Take a look inside the Metro's operations centre

November was a tough month for the Socit de transportde Montral's Metro network with lines going down multiple times per week, totaling870 minutes of delay for users.

Radio-Canada was afforded a rare look into the STM'soperations centre, where specially trained employees work day and night to ensure safety and coordinate the management of the fourlines.

The location of the site, up and running since 2012, is kept secret for security reasons. Employeesundergo a long process, including background checks andstress tests,which can last up to 18 months.

Whether it's equipment breakdown, emergency interventionor trespassing into a tunnel, the operations centre is responsible for managing outages in real time.

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There are approximately 2,000 cameras and motion detectors in the network.

Marie-ClaudeLonard,executive director of the STM Metro network, describes the operation as the "nerve centre" or "brain" of the STM.

Managing, communicating outages

Lonard says that when it comes to outages, Metro users themselves are responsible for 50 per cent of service stops, most of which are caused by people trespassingin the tunnels, someone getting sick on a train, doors being held open or people falling on the tracks.

In addition, the STM reports that 471 items fell onto the tracks in November alone.

Since 2013, the STM has hired social network managers who work directly at the monitoring centre.

When you contact the STM Twitter account via the Green, Orange, Blue or Yellow lines, you speak directly to a person at the operations centre.

Onwards and upwards

Despite the busy November, the number ofservice outages lasting more than five minutes is down by eight per cent compared to last year.

On average, Lonard saidthere are 1,000 incidents a year that force the Metroservice to stop for a period of five minutes or more.

Currently, 25stations of 68 are connected to the cellular network. The STM hopes to have all stations connected by 2020.