Comet V

The Comet V railcar is the fifth generation of the Comet railcar series, produced by the manufacturer Alstom, and a rather different car compared with previous models in the series. It has been in use by the New York metropolitan area commuter rail operators New Jersey Transit and Metro-North since April 2002. The main design is similar to its predecessors starting with the Comet III: each trailer car has six doors and the cab cars have five, and the doors at the ends are single-leaf with trap doors for low-level boarding while those in the middle are double-leaf but only open at high platform stations. The cars are 85 feet long over the couplers and their width adheres to the standard loading gauge of 10.5 feet. A unique feature of the cab cars is the lack of steps and a trapdoor at the vestibule door opposite the engineer's operating position, so they can only be used for high-platform boarding. The interiors have redesigned seats, larger windows, LED digital information displays and slightly more seating, with a stainless-steel exterior and roof-mounted air conditioning units. The Comet V was the inspiration for the Bombardier MultiLevel Coach, and one prominent problem has been failures in its door-opening mechanism.