TTC Delays and Disruptions

[Articulated]

Yeah, I was on the YUS, but south of there. The delay was still present when I left the line at around 11:35 PM. According to Citynews, a man was trapped underneath a train at North York Centre. Here's the news page that I found that out from, it's at the bottom of the page: http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_27082.aspx

Wow, second one in what, a week to survive being underneath a train?? Even more incredible in the fact that it's been reported that the T1s don't have enough clearance... it's either that they were incredibly lucky to both get H5s or is there actually enough clearance for a T1?

[Felix]

Yeah, I was on the YUS, but south of there. The delay was still present when I left the line at around 11:35 PM. According to Citynews, a man was trapped underneath a train at North York Centre.

From what I heard, it was some drunk who fell onto the tracks. He got some severe injuries.

[wil9402]

Man Survives Fall Onto Subway Tracks

Sunday September 21, 2008

CityNews.ca Staff

An Aurora man is lucky to be alive after he fell onto the subway tracks Saturday night.

Officers allege that the 27-year-old was walking right along the edge of the platform at the North York Centre Station, and he may have been intoxicated.

But his balance beam act took a harrowing turn when he slipped and tumbled onto the track. He scrambled to get back to safe ground, but he didn't make it in time.

A train was coming down the rails and he was swept right under it.

Traffic was suspended for about 20 minutes as workers struggled to free the trapped man.

Miraculously, he survived and is expected to recover fully from his injuries. The victim sustained a broken hip and a head laceration.

Traffic Services is investigating.

http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_27083.aspx

[ronaldmcgddonald]

According to TTC.ca, the YUS line is currently shut down between Finch and Sheppard-Yonge. Last updated at 10:07pm.

That's interesting. If the TTC reported on the delay as early as 10:07, but I heard announcements about it after 11:30, then how could Citynews be correct about the 20 minutes under the train? Maybe it's because there was an investigation/inspection afterwards that took more time.

[Buurin]

PAA activated at NB Sheppard around 17:38 today. Toronto EMS was called so it was medical, but I saw a stretcher with only equipments on it near the main turnstiles as I exit the station so I guess it was handled on scene.

[David7800]

According to TFS, there was a fire at Sherbourne station at 9:39 this morning, 7 trucks were dispatched

[Mike]

 

 

According to TFS, there was a fire at Sherbourne station at 9:39 this morning, 7 trucks were dispatched

On the TTC site it said that the Bloor line was down between St. George and Broadview.

[busman]

Anyone know if it was an actual fire? Last time there was a jumper @ Broadview, and on the TFS site it was listed as a fire.

[shambala]

According to TFS, there was a fire at Sherbourne station at 9:39 this morning, 7 trucks were dispatched

7 Trucks!! What was it? The Towering Inferno?

[ttcgeek]

7 Trucks!! What was it? The Towering Inferno?

7 trucks? I know that there would be 2 trucks from the neighbouring Station No. 313 from just down the street on Bloor. It probably was so bad that they needed for trucks from other stations.

[wil9402]

According to TFS, there was a fire at Sherbourne station at 9:39 this morning, 7 trucks were dispatched

I heard about this delay while on the subway at the beginning of 10am. As Mike said, subway wasn't running between Broadview & St. George. I couldn't hear the announcements well, but I swore I hard that the delay was at Kipling, unless that was a different delay (which wasn't on the OneStop screens). A delay (not sure if it was the Sherbourne one) was cleared at about 10:10am but longer than normal waits were to be expected.

[David7800]

7 Trucks!! What was it? The Towering Inferno?

It was actually 6 fire trucks and and 1 district chief. Besides, the site lists all vehicles that have been dispatched, does not necessarily mean that they are all there at the same time, or that they were dispatched and then cancelled.

[Buurin]

Off the TTC site right now: YUS shut down between Lawrence and Bloor.

[Articulated]

Off the TTC site right now: YUS shut down between Lawrence and Bloor.

My radio reports it as 'cable problems', I've heard signal problems as well...

[David7800]

CBC is reporting cable problem and smoke

[wil9402]

The delay on the Yonge-University-Spadina Line between Bloor and Lawrence is still ongoing. Mika at Transit Control mentioned on CityNews that 42+ shuttle buses were running. CP24 reported at about 7pm that Yonge & Bloor is shut down to traffic, only buses are allowed through, due to the amount of pedestrians. Yonge is apperently down to 1 lane each direction between Bloor and Lawrence because of the amount of pedestrians.

You can see some pictures of how Yonge & Bloor looked at about 5:30-6:00pm here. Also, here is CP24's article (with an overhead picture).

[6688]

CP24 has been covering this over the last few hours and this looks just too chaotic. I'm amazed that people aren't heading up the University/Spadina line, and heading back to Yonge via Eglinton, Lawrence, or even Wilson. And if you aren't going north of Lawrence, I'm sure 5 Avenue Rd. would work in a pinch. But then again, I haven't heard any suggestions as to recommended TTC alternates. They tell you to plan an alternative. Other than the subway, some people aren't aware of the alternatives. Would it kill a news station to investigate these alternatives, and report them to the public? Perhaps a new protocol could be looked at for situations like this. In a system this big, delays and outages like this are bound to happen. And it's not pleasant when there are thousands of people all wondering whats going on, and how to get where they are going. We've had a long time to get this right, why haven't they gotten there yet..

[Articulated]

CP24 has been covering this over the last few hours and this looks just too chaotic. I'm amazed that people aren't heading up the University/Spadina line, and heading back to Yonge via Eglinton, Lawrence, or even Wilson. And if you aren't going north of Lawrence, I'm sure 5 Avenue Rd. would work in a pinch. But then again, I haven't heard any suggestions as to recommended TTC alternates. They tell you to plan an alternative. Other than the subway, some people aren't aware of the alternatives. Would it kill a news station to investigate these alternatives, and report them to the public? Perhaps a new protocol could be looked at for situations like this. In a system this big, delays and outages like this are bound to happen. And it's not pleasant when there are thousands of people all wondering whats going on, and how to get where they are going. We've had a long time to get this right, why haven't they gotten there yet..

I see the same situation with VIVA... most people don't think of any alternatives, although YRT is in a better situation with routes running directly on top of VIVA routes. Many people can use routes like 85, 88 and 91 as parallel alternatives to VIVA but none do and crowd onto 1 and 99.

[D. DeLarge]

CP24 has been covering this over the last few hours and this looks just too chaotic. I'm amazed that people aren't heading up the University/Spadina line, and heading back to Yonge via Eglinton, Lawrence, or even Wilson. And if you aren't going north of Lawrence, I'm sure 5 Avenue Rd. would work in a pinch. But then again, I haven't heard any suggestions as to recommended TTC alternates. They tell you to plan an alternative. Other than the subway, some people aren't aware of the alternatives. Would it kill a news station to investigate these alternatives, and report them to the public? Perhaps a new protocol could be looked at for situations like this. In a system this big, delays and outages like this are bound to happen. And it's not pleasant when there are thousands of people all wondering whats going on, and how to get where they are going. We've had a long time to get this right, why haven't they gotten there yet..

I got caught in the mess right around 4:30 when it wasn't too bad. I wanted to go up the Yonge line from Dundas to Bloor but there was one packed train just sitting on the northbound side. I ended up looping around to St. George via the University line and all was well from there for me.

[Articulated]

Transit Toronto is reporting that the Yonge line will not reopen until the start of service tomorrow morning... This must've been a really major incident to close the subway for this long.

In other news, the TTC website is reporting that the Yonge line is affected by two delays: one from Lawrence to Bloor, the other from Bloor to Lawrence.

[CB4Raptors]

CP24 has been covering this over the last few hours and this looks just too chaotic. I'm amazed that people aren't heading up the University/Spadina line, and heading back to Yonge via Eglinton, Lawrence, or even Wilson. And if you aren't going north of Lawrence, I'm sure 5 Avenue Rd. would work in a pinch. But then again, I haven't heard any suggestions as to recommended TTC alternates. They tell you to plan an alternative. Other than the subway, some people aren't aware of the alternatives. Would it kill a news station to investigate these alternatives, and report them to the public? Perhaps a new protocol could be looked at for situations like this. In a system this big, delays and outages like this are bound to happen. And it's not pleasant when there are thousands of people all wondering whats going on, and how to get where they are going. We've had a long time to get this right, why haven't they gotten there yet..

Excellent post and well said. There was a story either on CP24 or on thestar.com where someone at Yonge and Dundas was wondering how he/she was going to get home to Don Mills and Finch. I know taking the Yonge subway up to Finch and taking the 39 Finch East bus is the "popular" way, but someone more aware of the situation would have taken the 505 Dundas streetcar east to Broadview station then the BD subway east to Pape station and riding the 25 Don Mills bus to Finch/Don Mills. Instead, that person is "stuck" having to take the jam-packed shuttle bus, if the person can get on one, up Yonge.

As for CP24 and all news outlets, they thrive on chatoic scenes, like the one at Yonge and Bloor. They love the drama, suspense and anger amongst the TTC passengers. Frankly, I don't think the media want to be the ones suggesting alternative TTC routes to the public in this situation. They would rather leave it up to TTC/police and let them and the passengers figure out the solutions on how to get home themselves.

But in defense of the TTC passengers, most of them had a long day at the office and wanted to get home ASAP. They were probably not in the right frame of mind in coming up with an alternative way in getting home. They want to take the simpliest way (eg. the Yonge subway).

[Buurin]

Damn, cable fell at Eglinton. I thought Lawrence was closed and the entrance(s) at Lawrence were jam-packed. (My work is right on top of Lawrence) Had I known trains are turning back AT LAWRENCE I would have squeezed myself in and took the subway north, instead I went on 124 to Bayview (taking one coworker with me ), then packed myself into a second 11 (barely missed the previous one but jam-packed anyway) which is still on 15-minute headway . School's out at Glendon at 6:20pm so even the Lawrence-bound 124 were packed.

But we are transit fans, we know the routes. There's people like the one above, there's one who pore over the ride guide for an alternate, and there's people waiting to pack themselves into a shuttle bus.

[Neil]

On the positive side the delay meant that the early subway closure north of Lawrence did not occur. Trains were operated over the normal Saturday schedule (with the last trip being 118x southbound from Finch). Vehicles in this part of the line were stored on the main line.

[6688]

Excellent post and well said. There was a story either on CP24 or on thestar.com where someone at Yonge and Dundas was wondering how he/she was going to get home to Don Mills and Finch. I know taking the Yonge subway up to Finch and taking the 39 Finch East bus is the "popular" way, but someone more aware of the situation would have taken the 505 Dundas streetcar east to Broadview station then the BD subway east to Pape station and riding the 25 Don Mills bus to Finch/Don Mills. Instead, that person is "stuck" having to take the jam-packed shuttle bus, if the person can get on one, up Yonge.

Thanks for the compliment

The TTC is actually set up in such a way with an excellent grid system, that you could literally take a dozen different ways to get up there. And that is a major advantage that the TTC has.

As for CP24 and all news outlets, they thrive on chatoic scenes, like the one at Yonge and Bloor. They love the drama, suspense and anger amongst the TTC passengers. Frankly, I don't think the media want to be the ones suggesting alternative TTC routes to the public in this situation. They would rather leave it up to TTC/police and let them and the passengers figure out the solutions on how to get home themselves.

But the problem with media leaving it to the TTC to advise passengers of alternatives, is that the TTC can't even get that part right themselves at the scene of the situation. There is a major communication problem on the TTC side of things. The only time you will hear alternates is when you have Mika, or that other guy on Breakfast Television, or in the late afternoon (3-5PM) After that it seems to go down the hole. I'm sure somebody at one of the local news outlets could take the time to view a system map and advise the public accordingly. I've always wanted to work with Cam Woolley Maybe I should pitch to CP24 that I could be their new "Public Transportation Specialist."

But in defense of the TTC passengers, most of them had a long day at the office and wanted to get home ASAP. They were probably not in the right frame of mind in coming up with an alternative way in getting home. They want to take the simpliest way (eg. the Yonge subway).

And for some passengers, the way they usually take, is the only way they know (eg. Yonge Subway). If I wanted to get home ASAP after a long day of work, it certainly won't involve taking a shuttle bus crammed to the gills. I would be investigating the other ways to get around on the TTC. I just wish the media outlets could be a little more informative in a scenario like this where tensions amongst thousands of people are getting high, and would help to smooth out an already hostile situation. But the bottom line here is, that the TTC needs to get their act together, and come up with ways to communicate alternative routes, and even communicating that there is a problem to begin with...

[TTCNLFBT]

The SRT is currently down due to disabled train. Shuttle buses are running right now.