Discussion
Well, today is start by off special. Headed for the northbound train platform (I walk right past the Southbound to get there) and could see the south end of the ION 301 just as it was leaving. Got to northbound platform to find the info boards not working, then spotted the next train heading North … from the southbound platform I’d passed 15 minutes ago.
THEN they announced the service disruption. On the SOUTHbound track, south of where I was trying to go north.
Eventually, she waved all of us to seats, refused the fares, and headed North on King - but then looped around on Bridgeport and dropped us of … at the Southbound ION station that was “out of service”. Where I had started from 20 minutes before.
Drivers understanding was the diversion was going to be trains running North on the Southbound rail - then her bus was replacing the Southbound train.
Except the next train showed up … from the North, heading Southbound.
Train pulls up, and starts announcing “out of service, do not board” and the auto announcer is directing people to check the map for the nearest bus stop. Driver gets out and starts explaining that he’s not going “onward” from here.
Luckily we’re Canadians, it’s early, not TOO cold out and nobody has had enough coffee to be upset, we’re all just baffled.
At this point, a couple of transit cops have materialized somehow, and the turned-around shuttle bus we just left is still there.
Anyway. This tiny little woman who looked like she should be somewhere making breakfast for grandkids hopped off the bus she was driving and talked to the train driver and security. Whatever was going on had JUST happened, and the driver was the first to get the directives straight. The train operator had literally been told as he was on the southbound track that he was to go no further than the stop we were now at, but not why or what to do instead.
Our bus driver, bless her, fixed it.
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Confused? Yes me too. Still standing on the Northbound track, watching the Nothbound train going North on the SOUTHBound track, I notice the 301R rolling up on the parallel street in the Northbound direction, so I ran for it.
Driver refused my fare and said she was turning around to … south. But by this point there were about 10 confused passengers all trying to get 2 or 3 stations NORTH of here. Driver was on the comms though, trying to figure it out.