Trolleys collide at Boylston; at least six to hospital

Maybe they could train that useless yellow sandwich sniffer that barks incessantly to sniff out bad switches?

Would probably save more lives.

yeah Comcast leases tunnel space to run conduit to provide service. Cheaper than digging up streets to pull new cable.

But WHY a crash is effecting cable tv service.. outside of a a wire being torn down, can't really think of any other reason.

Whether there's service running through Boylston station, on the inner tracks, or whether southside service short-turns at Arlington and northside service short-turns at Park Street.

The helicopters are private and leased by TV stations which get their funding from selling Ads. Not like WHDH can't decide between leasing a helicopter or funding a green line switch replacement project. If you don't think the helicopters are worth the money, don't buy the products advertised.

The real disappointment is to think how much money the MBTA/Government will spend on the emergency services, the lawsuits, replacement part, etc and think about how that money could have been spent upgrading antique equipment which caused the problem in the first place.

Yeah, it strikes me as odd that a train would slam full-speed at that station unless the driver wasn't paying attention. Texting, perhaps? We'll just have to wait and see.

Perhaps someday we'll have a Green Line where a distracted driver cannot cause the collision of two trains carrying hundreds of riders; where passengers standing out in 20° winter cold will know how many minutes till the next train comes; where it doesn't take 45 minutes to go five miles.

Perhaps someday.

driver negligence. However, that driver negligence may have been prompted by a long-standing management policy regarding signal operation.

The Green Line has several locations where block signals are permanently set at red, even if the track ahead is clear and the operator can see the track is clear. In fact, the train that Adien Quinn hit while texting was stopped waiting for just such a signal to clear - note that the signal in question had been changed to absolute stop about a month prior to the Quinn crash (perhaps because of the texting evidence, the NTSB did not conduct a detailed review of Green Line signal practices as part of their investigation).

At such locations, it is not uncommon for many operators to blow through those signals at speed. I see this happen at least a few times a week. In fact, I really noted this behavior one morning in February 2012, when our operator (westbound E car) had blown through every red signal between North Station and Park Street, and was about to blow through the red signal outside of Bolyston (location of the latest crash), when he stopped because he saw a train on the platform at the last minute.

I noted the car number, time of morning, destination of train, and the operator's badge number, and submitted a complaint to "Write to the Top". Immediately got the "robo e-mail" acknowledging receipt - along with a case number. When I contacted the MBTA about a month later to inquire about the status of my complaint (prompted by witnessing another close call), I was told they had no record of my complaint.

While the last signal protecting the Boylston outbound platform is not set up as "absolute stop", I believe it is not unreasonable that some operators might disregard signals as a matter of course. And the Boylston signal has another feature - it's located right at a switch with a switch position light that's green. At a quick glance, one could easily mistake the switch light for the block signal especially if they're tired or otherwise distracted.