The T

Hugo Hernandez, 22, is scheduled for arraignment in Boston Municipal Court today on multiple charges of indecent assault and battery on the T, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney's office.

Hernandez was originally arrested late Wednesday at Sullivan Square for an Orange Line incident on Oct. 19, but by the end of yesterday, Transit Police pegged him for three more incidents, the DA's office says. Read more

Channel 5 reports the 18-year-old was hit on the Fitchburg Line near Belmont High School.

Stephanie Seeliger tweets:

On the T from Allston to Park. SO MANY leggings for pants are happening all around me. It's awful.

The day after a panel released a report warning of, among other things, potential derailments on the Red Line, the T issued this alert for Red Line riders:

Attention: November 8th -14th is National Elevator and Escalator Safety week. Please pay careful attention when riding on our elevators and escalators, and please adhere to the safety rules at all times and when riding on an escalator with children, please pay careful attention and promptly step on and off the equipment. At the MBTA, we want you to have a safe enjoyable transportation experience.

Oh, yeah, the alert comes two days after news broke that the family of a woman who died on a T escalator has filed suit.

Fabulously Out There reports she was on the Blue Line this morning when a woman in her car began to collapse onto the floor just past Maverick inbound:

... At which point I dropped my purse, tore the iphone out of my ears and dropped on the ground into the hot tea said girl had just dropped and softened her fall.

All I could think was "don't let her head hit the ground, woman. Don't drop her!” Next thing I know, 80% of people step back and the lady on my other side totally stepped up too.

"Hit the emergency button," she yelled. One dude looked at me and I said "No, seriously dude, hit the button."

And, KUDOS to the MBTA because when we arrived at Aquarium, the MBTA dudes were already walking up to the train. ...

Fabulously, a native of Germany, adds she's thankful for the three days of first-aid training everybody in Germany is required to take before they can get a driver's license.

Anna B. recently moved to Quincy and reports on her experiences to date on the Red Line, including:

... Also, it was hilarious seeing a bunch of passengers reading the Metro article about T safety while we were stuck at North Quincy due to a dead train ahead of us. ...

Meanwhile, at the other end of the Red Line, Bill Yelenak tweets he dodged a bullet this morning:

I took the Red Line to work today from Davis Square and didn't die.

But a consultant says development would be next to impossible without serious work by Boston and Brookline, whose line the yard and adjacent properties, such as the old Circle Cinema, straddle, Wicked Local Brookline reports. One wonders if Brookline would ever approve the 8-to-16-story building next to Fisher Hill the consultants say would be necessary just to break even on the development costs.

From the T web page:

Green E Line is being diverted at Brigham Circle due to a road paving project on Washington St. in Brookline. Please use route#39 bus between Heath Street and Brigham Circle. 11/4/2009 12:34 PM

Memo to T: Huntington Avenue service goes NOWHERE NEAR this project. And if the rationale for terminating at Brigham Circle is a traffic problem delaying the streetcars (which can be easily solved by a couple of police officers), given that the #39 buses are equally affected by this, as per this item subsequently posted on the T web page: Read more

The Globe reports on comments Deval Patrick made this morning on WTKK.

Wicked Local: MBTA seen ignoring most 'safety-critical' projects, likely needs new funding source.

Read the D'Alessandro report.

"Seek alternate transportation to avoid delay," the T advised, citing CSX switch problems in Worcester.

Ben tweets:

first time riding the commuter rail in a year and a half and there is a 50 minute delay. i forgot how much the train sucks. thanks mbta

Dead train at Copley messing things up.

Michael Sesling has been writing about his daily commute on the C line - in poetry. From his latest poem:

and they stared
everyone looked at this seat
and then looked at everyone else
looking at the seat
but not a soul moved toward it
it just stayed
empty

some days an empty seat is like
an injured animal
being circled by hungry vultures
but this day
who knows why nobody made a move
maybe we were all too aware of our own selves

the woman in green sweater
seated in the adjacent seat
surely wondered why
everyone stood around
as she turned
looked
with a momentary stare
before she drifted back into
her shuffled papers

Dan Dunn poses this stumper this morning:

What's long, slow, red, and takes 45 minutes from Alewife to Kendall?

Blame, no, not slippery rails, but that other fave, signal problems.

Finn proposes:

Hi, this is Andre Tippett of the New England Patriots. If you yell on your phone on the MBTA, Wilfork will sit on you.

If you decide you don't really need to bring your laptop, $700 digital camera and Celtics season tickets to work with you, you probably at least want to put them in the trunk, MBTA Transit Police suggest.

Those darn wet leaves: They're wreaking havoc inbound on the Worcester Line this morning, wth delays of up to 30 minutes.

UPDATE: Curse those leaves! Reports are flooding in of delays on several lines.

The MBTA says an anti-groping ad campaign that started last year has resulted in more arrests - and more women coming forward with complaints about gropers:

He was holding a guitar, but in the short time I listened to him at Downtown Crossing, Fester didn't actually play. Instead, he sang "Yesterday" to a karaoke CD.

In the "kids today" department, as I was walking up to the Forest Hills side from the Oak Grove side, these two teen girls in front of me were talking about Halloween, when one blurted out, "I wanna be a WHORE!" You go, girl!

Is there something we need to know about the five people announced this afternoon as board members of the new mega Department of Transportation that will oversee everything that moves in the state starting Monday?

In any case, here they are, along with descriptions supplied by the state: Read more

Broke train at Broadway
Means a lot of rider angst
Just another Friday.