In an effort to equip more urban train platforms with automatic sliding gates to prevent people from falling onto the tracks, the transport ministry will request funds in the fiscal 2002 budget to conduct a survey on the matter, ministry officials said Tuesday.

There are two types of platform fences: Those that just have openings without any gates and those that have automatic sliding gates coinciding with the location of a train's doors, according to ministry officials. The ministry hopes to encourage railways to install the latter, which are believed to be safer.

Several hurdles will need to be overcome before the gates become a common fixture at stations, officials said, citing such problems as the lack of space on some platforms to set up the gates, the possibility of trains being delayed as conductors take more time to confirm that all passengers are on the train, and the flow of people being blocked by the gates.