CHARLOTTE — The Charlotte Area Transit System could use artificial intelligence to track riders who are banned but still try to board the light rail or bus.
It’s one of the latest moves to improve security on Charlotte’s public transit. CATS officials say they’ve also cracked down on fare enforcement since the stabbing death last year of Iryna Zarutska on a Blue Line train.
Channel 9’s Joe Bruno got an inside look at the new methods CATS is using to keep riders safe.
“It’s safe, but I ain’t gonna say it’s safe for everybody,” said Fred, a passenger with CATS. “You know, some crazy people be doing crazy stuff on the bus.”
Officials say they’re doubling down on safety and exploring ways to make the bus and light rail safer. It comes after Zarutska was killed in August, and Kenyon Dobie was stabbed in a separate incident weeks later. Neither of the two men arrested in those cases had bought a ticket, and one of them, Oscar Solarzano, had actually been banned from the system.
Interim CATS CEO Brent Cagle says AI can help identify riders who have paid, and those who shouldn’t be on board.
“We want to understand the limitations, the opportunities and limitations of the technology, and then we want to have that conversation,” Cagle told Bruno.
It starts with boarding. Right now, whether your ticket is checked depends on whether an officer is there to ask for it. Cagle says some people buy tickets but don’t activate them unless they see someone is checking.
“If you use the Blue Line, you’ve witnessed the mass ticket activations that occur when fare inspectors board a train, right, everybody pulls out their phone and starts activating those tickets,” Cagle said.
To combat this, CATS is moving forward with ticket validators. The technology is already in places like Phoenix, Arizona. It requires you to activate your ticket before boarding.
This is where AI comes into play. Through a camera on the platform, AI can detect whether someone properly paid, flashing green for payment or painting you as red if you didn’t.
“Instead of having to go through the whole train to ask everyone on board if they have a ticket, they can really go directly to folks who are suspected to have not had a ticket,” Cagle said.
CATS is also considering using AI to identify whether someone is carrying a weapon. Cagle says right now the technology is good at identifying guns but isn’t able to easily to identify if someone is carrying another weapon like a knife.
Facial recognition is another AI option being explored. CATS has 4500 cameras throughout its system. The technology scans the faces of passengers and alerts security if someone who has been banned comes on board.
But that system has flaws.
“It’s not right 100% of the time. It also, as we understand, it has a higher error rate for communities of color,” Cagle said.
Cagle says CATS is doing analysis over the next 12 to 18 months to see if the technology improves to a point where it makes sense to try it in Charlotte.
There’s already a pilot program with this technology in Kansas City, Missouri. Transit leaders there say it improves response time, cuts security costs and identifies banned riders or missing people.
“Fare enforcement it’s not just about punishing people, it’s making sure that we restore the confidence back in our system,” said Charlotte city Councilmember Dimple Ajmera.
She has been outspoken about the need for fare enforcement since Zarutska’s murder. She says the city needs to be mindful of civil liberties - but she likes the idea of using AI.
“We got to use some sort of technology to help identify folks that have been previously banned for severe, serious safety issues, and technology helps us do that,” Ajmera said.
Two CATS passengers we spoke with, Fred and Jeremy, agree. But they say AI is no substitute for real, human security.
“What is AI gonna do right if it already happened in a moment and y’all just caught it on camera?” Jeremy said.
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