(The White Plains Journal News posted the following article by Greg Clary on its website on May 14.)
NANUET, N.Y. — NJ Transit rail commuters got their normal ride home last night, but still wanted answers about signal problems Wednesday evening that created up to two-hour delays and left many passengers wondering what was happening.
“That was a fiasco,” said New City resident Orrin Getz, a regular rider on the Pascack Valley line that runs between Hoboken and Spring Valley. “They didn’t tell anybody what was going on. There were no announcements. If there’s a problem, at least we should know what’s happening.”
NJ Transit officials said yesterday the service delays occurred after lightning from an afternoon thunderstorm hit a control box near the Bergen Tunnel, knocking out automatic signaling and track changes for 98 trains.
“Due to the loss of a major train-control system, we lost the ability to control the trains automatically,” said Janet Hines, a spokeswoman for NJ Transit. “Everything had to be done manually, including moving the switches.”
Hines said the delays lasted until about 9:30 p.m. and no other automatic service could be used without first fixing the circuits.
Monte Morgan of Emerson, N.J., is a regular on the local Pascack Valley line though last night he wasn’t sure if he might have to take the express to Pearl River and get back home on his own.
“They made an announcement that they turned everything to a local,” Morgan said. “Then I got onto the express and asked the conductor, who said it was still the express.”
Morgan said that after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the railroad should have come up with “a bullet-proof plan” and could have used last summer’s seven-state blackout as a good test for emergency preparedness.
“This was a little better than the blackout, but not much,” Morgan said. “Conductors were yelling over the intercoms to get the trains moving.”
Morgan and Getz estimated that they got home 90 minutes later than they normally would have.
Hines said the railroad doesn’t have an emergency manual, but follows a set of procedures in the event of a shutdown or other interruption.
She said those steps were followed Wednesday evening, including deploying staff with bullhorns to announce schedule changes and direct passengers; contacting radio stations and other media to spread the news; and speaking directly with 40 train crews to pass information to those people already on trains.
Randy Glucksman, a West Nyack resident who lost only about 50 minutes to the interruption, said passengers had to wait quite a while until they heard from customer service representatives on the platform in Secaucus.
Hines acknowledged that new variable message signs that give schedule information at the Secaucus Transfer Junction were giving out incorrect updates, saying all trains were still on schedule.
She said the railroad was still trying to figure out why the electronic signs malfunctioned and how to prevent it in the future.
Rail company representatives put notices on train seats yesterday afternoon detailing what happened the previous day, to help customers understand why they were held up.
For some, the information comes a day late.
“I do not understand why NJ Transit has still not improved its communications to its customers,” Getz said, “and why the management is still so inept in being able to handle a major problem at one of its terminal facilities.”