last year's 7 July bombings on the London Underground and a city bus, which killed 52 people, have increased the focus on public security on the broader transport network. The deaths of more than 200 people after seven commuter trains were bombed in Mumbai, India, earlier this month have further shown the vulnerability of public transport.

The debate will forever be dominated by the need to balance protection of the travelling public with their right to travel freely. But there is one thing most agree on: there is no way the security risk to public transport can be eliminated completely. "If you are operating an open network, such as the Tube or mainline stations, what you are aiming to do is to try to cut down the risks as much as you possibly can. Through intelligence, through conventional policing, specialist policing, measures we impose on operators and so on," the then UK transport secretary Alistair Darling said after the London bombings.

"What you cannot do is seal off the system from attacks completely - short of shutting the system down," he added.

The Association of Public Transport (UITP), which represents operators, government authorities and research and academic institutions, agrees. "You cannot treat security in public transport the way you treat aviation," says Andrea Söhnchen, manager of the association's security commission. "You cannot screen people in the same way and there are no seat assignments."

On the prevention side there are a number of things that can be done to reduce the risk. First, the way train stations, especially underground lines, are designed is important. Clean, open spaces, where it is difficult to hide items, and broader corridors is one way of making it harder to plant bombs. New stations in London and Paris have done this but the problem is with older systems. "The biggest transport systems in the world are the older ones and changing them takes time and money," says Söhnchen.

Surveillance cameras are another way of checking for unusual behaviour or suspect objects. Technology is beginning to respond to the need with new cameras introduced which are capable of detecting suspicious behaviour.

Third, people at transport stations - and not just security staff - can play an important role. In Japan, for example, flower and newspaper sellers are trained to deal with security situations - not necessarily to intervene but whom to contact if a problem emerges. Cultural sensitivities surround the issue of involving passengers in this process, especially about announcements on remaining vigilant and keeping a look out for suspicious items. "Normally this works in the UK and US but in France people do not like this," says Söhnchen.

For transport and security staff changing their pattern of when and where they patrol, increasing their numbers and deploying sniffer dogs is a way many countries also deal with risk.

A large part of the thinking on security risks to public transport, however, is devoted to responding to attacks when they arise. This means drawing up contingency plans involving transport, security, health officials and the media on how to deal with attacks and get information out to the public.

Although it is mostly the remit of national and regional governments to deal with this issue, the global exchange of ideas among those involved in public transport is vital. The UITP and the European Commission organise seminars and are involved in joint studies on security and public transport. The Commission has brought out a Green Paper on the protection of critical infrastructure, which involves public transport, and in the autumn will release a policy paper setting down where changes are needed.

But in the meantime Söhnchen stresses the need to pay attention to the response to attacks as much as preventing them. "It's not the transport that's being targeted in an attack, it's the people...it's not enough just to concentrate on protection but also on the speed of a co-ordinated response."

In the last five years those in charge of public transport have been struck with a difficult conundrum: how do you protect the travelling public from terrorist attacks?