At least three New York-bound trains were stranded Tuesday morning. power transmission failure Commuters stranded in a tunnel under the Hudson River.
An Amtrak spokesperson told the Daily News that a power issue at Hackensack Substation 42, a vintage facility built in 1932 near the tunnel exit on Tunnel Street in North Bergen, caused the 9 a.m. The power outage occurred between 10:20 and 10:01.
At least four trains (Amtrak trains 2152 and 642, and New Jersey Trainst trains 3716 and 3830) were affected by the power outage and were unable to travel between Midtown and New Jersey.
Amtrak, the federal railroad operator, owns and operates the former Pennsylvania Railroad tracks used by both Amtrak and New Jersey Transit trains.
The midtown meltdown came as an early morning motorcycle accident swamped traffic in the Lincoln Tunnel during the morning rush hour, leaving many Jersey residents with few options for getting to work in the city.
A passenger on New Jersey Transit train 3716 boarded the train around 9:15 a.m. after a New York-bound New Jersey Transit bus detoured from the Lincoln Tunnel to the Secaucus Junction station in the New Jersey Meadowlands. told the news.
Passengers said the train died a short time after it entered Union City, New Jersey, and the North River Tunnel, where trains pass under the Hudson River.
Passengers said crew members blamed power wired into Amtrak's intercom and then told passengers they would switch the train's dual-mode locomotive to diesel power as it exited the tunnel and returned to New Jersey.
When power was restored minutes later, the train entered the tunnel and arrived at Penn with power, passengers said.
FILE – At least three trains, Amtrak trains 2152 and 642 and New Jersey Trainst 3830, were caught in a power outage, unable to travel between Midtown and New Jersey. (Shutterstock)
New Jersey Department of Transportation spokesman Jim Smith confirmed that train 3716 backed out of the tunnel under diesel power. Train 3830 arrived in Penn on diesel power, Smith said. In the end, the train was delayed by less than an hour in arriving in Pennsylvania.
Amtrak's aging infrastructure (much of it inherited from the defunct Pennsylvania Railroad) and the New Jersey Department of Transportation's aging fleet have both contributed to a summer of hell for Garden State commuters, with traffic lights Both the system and the traction system failed frequently, often multiple times. Week by week.
Both railroads pledged in June to conduct more frequent inspections of both power lines and train pantographs that collect traction. Officials from both companies also said they are seeking grants to upgrade substations like the one that failed Tuesday.
Substation 42 is currently scheduled to have a new control room built by 2025, and the project is expected to cost approximately $17 million, according to the Northeast Corridor Capital Investment Plan.
The grant calls for the new control room to have the capacity to handle additional substation transformers, but this modernization is not expected to update the facility's current power system.
Earlier this year, four transmission circuits were replaced at substation 41 in Kearny, N.J., which provides power to a section of track deep in the Meadowlands.
John Annies and
A previous version of this article incorrectly identified the train that backed out of the tunnel as train 3830.
First published: September 10, 2024 at 3:53 p.m.
