Link Disruption
Earlier this week, I asked Sound Transit if they had determined the cause of the extended Link disruption on September 17, and the cause of the disruption last Friday. I got this response from John Gallagher, Sound Transit Media Relations Manager:
The disruption on Sept. 17 was caused by a damaged pantograph on an LRV, which in turn damaged the OCS near UW station. We still do not know the cause of the pantograph damage. We were able to make repairs to the OCS to return the system to service, but we will need to have a weekend disruption to complete the repairs. We are looking for a weekend later this year when there won't be any major events or activities so that we can minimize the number of passengers who will be impacted. This is likely to be a single-tracking event. For the time being, there is a 10 mph slow order from just before UW station to about 400 feet north of the station in the NB tunnel, which passengers likely notice as they travel through the area. This adds about two minutes overall to the trip.
OCS" stands for Overhead Catenary System, which delivers power to Link trains through contact with the pantograph on top of the train cars. John Gallagher continued:
The outage last Friday occurred near the same location by coincidence but was not related to the OCS. There was a mechanical failure in the trailing car of the consist. Because of the location, we needed to check to make sure that it wasn't OCS-related, but the LRV was eventually able to move to the station on its own power.
I also inquired about how Sound Transit is handling the crowding on the trains:
The volumes that we have been seeing since the Lynnwood extension opened are what we anticipated. We have surge trains on standby to provide additional capacity and relieve crowding should platforms become too crowded at peak, much as we have after sporting events, but we have not yet had the need to deploy those trains. We know the trains are really full during peak, and we appreciate riders' patience as they adapt to the changes.
The crowding is expected to continue until the 2 Line opens across Lake Washington later next year, when trains will run every 3-4 minutes between Lynnwood and Downtown Seattle.