Boylston Station Collision 11/14/08

[typesix]

3707A rear ended 3630A at about 8:50 am today. No derailment, but force of collision created a coupled 4 car train. Collision occurred at one of the signals before entering Boylston eastbound, on straight section. As of 9:15 am, busing between Arlington and Government. No major injuries currently reported. The plan is to move the 4 car train into Park pit area, with the inspectors as operators, after injured passengers are taken off. A test train will run through the collision area before service resumes.

[Ron Newman]

Boston.com: 'Minor' trolley accident delays Green Line

Two trolleys collided this morning on the Green Line near Boylston Station in a "minor accident," according to an MBTA spokesman.

Three to four people were transported to local hospitals with neck and back pain, said MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo in an e-mail. The collision at 8:45 am. did not damage or derail the trolleys, he said.

A notice posted at 8:55 a.m. on the website of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority said that Green Line service was experiencing 15 to 20 minute delays because of a disabled train near Boylston Station.

[Robert Paniagua]

Hopefully noone got hurt and I see no T8s involved, but I hope that 3707 and 3630 can be saved without retirement, I wonder how badly wrecked they are

[typesix]

The cars from what I heard seem to be OK except for the hard coupling. The cars have been moved to the Park loop for later inspection and a test train went through with no problems. Park loop is sealed off, with a cone at the Boylston switch. Busing was originally from Arlington -Government, then changed to Copley-Government due to backups. Normal service resumed around 10:25 am.

[GP40MC 1116]

Hopefully noone got hurt and I see no T8s involved, but I hope that 3707 and 3630 can be saved without retirement, I wonder how badly wrecked they are

Look Up and read this again...

3707A rear ended 3630A at about 8:50 am today. No derailment, but force of collision created a coupled 4 car train.

[Arborway]

We wanted three car trains on the Green Line, but the T surprised us a and gave us four! We can now cover six BU stations in a single stop!

*rimshot*

[Arborway]

No matter what the cause, this is only going to increase the calls for some kind of ATO on the Green Line. It's annoying that this is the second Boylston collision in the past year, and the the third total (unless I'm forgetting one).

[Ron Newman]

Lots more discussion at http://community.livejournal.com/b0st0n/6338708.html and http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaki ... ley_a.html

[Unfixed ShihTzu]

Someday the MBTA will realize that it can't keep jerking it's customers around like this. Obviously when you're stuck in a tunnel for an hour between Kenmore and Copley as one person commented, it's not because of "minor delays" and you won't "be moving again soon" as the operator put. Answers like that are going to piss people off. If they said something like "there's been a minor collision at Boylston station and we're waiting to offload passengers at Copley/Arlington, we apologize for any inconvenience," I think people would be much more understanding. I would be pissed off too if someone kept bullsh*tting me and it was that obvious they were bullsh*tting me.

[jamesinclair]

We wanted three car trains on the Green Line, but the T surprised us a and gave us four! We can now cover six BU stations in a single stop!

*rimshot*

I was surprised today when I got off at park street, and there were two trains (4 cars) at the inbound track.

The front train was unloading a wheelchair (type 7) so my train decided to pull in anyway. There was a tiny gap between the two trains.

[ags]

It was more like 90-120 minute delays. Horrible if you were caught underground with nowhere to go!

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

The T has absolutely got to get rid of the canned robo-announcements about disabled trains on the station PA system. It's insulting to mention minor delays when the lines are outright shut down. This was a major problem during the Red Line summer from hell with all the tunnel fires. Why can't they have a live person go on the PA and say with just a little more specificity what happened instead of the (bad) computer voice that gives the same message regardless of whether it's a 5-minute delay or a 3-hour delay? That's the one thing I absolutely loathe about the new automated announcement system in the stations. As soon as I heard the generic announcement at 8:55 coming upstairs from the Red Line at Park I just said "screw it" and walked to work from there. I'm getting that conditioned to treat the information given with contempt.

And given all the horrible publicity from the last year about negligent communication from the operators (see Red Line, summer, riders evacuating on the Longfellow after getting stranded) why are they not writing up operators who fail to announce? Honestly now, that is the MOST BASIC PART OF THEIR JOBS in a delay or emergency. And it's completely random whether they do jack squat and completely inconsistent what they say when there's one brave enough to say anything. There's gonna be another lawsuit from this one, and it's the silent treatment from the operator that's going to trigger it. How many times does this have to happen before there's a crackdown and some real standards put in place?

Particularly inept spin job from Pesaturo, too. He's had enough practice this year that he ought to know better.

[sery2831]

Honestly now, that is the MOST BASIC PART OF THEIR JOBS in a delay or emergency. And it's completely random whether they do jack squat and completely inconsistent what they say when there's one brave enough to say anything.

Not to defend what goes on but one thing that creates the lack of announcements on the trains is a lack of information provided to the stuck trains. Most people that work on the trains are not buffs like us. They ignore a majority of the radio chatter only because it doesn't involve them. And honestly it's not there job to monitor the radio constantly, they are charged with moving their vehicle in a safe manor. And when incidents like this happen no time frame about the delay ever comes from the dispatchers. The dispatchers change the plan 3 or 4 times before an action is taken. So the passengers and often the crews are left in the dark for sometime. It's enough time to aggravate the passengers and this is how we end up in this situation of everyone complaining and wanting 'live' delay information.

[StevieC48]

I agree with John on that fact. If you can listen for your self on a scanner and see what happens.

[CSX Conductor]

I wonder if the motorman of the second train's cell phone records have been reviewed yet.