Missouri Mule
01-25-2005, 10:06 AM
Isn't this incredible? Imagine what a terrorist could do. Five years, no less.
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'C' SICKNESS ON THE SUBWAY
By CLEMENTE LISI
Call it C for "canceled."
A fire in a subway control room has put the C line out of service for up to five years and caused serious problems on the A line that will make the commute miserable for hundreds of thousands of subway riders, officials said yesterday.
The unstaffed room containing 600 electrical devices called "relays" that are used to power signals and switches along a segment of the vital Eighth Avenue line were destroyed Sunday in the blaze.
Cops blamed a vagrant who set a shopping cart full of wood blocks ablaze six feet into the tracks at the Chambers Street station. Cops are searching for the derelict.
The flames quickly spread across the ceiling and along a wall, igniting wires that led to the locked control room.
The blaze melted thousands of the wires and knocked out power to dozens of signals and switches.
"It's major, major damage," said Transit Authority president Larry Reuter.
"It's a barbecue. It's black and melted."
The fire forced the TA to indefinitely cut C train service — which runs from 168th Street in Manhattan to Euclid Avenue in Brooklyn and has 110,000 daily riders — as well as convert A trains into locals for much of the day.
Service on the A — which has 470,000 daily riders and runs from 207th Street in Inwood in upper Manhattan to the Rockaways and Ozone Park in Queens — was cut by nearly 66 percent yesterday.
Reuter said suspending the C is a "long-term problem" that could take an estimated three to five years to fix and cost "several millions of dollars" because new equipment has to be built from scratch.
Track workers using radios yesterday manually guided A trains through the quarter-mile stretch of lower Manhattan track that was affected.
Because of the cuts, the trains yesterday were overcrowded and waiting times during rush hour stretched from every three minutes to as much as eight minutes.
"Trains have to get permission to proceed" nearly every 1,000 feet, Reuter said.
"The system is extremely vulnerable," he added...
(Snip)
http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/39314.htm
============================
'C' SICKNESS ON THE SUBWAY
By CLEMENTE LISI
Call it C for "canceled."
A fire in a subway control room has put the C line out of service for up to five years and caused serious problems on the A line that will make the commute miserable for hundreds of thousands of subway riders, officials said yesterday.
The unstaffed room containing 600 electrical devices called "relays" that are used to power signals and switches along a segment of the vital Eighth Avenue line were destroyed Sunday in the blaze.
Cops blamed a vagrant who set a shopping cart full of wood blocks ablaze six feet into the tracks at the Chambers Street station. Cops are searching for the derelict.
The flames quickly spread across the ceiling and along a wall, igniting wires that led to the locked control room.
The blaze melted thousands of the wires and knocked out power to dozens of signals and switches.
"It's major, major damage," said Transit Authority president Larry Reuter.
"It's a barbecue. It's black and melted."
The fire forced the TA to indefinitely cut C train service — which runs from 168th Street in Manhattan to Euclid Avenue in Brooklyn and has 110,000 daily riders — as well as convert A trains into locals for much of the day.
Service on the A — which has 470,000 daily riders and runs from 207th Street in Inwood in upper Manhattan to the Rockaways and Ozone Park in Queens — was cut by nearly 66 percent yesterday.
Reuter said suspending the C is a "long-term problem" that could take an estimated three to five years to fix and cost "several millions of dollars" because new equipment has to be built from scratch.
Track workers using radios yesterday manually guided A trains through the quarter-mile stretch of lower Manhattan track that was affected.
Because of the cuts, the trains yesterday were overcrowded and waiting times during rush hour stretched from every three minutes to as much as eight minutes.
"Trains have to get permission to proceed" nearly every 1,000 feet, Reuter said.
"The system is extremely vulnerable," he added...
(Snip)
http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/39314.htm