Dead trains on the Red, Green, Needham and Providence/Stoughton lines (so far) made for another interesting commute for many this morning.
UPDATE: "Significant delays" possible on the Fitchburg Line due to signal problems.
The T is alerting inbound riders that there's plenty of Orange Line service at Ruggles, should they wish to get off the train there.
The Globe reports that with 75 commuter-rail coaches already more than two years late, the MBTA is pissed off enough about shoddy construction by the Korean company it hired to build them to think about looking for a new builder.
Kristina Cary reports from an inbound Needham Line train:
We're stopped right after Forest Hills with all power off.
The T estimated a 30-40 minute delay for the 8:30 train she's on. Steve Poftak, also on the train, though, tweets it took 50 minutes to get from Bellevue in West Roxbury to Ruggles.
Riders on the 5:40 train to Fitchburg tweeted their train came to a sudden stop in Cambridge after hitting a car at a crossing there. AsianKerr reported the conductor came on the PA not long after:
Sorry folks, we have struck a vehicle.
After getting the remains of the car out of the way and after the train engineer was interviewed by police, the train started back up around 6:24 p.m.
Kat G. says she was pretty surprised to see graffiti on an inbound train this evening at Walpole.
Commuter-rail lines that share the Northeast Corridor with Amtrak (Providence, Franklin and Needham) are reporting delays thanks to an overhead Amtrak wire that came down somewhere between Forest Hills and downtown.
Sarah M. tweets:
Little kid asks dad why toy train at South Station isn't moving, "because it's just like real life."
MBTA Transit Police report on an incident at 8:15 p.m.:
An Eastbound MBTA Fitchburg Line train struck a trespasser on Track 1 approximately 200 yards east of the Route 2 Bridge in Concord, MA. The person struck was pronounced deceased.
Police report the victim was a white woman, between roughly 18 and 22.
Today's MBTA tales of woe come from the Franklin Line, where "mechanical problems" caused big delays and major crowding:
Suzie Mac, an hour late for work, reports:
Stopped at Norwood Central and train too full to let passengers on! Left them on the platform!
State Rep. Dan Winslow, a regular on the line, adds:
We're crammed on like sardines on Franklin train. Three train routes combined on one @mbtaGM? Why ^ breakdowns?
Norm Vigeant posted a photo of three MBTA locomotives and a commuter-rail coach crossing a causeway at the Wachusett Reservoir in West Boylston on Saturday.
Normally, the T would use the Grand Junction bridge (the train bridge under the BU Bridge) to move cars from its repair facility in Somerville to points south, but the bridge was shut last Wednesday for some emergency repairs, changing what used to be a 7-mile trip into a 108-mile loop by way of Ayer and Worcester.
Dolce the Yorkie. Photo by Transit Police.
MBTA Transit Police report arresting a Henderson, Nev., woman on animal-cruelty charges yesterday after witnesses reported she was pummeling a Yorkshire terrier in the woman's restroom at South Station.
Ana Prado was in town to answer a drug-trafficking charge in Suffolk Superior Court - she's the woman who allegedly left painkillers stuffed inside rubber gloves at the Logan Airport Hyatt when she checked out there on Sept. 14.
According to Transit Police, officers were alerted by a woman who'd just come out of the restroom in the commuter-rail section of the station:
The MBTA tweets about its new ticketing app for North Station commuters:
In less than 3 days we have sold more than $10K in #MBTA mTickets, app downloaded more than 6K times!
You know it's bad, Lee Ann Hooley tweets this morning, when the conductor announces "If you do need to get into town quickly, I suggest you drive."
Hooley and AsianKerr were among the hostages this morning on the Fitchburg Line, where yet another choo-choo went bye-bye, forcing commuters to wait for another train to come up and get hitched to their train for the long, even slower ride into Boston.
AsianKerr was onboard the 6:30 train when she tweeted at 6:50:
Buy, use tickets on your smartphone, if your smartphone is an Android or iPhone. Versons for BlackBerry and South Station lines are planned.
Way late, but the T today took delivery of four new two-level commuter-rail coaches from Hyundai-Rotem at its Boston Engine Terminal in Somerville. According to a report by acting General Manager Jonathan Davis:
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