Red Line Busing

[leighjen.livejournal.com]

Due to a "power problem at Harvard"  the MBTA is busing from Park to Alewife.  

Not looking forward to the commute tonight.

Comments

[aspasia02.livejournal.com]

I don't know how much of a "power problem" that actually is - the entire T stop is evacuated, an alarm is going off like crazy, and pretty much half of the BPD and Cambridge PD seem to be there - ambulances, fire trucks, medic teams, cops, you name it. There's also a helicopter hovering overhead, though it never moved from right above me so I couldn't see what was on the side of it - looked yellow and blue, so I'm guessing it was a news team and not the PD. Tons of activity going on, and *lots* of people milling about, trying to catch cabs and stuff out. The first thing I was going to do when I got back to my office was post about it, actually, to see if someone knew what was up - you beat me to it!

[leighjen.livejournal.com]

I figured there was more to the story. You don't run buses from Park to Alewife for some little something at Harvard. Thanks for filling in the blanks.

[aspasia02.livejournal.com]

My boss just sent me this by email, from somewhere on boston.com:

Traffic Incident
4:24 PM 07/03/07 Transit
MBTA bus transit
Delays for buses: Expect delays and diversions on all bus routes that service the Harvard Square area due to fire department activity at the Harvard Square Station. Allow extra time.

What the heck is going on..?!

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

Wow, it certainly ramped up from when I was there! We got off the train at Harvard, smelled some smoke, and then the alarm started going off as we walked toward the exit. I think our train was probably the last one through.

We continued with our plan to acquire ice cream at Herrell's and walk to Davis/Teele, but when we left the area, there was only one engine and a few cops that I recall.

[hoo.livejournal.com]

They threw us out of Kendall Station at 3:50. Emptied and turned off a train that was sitting there.

[rainbow-spork.livejournal.com]

I must have been on one of the last trains through, and when I got off at Porter at about 3:55, the entire Porter T station was full of smoke. Everyone who'd just gotten off the train to discover this was, of course, rushing to get out the station as quickly as they could. But the weird thing was that there was absolutely no one of any official nature, or even the automated announcement suggesting people leave the station. I think it was even still open. About 20 minutes later, when I was looking out the window at the gym, a fire truck and police car finally showed up.

So does anyone know what actually happened?

[aki.livejournal.com]

Hee hee. That's pretty funny, actually.

[ron_newman]

You may want to consider the Fitchburg commuter rail, which leaves North Station at 5:20, 5:40, 6:20, and 7:35, arriving at Porter Square ten minutes later.

[ron_newman]

in case this continues later into the night: the remaining departures from North Station are at 8:45, 10:40 pm, and 12:10 am.

[aki.livejournal.com]

Don't know when it started up again, but all was normal (at least between Central and Porter) by 9:30 PM.

[littlestarletta.livejournal.com]

I go home to Braintree/Quincy and I was considering commuter rail but stupid charlie linkpass doesn't work on comm rail yet!!! >:O

[ron_newman]

I sometimes commute on that line, so the schedule is up on my office wall as well as in my backpack.

[badseed1980.livejournal.com]

Oy. Glad I walked home from Kendall.

[rufinia.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the heads up!

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

I was there at about 4pm...firefighters were just getting to the entrance by the gate to Harvard Yard, at least three fire trucks aboveground. Alarm going off, though I didn't the chopper, etc., at that point.

Wacky.

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

Yeah, right around that time I was driving into Harvard Square via Broadway, and I was at the weird intersection where you can fork left in order to head into the center of the square, when suddenly there was a Cambridge Police squad car coming behind me. I was first at the light and I almost got forced into a collision with someone coming from the lanes to the left of me who didn't notice that a cop was trying to get through there. Fortunately, I managed to pull forward without incident, but saw the cop plant the car at the bus tunnel entrance and thought, "This had better be really fucking good." I guess that counts. :-/

[rikchik.livejournal.com]

I just biked home from Alewife. Davis is a madhouse - huge mobs of people crossing the street by Johnny D's to get on a bus, traffic backed up in all directions, honking... yuck.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Isn't the MBTA supposed to have some sort of advisories on its website? Cause I just looked and saw diddly-squat about this, but they did have info about other issues.

Boston.com has a headline ("Developing") that claims there's a disabled train at Harvard.

[aspasia02.livejournal.com]

on the front page, or somewhere else? I can't find anything on boston.com about this.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Well, it -was- there right at www.boston.com. But now it's not :\

[leenah.livejournal.com]

there WAS an advisory just a short time ago, but now it's apparently fine.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Huh. I guess I saw it just before it vanished.

[xmasfruitcake.livejournal.com]

http://www1.whdh.com/
look at the video on the main page - to the left.

[swissarmykate.livejournal.com]

I was waiting at the Davis bus stop for a friend to arrive on an outbound train and heard about "smoke somewhere between Harvard and Porter" from some MBTA bus drivers who were re-routing their buses to join the shuttles.

I approached an MBTA staff person and expressed my worry that my friend was maybe on a disabled train and he told me no one was hurt. This was around 4:30 but let us hope he is correct.

My friend is now amongst the throngs of people waiting (I think at Charles/MGH) for bus shuttles to follow the Red Line route outbound.

[swissarmykate.livejournal.com]

UPDATE:
My friend just got off the Red Line - apparently it's running again...

[jennyelfenmass.livejournal.com]

that's good to hear. Thank you!

[jennyelfenmass.livejournal.com]

Makes me suddenly glad I drive...

[mule13.livejournal.com]

yeah, that sucked...one person at Charles/MGH very quietly informing a few people that the trains weren't running and that we had to take shuttle buses...packing shuttle bus in bumper-to-bumper traffic to park, where both sides of the red line platform were packed, followed by 5 minute stops at each of the stops while trying to inform morons that there's no room in the train, no matter how long you stand on the edge of the platform, and to PLEASE STEP AWAY FROM THE TRAIN....all in all, 1.5 hours from MGH to Quincy Center....

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

Damn, I wish I'd checked LJ one more time before leaving work.

I wound up getting on the red line at Downtown Crossing, getting off fifteen minutes later at Park and walking back to Downtown Crossing to take an Orange Line train to a bus to get home.

Had someone at the T, I dunno, mentioned the problem to us audibly during the time we were waiting on the packed train going nowhere, I could have skipped some of the intervening steps.

[sexishorti911.livejournal.com]

it was all caused by a brake problem on a train from porter sq en route to harvard sq. harvard was evacuated as a precaution. there was some smoke, maybe a small fire. no injuries, thankfully.

Bus messed up, too

[bex77]

Hubby was on the last train into Harvard Station from downtown, about 3:50 pm. Said they smelled "burning electrical smoke" as they went up the stairs, and the alarms went off just as they cleared the station at Church Street.

The subway thing messed up the bus, too.

The MBTA was stealing local buses (#69 is mine) to shuttle people so we had no bus service, had to walk home from Harvard to East Cambridge, 40 minutes. At least it was a nice day. Most nights I wouldn't have cared, but I was supposed to help move furniture at 6 pm...was just getting home then! Figures...

[mazeofmemories.livejournal.com]

Ugh it was so fucking retarded.

[anjaliesque.livejournal.com]

Hundreds upon hundreds of people were tossed out of Park Street and packed into Boston Common impatiently waiting for shuttle buses that never came. Finally one showed up, and the crowds almost trampled a disabled man in a wheelchair as they fought to get on. The crammed bus was the slowest ride in my life, taking 45 minutes to get from Park Street to Harvard - where they kicked us all off to get back on the subway anyway.

what really annoyed me...

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

I was at Kendall when they told us to leave the station and that they'd send shuttle buses.

We waited for buses to come, and when they finally did, sometime later (fifteen minutes? who knows?), they suddenly said, "oh, wait, the T's running again," and sent the shuttle buses on their way. Without picking up anybody. So you had a mob scene at the T stop, and this poor girl crushed next to me on the train looked positively ill, and was whimpering, "I should have never moved here. I feel like I'm going to throw up."

I'm so glad she didn't. It was a really uncomfortable and cramped ride back home.