Stunningly stupid move by Amtrak......No one on the train crew thought it unusual that no one boarded the train?
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I'm not making any excuses for the situation, but Amtrak just recently took over operations at Washington Union Station due to issues with the previous operator on long lines boarding trains. A little irony there. The article I read stated that all passengers received a room for the night, full refunds on tickets, a ticket on a morning train, and a food voucher. While this should never have happened, at least Amtrak has learned a little something about customer service over the years. Try getting that from an airline.
Stunningly stupid move by Amtrak......No one on the train crew thought it unusual that no one boarded the train?
No Comment.
Why is it not a standard procedure that if no one comes down to board, that a train crew member goes up to the gate to see what's happening?
Okay, I can understand this. Whoever, on the station staff, is in charge of manning the boarding gates made a mistake and forgot to man this gate. Shame on Amtrak. They did their best to make it right and to treat their passengers properly. The End.
It was a very embarrassing failure, and I have no doubt that the incident has been investigated, and, further, that a process has been put into place to make it less likely to happen in the future. There may be new instructions to train crews, to question the lack of passengers when there was an expectation that some would board the train.
It is only news because it is a very rare and unusual service failure. That's probably why they did not have an effective process for detecting it.
Only those who have never forgotten to wake up for work or school, missed an appointment, or a birthday, or (Horrors!) their wedding anniversary, have the standing to berate Amtrak further over this incident.
The video (at least at this point of time) at the top of the page is of the very long delay of the Autotrain because of a derailment . Gotta love Tucker Carlson’s quip “…because Amtrak could not figure out how to navigate around a derailment…” LOL, I would love to hear how one navigates around a derailment.
Jim
Washington Union Station is kind of a mess to board a train. My daughter and I did an overnight stay in D.C. last month and took the train from BWI. On the return trip to Baltimore, only half the riders fit in the boarding area and the rest were in a line stretching into the main hall.
Jim
I regularly ride MARC out of Washington Union Station and never have seen any problems like this, MARC, Amtrak, or otherwise. MARC personnel are always standing on the platform right up until the second the train starts rolling because it's commuter rail and people tend to jump on at the last minute. Honestly this sounds like a lack of staff due to the holiday, or a training issue.
Amtrak did what was reasonably possible to make it right given the realities of our passenger rail system, so good on them. Mistakes are going to happen in any organization and the response is how you judge companies' commitment to customer service.
Where I have a problem is with the discussion about putting a process into place. It sounds like there was a process in place, but that due to the unique facts of the situation that process proved inadequate to deal with the exigencies of the situation. Because waiting for the designated time for passengers to show up and then proceeding to the next station is a process...and one that makes sense in lesser used stations. In properly functioning organizations this is where people choose to stop mindlessly following the process and think for themselves. That is what didn't happen here.
