The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness
Gridlock

Crowds, delays at Ft. Totten after train breaks down on last day of Red Line surge

By
November 22, 2016 at 7:12 p.m. EST
Dense crowds amassed Tuesday night outside Fort Totten Metro station after a train broke down on the Red Line. Photo: Vernon Miles (@VernonAndOn)

Dense crowds amassed outside Ft. Totten Metro station Tuesday evening after a train broke down on the Red Line on the last day of SafeTrack surge #10.

Metro had warned of anemic service resulting from the surge, which shut down service from NoMa to Ft. Totten. But a breakdown on the line at the height of the rush hour, about 6:10 p.m., proved too much for the system to handle.

Get the full experience.Choose your plan

“Because of the amount of time it took for that train to get taken care of, crowds did get huge, but transit police and rail personnel were on the scene,” Metro spokesman Ron Holzer said.

Metro said the issue was a brake problem on the train, which riders reported to be a 7000-series model, the newest in the system’s fleet.

The breakdown resulted in massive delays. Talia Cadet, 27, began her commute from Union Station about 5:20 on Tuesday. SafeTrack had already thrown a wrench in her commute, forcing her to transfer at Gallery Place and ride the Green or Yellow line to Ft. Totten.

When she arrived, she said, the platform was swarmed. And a train didn’t arrive for 35 minutes. So she and hordes of other riders decided to take a shuttle bus.

“It’s really cold out here,” she said. “And the chaos…it’s kind of like the Hunger Games trying to get on a bus.”

Riders reported massive lines for shuttle buses; some opted to take Uber instead of fighting the crowds.

Cadet said SafeTrack had been manageable other than Tuesday and one other day she could remember.

“Yeah, I thought they would end the surge on a good note but they didn’t,” she said.

This post has been updated.

Loading...