Metro Line 7 GoA4 Automated Operation
🤖 AI-generated summary of the sources below · 🔎 Last verified
This overview was generated with AI from the public sources listed below and checked against them before publication. It has not had a complete human fact-check — treat it as a starting point and follow the sources.
Line 7 is the first Nanjing metro line designed to GoA4, the highest automation grade: trains wake themselves, leave the depot, run the line, berth, open and close doors and return to sleep on a timetable. It opened in three sections — north on 28 December 2022, south on 28 December 2023, centre on 28 December 2024 — completing a 35.49 km, 27-station line. CRRC Puzhen built 53 six-car sets with SIL4 signalling, obstacle and derailment detection and active smoke detection. There is no enclosed driver's cab; a console at the front sits in the open, visible to passengers.
📊 Impact
The north section alone averaged 50,200 riders a day by the end of 2023; with the south section open, the line set a single-day record of 153,000 on 3 April 2024. Completing it took the Nanjing network from about 473 km and 226 stations to about 484 km and 234 stations across 13 lines.
🎓 Lesson
Read the operator's grammar. Every Nanjing and Jiangsu announcement says the trains 具备无须配置司机的能力 — have the capability to be run without a driver — which is a statement about the design, not about who is aboard. Pre-opening reports said plainly that a driver would still ride and watch the console, and no accessible source names a date on which staff stopped riding. A GoA4 line is a purchase; unattended operation is a decision taken later, if at all.
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📎 Cite this project
1001 Smart Cities (2026). “Metro Line 7 GoA4 Automated Operation” — Nanjing, China. The Smart City Atlas. https://1001smartcities.org/projects/nanjing-metro-line7-driverless/ (last verified 2026-08-06). Data: CC BY 4.0.
The underlying data is free to reuse with attribution — see the open data page.