News Archives - Page: 3

This morning, at 2:15 AM, a PATCO train caught on fire while in the City Hall, Camden Subway Station.  Smoke filled the station due to a fire in the undercarriage of the car due to a mechanical malfunction.  There was serious track damage too.

For more details, click the link for ABC6's news story about the incident.

To Cast your vote!

http://forums.philadelphiatransitvehicles.info/topic/7272271/1/#new

Citing safety issues, SEPTA announced that the first two seats of each train of Silverliner Vs will be roped off from passengers, sparking a debate as to why SEPTA suddenly came out with this policy. Despite this new rule, riders will still be able to get a good view from the 2nd or 3rd row of seats, and the rear railfan window will still be open.

Read details in this article: http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20110303_SEPTA__passengers__group_spar_over_seating_on_new_cars.html

This morning, at around 7:30, a Manayunk/Norristown Line train pulled down a half a mile of wire, shutting down service for hours Thursday morning.  Even when service was restored, a very limited PM rush schedule was operated, with service running every two hours on one track.  SEPTA officials blame this incident on the fact that the wires date back to the good old Reading Railroad days, from 1931!

The schedule for Friday's morning rush hour will be limited as well, with a number of trains cancelled or cut back to Miquon.  SEPTA boosted service on the Norristown High Speed Line to give passengers another option, and will operate shuttle bus service for people needing to connect with trains at Miquon.

This article highlights the details of what happened with the Manayunk/Norristown Line and definitely is a call for more infrastructure funding for the system: http://www.philly.com/philly/news/117364528.html

As if the Manayunk/Norristown Line issue wasn't enough, a Philly bound Trenton Line train snagged a wire in the Juniata section of Philadelphia (at G and Venango Streets by SHORE interlocking), causing a small brush fire.  The passengers on this train were saved by a New Jersey Transit diesel train.  Otherwise, Trenton Line as well as Chestnut Hill West service was suspended for a while as tracks 3 and 4 were shut down; Amtrak continued to operate on tracks 1 and 2.

Details in this NJ article and on Railroad.net.

If all this wasn't enough, there were delays on the Lansdale/Doylestown Line due to equipment problems!  Finally, the day came to a close with issues on the Trenton Line AGAIN due to Amtrak signal issues.  This definitely wasn't one of SEPTA's better days!

Finally, the first PATCO car was shipped up to Hornell, NY as part of the Alstom contract for the rebuilding of the PATCO fleet.  Car # 247 left Lindenwold Thursday morning by truck with the help of Silk Road Transport.

For pictures, visit: http://www.railroad.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=72&t=76921&start=15

We would like to extend my sincere thanks to Doug Diehl (Redarrowdoug), Michaelbug, and Silverliner_II for their contributions to our photo galleries. As many of the members/lurkers notice within the past several weeks, a bunch of older photos has been uploaded to our gallery.
http://www.philadelphiatransitvehicles.info/multimedia/thumbnails-lastup-0.html

SEPTA has posted the new schedules for its transit routes on its website at http://septa.org/schedules/upcoming.html.  Here are some of the major highlights:

Route 95 Detour Routing:  Due to PennDOT construction of route 23 (River Road) in West Conshohocken, the 95 now runs VIA Gulph Mills Station on it's way to the Inquirer Building to Swedeland.  The 95 buses will also hop on I-76 between West Conshohocken and Gulph Mills.

Route 97 extension to Chestnut Hill Loop: Most route 97 buses actually interline with the 94, so service will be extended to Chestnut Hill during the daytime hours.  There will still be some trips that short turn in Barren Hill.  Also, the 97 will run via Seven Stars Lane to get to the Metroplex.

Route 103: Service will be taken off of West Chester Pike and Lynn Blvd to serve Overbrook Park and Township Line Road.  Also, Sunday service will run between 69th Street Terminal and 77th and City Aves (Overbrook Park).

Routes 105 & 106:  Route 106 will run with the 105 to Paoli during weekdays.  However, this resulted in some cuts to service to Paoli on the 105.  It's a bit more confusing, and it seems like casual riders may need to have both the 105 and 106 schedules if they travel west of Radnor.  Also, route 105 will no longer serve Overbrook Park, running on a modified routing to 63rd and Malvern.  In fact, some trips will start at 63rd and Malvern heading to Paoli!

Route 128:  In Levittown, the buses will no longer run on Haines Road and Kenwood Drive due to concerns brought up by Bristol Twp and Tullytown Borough.  Apparently the residents of Kenwood Drive don't like the buses cutting through their neighborhood on the way to Levittown Town Center.  Therefore, the 128 will remain on Bristol Pike to Levittown Parkway (running right by Levittown-Tullytown Station) and follow the 127 routing through the Town Center.

Route 310: There are some minor routing changes in the Horsham Business Center, taking the Breeze buses onto Witmer Road.  This also removes an ugly left turn from Business Center Drive onto Dresher Road, since the intersection isn't protected by a traffic light and traffic is horrendous on Dresher Road during rush hour.

For more details on these routes as well as other services, check the website.

SEPTA's hopes that its board will approve a loan of $250 million through bonds to cover the cost of the Silverliner Vs as well as the Wayne Junction Station rebuilding.  While Wayne Junction was delayed with the cuts in state funding this year, SEPTA is afraid of losing the federal funding for it if they don't start construction soon. 

They hope to pay the money back over 25 years with grants from the Federal Transit Administration.  Interestingly, this is the first time since the purchase of the M4s that SEPTA has borrowed money, which is pretty good for a transit system.

More details here: http://www.masstransitmag.com/online/printer.jsp?siteSection=3&id=13457

Unbeknownst to TMA Bucks, who had no choice but to discontinue the Doylestown rushbus do to the discontinuance of funding for the line, Bucks County, Bucks County Transport, and Doylestown officials had a meeting to determine what to do to solve this problem.  The result?  The Doylestown DART will be return and be operated by Bucks County Transport.  More details here:

http://www.phillyburbs.com/news/local/the_intelligencer/the_intelligencer_news_details/article/27/2010/december/31/doylestowns-rushbus-service-gets-a-reprieve.html

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The first three production units of the Silverliner V order has arrived photo recorded by John A

Due to discontinued funding, the Doylestown rushbus (formerly known as the Doylestown DART) will be discontinued.  Saturday DART, operated by Bucks County Transport will be discontinued as well.  Details here: http://tiny.cc/172sw

Last Sunday just hours before the blizzard came into our areas. Mr. Almeida was brought to the attention by CSX dispatchers. That CSX trains were sent in South Philadelphia to pick up three Silverliner Vs at Rotem. They were so close to make the run; however, the mechanical issues “brake” on the Silverliner Vs cars forced the crews to postpone the delivery of the first three cars. To make matters worst, the weather during the evening hours of Sunday forced the crews hand to postpone the delivery of the first three cars. It is unknown as it stands now when SEPTA will get these first cars but from the looks at it they may have these cars by the beginning of next week. All i have to say is we shall see. Once SEPTA have received these cars, they will undergo at least 8 weeks of testing. When approved and no major flaws are found they should be in service by either late February or early March.

Just to recap, SEPTA is to receieve 120 Silverliner Vs to replace the 68 Silverliner II and IIIs in service. Both the Silverliner II and III has been running on waives issued by the FRA to keep these cars running. However come in 2012 these cars will be unable to operate. Hopefully the worst part of this Silverliner V orders is right behind us. Let's hope the production will continue smoothly.

Major Changes on the Current Assignments Page( http://www.philadelphiatransitvehicles.info/Current_fleet_Assignments.php ).

With these changes: Callowhill has lost 1/3 of their fleet of NABIS. 5249, 5259-5263 are now assigned to Midvale. Southern has received 5320, 5322-5323, 5325 from Callowhill. Frontier has scrap more of their Eldorado buses and have received more 2004 New Flyers in return. Latest update on 4581, which was remove from service at Frontier a month ago, is that it now the bus is wrapped in the Lucy scheme.

Once again, the Silverliner Vs are delayed again.  The three that were due on December 20th, which would have allowed SEPTA to try to run a 6 car train of Vs, will not make it on time.  In fact, now there is no definite date as to when these cars will be delivered.  With the problems these three cars have had, in addition to the prototypes built in Korea that are running on the system now, this is par for the course.

More details here: http://planphilly.com/news/notebook/septa-misses-another-silverliner-v-deadline

Remember that massive bus reassignment several months ago which robbed Frontier of much of their fleet of Zfers (#5892-up)? Well now they are getting their zfers back with more zfers being reassigned in the future! As been reported on the forums for the past month. SEPTA has started retired the Eldorados assigned to Frontier. So far, to replace these Eldorados, 5890-5892, 5903-5904, 5911-5923, 5928-5929 with 5932 has been reassigned to Frontier. This is the most bizarre assignment because much of the fleet of buses listed above were assign at Frontier only a few months ago and were sent to Comly and Midvale just prior of the Fall 2010 schedule. Now, they are giving these buses back to Frontier with possibly more zfers to come down the road.

Get your last shots of the Eldorados while you still can, it is quite possible that these little bouncy boxes will meet their demise sooner versus later. On a side, but related note, some of the Eldorados, which were removed from Service, has been reassigned to Contract operations. 4552 is now dressed in the Lucy scheme.