Last Thursday was a long day at work and then I came upon a disaster in Union Station. As I walked to the southbound tracks, which my line is out of, I came upon a mass mob of commuters, all standing still. Some were even walking the other direction out of the station. First thought This can't be good. And it wasn't. Union station is one of three Metra stations that brings in commuters from the subburbs. The southbound tracks facilitate three lines, the Southwest Service to Orland Park (my line), the Heritage Corridor to Joliet, and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (my old line). Now BNSF is the big dog of the southbound tracks. They head west to Aurora and probably bring close to 100,000+ commuters a day back and forth to work. The Heritage Corridor and Southwest Service are smaller lines, don't run as often, and only take up one track each. Oh, and there are probably four dedicated tracks to Amtrak on the southbound tracks too.
So yesterday an engine taking commuters out on the BNSF broke down just after leaving its track, but not yet out of the station. It died on a major switching area and led Metra to a predicament of not being able to bring in or let out any other trains until they got that one off the tracks. Here is a synopsis of the situation according to Metra left on train seats this afternoon.
As most of you are acutely aware, there was a major train service failure at the peak of last evening's rush our. It all started when Train No. 1247, scheduled to leave Union Station with 9 cars at 4:28 PM, had a sudden engine failure as it was part way out of the station. Unfortunately, the train stalled at the worst spot and the worst time possible since it blocked most of the station tracks. This mean that trains could not leave nor could empty trains arrive from the storage yard.
Then, the computer that controls the track switches at the south side of Union Station overloaded, requiring operators to manually set switch controls from the dispatch center. After assessing the extent of the failure, a spare engine was sent from the yard to drag the disabled train of the way. But the damage had been done.
We sincerely apologize, and we have thoroughly reviewed the events of last night with a critical eye towards avoiding similar problems in the future
Metra
While this note is welcoming to read as I got on the train this afternoon, there are some critical things Metra could have done yesterday to avoid some of the mess I ran into.
First, they needed to have someone with a bullhorn up on the second level telling commuters what was going on. They had a person on the track level, but this did the commuters upstairs no good for knowledge of what was going on. All you heard were mumblings of BNSF this, broken train that, etc. Second, they needed to explain that this was an entire problem for the southbound tracks. After hearing this was a BNSF problem, I quickly had to decide about my situation as I was on a different line. I had to figure out how to 1) get downstairs through this mob, who didn't care if I was on a different line than theirs, and 2) figure it out quick because my train was scheduled to leave in five minutes and the next train was an hour and fifteen minutes later. I quickly determined that I could head to the northbound tracks and cut down a hallway that leads to my track, I just hoped the mob of BNSF commuters were not in my way. Luckily I was able to do just that, warning and taking others I recognized that took my line to follow me. As I got to the track it was evident that my train was not there, nor leaving on time.
Third thing Metra needed to do a proof read on the apology note. I have always liked the Metra apologizes in the past. They are informative, yet not corporate speak. You can tell they were written by a human, not a PR department. But the damage was done. A great line. This meant that trains could not leave nor could empty trains arrive from the storage yard. Not so great of a sentence. I know what they meant, but it just is ugly to read three times before you get it.
Overall, I have been pleased with Metra. They hit a few snags along the way when they do upgrades to systems, but what system doesn't go through snags. Even the Chicago Tribune fell victim to a snag two weeks ago with a system upgrade over a weekend. They almost didn't have a printed paper for that Monday edition. Last time the Trib didn't run an edition was the Chicago Fire back in the day. Now that's consistency.
One customer service tool Metra could use is an email notification system if a problem occurs early enough in the rush hour period (or before) that commuters will know what is up before they get to the station. If yesterday's problem happened at 4:30, I don't leave the office until 5:00, like many commuters. So if I got an e-mail shortly before I left stating that trains will at least be delayed, I would have been a happier camper, and I'm sure all the commuters on the BNSF would have been too!
