Passenger Trains > [Monday] Weather disrupts the LIRR again

The NY Daily News has a short piece about extensive delays to the Long Island Rail Road on Monday night.  A line of severe storms knocked out signal systems in the key NYP-Jamaica stretch, a tree fell on the tracks on the Port Washington branch, etc.  The delay was several hours as all service was suspended.  To make things worse, MTA closed access to Penn Station, forcing tens of thousands of prospective riders to wait in the rain.

Several grand standing legislators were interviewed on the late news broadcasts, bemoaning the "fragile" signals which often fail in times of bad weather.


Severe weather

Give these bloviating 'grandstanders' a lightning rod and let them take it the shorts, then the'll have something moan about. 
What was the problem with Penn Station, lack of power, flooding, no trains in or out, they must of had some kind of good reason to keep the masses out.

Lackawanna484 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The NY Daily News has a short piece about
> extensive delays to the Long Island Rail Road on
> Monday night.  A line of severe storms knocked
> out signal systems in the key NYP-Jamaica stretch,
> a tree fell on the tracks on the Port Washington
> branch, etc.  The delay was several hours as all
> service was suspended.  To make things worse, MTA
> closed access to Penn Station, forcing tens of
> thousands of prospective riders to wait in the
> rain.
>
> Several grand standing legislators were
> interviewed on the late news broadcasts, bemoaning
> the "fragile" signals which often fail in times of
> bad weather.
>
>
> Severe weather



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/16 15:10 by SP4360.

MTA and Amtrak police generally close access to NYP when crowds become significant.  That can happen in one of the frequent LIRR signals failures, or in one of the less frequent Amtrak / NJT problems.

The general approach is they don't want crush conditions, so they secure the doors, and limit access from the subways (A C E F and others).

It takes a while to appreciate how many people are processed through NY Penn every five or ten minutes.  The Amtrak and LIRR people managing the dispatch do an amazing job 24/7.

 Lackawanna484, thanks for the info on their procedures.