Peter Maranci reports that not only did he get into Ruggles 35 minutes late - because the train ahead of his died and had to be pushed off the tracks (and then shot?) - but then he and other commuters had to rely on the kindness of a conductor just to get out:

... [B]oth of the doors on the side that I was on were stuck (no conductors around, of course!). We all turned and ran for other doors, but the train was moving by the time we got to them. Finally a conductor stopped the train, and we got off. But the doors now opened on the closed part of the platform, the part that has been crumbling for years. We stepped out onto a thick sheet of unsanded ice. We all made it across the ice and around the "CLOSED" barrier safely ...

Charlie on the Commuter Rail notes that the issue of commuter-rail conductors not announcing where their trains are going at Ruggles grows only worse:

They often don't bother to announce the destination of the train, and sometimes they don't even step out on the platform! Since the trains have been more and more erratic, time-wise (they can vary from the schedule by five minutes or more) this is particularly worrisome. Often passengers have to go into a train and ask the passengers inside where the train is going.

Also, there was a car on the Franklin Line last night that smelled like sewage.

You may recall how the initial "let's mess with commuters' heads and not announce destinations at stations like Ruggles" thing started during the secret work action, which is supposed to be over, but, you know, conductors just wanna have fun.

Meanwhile, Train Stopping shows that what we have on commuter rail is a failure to communicate: In response to a commuter complaining about inaccurate delay info on mbta.com, a customer-service manager at MBCR (which actually runs the trains), replied:

We provide the MBTA with the delay information but we cannot access their website to post delay information; that falls under their purview.

Allegedly the MBTA is working on a fix, but has provide no completion date.

Charlie on the Commuter Rail describes what one might think is a scene from a third-world railroad station at Ruggles the other night, except that's probably an insult to third-world railroad stations:

... Nothing came in when or where it was supposed to. The Needham Heights train that shows up at Ruggles at 4:13 PM...didn't. Trains came at the wrong time, half an hour late or more.

And in every single case the conductors didn't bother to announce what the train was.

Jeremy Thomas, 18, and Jonathan Thomas, 20, face charges that they shot a guy twice (well, that one of them shot the guy repeatedly but only managed to hit him twice) as their Orange Line train opened its doors at Ruggles station on June 28. Roxbury District Court Judge Edward Redd today ordered the brothers held on $200,000 cash bail, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney's office.

SuperMark wonders about what he saw around 10 p.m. Saturday:

... i'm pretty sure someone got stabbed, but was hoping for an actual story. All I know for sure is that some guy was covered in blood, the EMTs were joking with him, there were no trains stopping at Ruggles, and the cops were questioning a group of kids on a bus. ...