(The following story by Kieran Nicholson appeared on The Denver Post website on December 13.)
DENVER, Colo. — Crews continue to clean up the mess created when a Union Pacific train derailed Tuesday, spilling coal onto RTD tracks and causing a light-rail train to also derail. “It’s going well,” Regional Transportation District spokeswoman Daria Serna said of the cleanup. “Certainly, we want to get it back up and running as soon as possible.”
The line is closed south of the Oxford station and affects two stops: Littleton Downtown and Littleton Mineral. It is still uncertain when that portion of the line — which carries C and D trains — will reopen, Serna said.
Commuters can still park at the lots of the out-of-service stations and catch a bus to Oxford station.
More than 20 coal cars derailed in the accident along the South Santa Fe Drive corridor, each of them carrying more than 100 tons of coal.
Wednesday, RTD was putting light-rail cars back on the tracks. UP will repair both sets of tracks. RTD officials and investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board will have to assess the damage caused to the light-rail tracks and then fix any problems.