Green Line incident Sunday, July 10

My family was travelling from Oak Grove to BU on Sunday, July 10.
As my wife, sister-in-law and I waited on the inbound platform to board a Green Line train, there was an incident involving a suspicious man and a bag.
Apparently, the man either dropped or threw his bag on the Green Line tracks, just as a Heath St. bound train came into the station.
Another passenger alerted the train driver, who got on his phone, presumably to call the police.
We weren't really sure what was going on, but the man and the train driver were having an argument about the bag. At one point the man got on the train and proceeded to try to get into the drivers area.
The driver finally persuaded the man to leave the train.
Approximately 20 minutes had passed from the time the train pulled into the station and the Transit Police arriving.

Twenty minutes.

Why didn't the police arrive immediately, especially after the London bombings mere days ago?
The MBTA and the Governor have been saying the patrols of the system have been increased, yet there was not one officer at North Station, nor at Downtown Crossing on our way back out of the city.
I've been taking the T every day for sixteen years, pass through major stations such as North Station, Downtown Crossing, and South Station, and not once have I seen an MBTA officer on the platforms.

If there are ten officers in South Station milling about on the concourse, how is that going to deter someone from leaving a bag on a train?
There should be officers on the platforms, as well as in the cars.

MBTA security is a joke.

In the metro this am someone wrote that the T did nothing to warn passengers that the orange line was shut and being bused from oak to Back Bay. He is dead wrong they did do some notifying.

I was on a red line car that rush hour and they said the orange line due to flooding was being buses from Oak to Back Bay. I went to the downtown platform anyway and there was an Inspector on the platform telling people, so that person in the paper is full of it.

mb41 wrote:In the metro this am someone wrote that the T did nothing to warn passengers that the orange line was shut and being bused from oak to Back Bay. He is dead wrong they did do some notifying.

I'll second that, if the writer was talking about Thursday's delays. They were right on the horn about it all. I waited in Haymarket until I heard the announcement (a lot of people stayed on the Orange Line platform though, they weren't listening) and made my way to the Green Line, got off at Copley and walked to Back Bay where I boarded the first Orange Line train to come. My commute was about 10-15 minutes longer than usual, not a bad delay, considering the circumstances.

I was going to write in to the metro but they never publish my letters because they know I'm pro transit. Bastards!!!!

My commute was bad that day. 69>redline>green line>39 from brigham>36 from Forest to home. Yucko!

While the red Line (Braintree-JFK) was a bit screwy too today. Also to add to that, there was some T police action at JFK/UMASS involving five questionable parties on 5 different cars, that train was searched for them.

mb41 wrote:My commute was bad that day. 69>redline>green line>39 from brigham>36 from Forest to home. Yucko!

Too bad you couldn't have done this instead:

69>Red Line to South Station> Needham CR to Hersey or West Roxbury

I can only ride to Forest Hills on the commuter rail, plus is does not run as often as the buses do. I don't agree with riding to Rosy/west on the train anyhow. I feel that train serving Needham is good but it takes business away from the 35/36/37 bus lines.

Sorry, but what do any of your replies have to do with my story, and who changed the subject from "Secure?!" to what it is now?

To the Originator of this topic,

Sometimes it is neccesary to rename a thread to better reflect the posting and it's content, so that's why it was renamed to be more in accordance to the actual events on board the Green Line on 7/10/05.

mb41 wrote:I feel that train serving Needham is good but it takes business away from the 35/36/37 bus lines.

My apologies, I thought this was Railroad.net, not Bus.net. LOL

And another down-side for the Needham line for you may be that it is a farther walk than the bus stop. I just mentioned it as a one time way to try to avoid the delays on the other lines caused by that day's situation.