Chicago Commuters Give Up And Walk Along Tracks After Long Delay

Chicago trains were a mess Thursday after a suspected fallen signal cut power and closed rails on the city’s north side. The problem took so long to fix and tied up so many trains that riders were directed to walk along an elevated portion of Chicago’s famous L-line to the closest station; a dizzying prospect for anyone afraid of heights.

The video comes from commuter Devin Jarell who goes by DevinIsRad on Twitter. And folks, there is nothing radder than riding mass transit so of course Jarell was there. He said his fellow travelers wait about an hour before Chicago Transit Authority made the call to escort everyone off the train and onto the tracks.

Emergency personal were on hand to help riders trek to their closest station. It might be a cool chance to see the city from a different perspective…if this weren’t the same stretch most riders took everyday to work. ABC7 caught up with Jarell and some of his fellow commuters:

Getting evacuated from his Purple line train and walking along the elevated tracks was clearly not how Devin Jarell, or any of his fellow passengers, expected their morning commute to go.

“Right before we got to Belmont station, the train stopped and the conductor said there had been an issue on the tracks,” Jarell said. “Then he kept saying there would be a longer delay and a longer delay and the power cut off.”

“I’m kind of still in shock right now trying to figure out how I’m going to get to work,” said commuter Jasmine Jones.

The power outage shut down all CTA tracks near Belmont, forcing evacuations on all tracks and leaving many scrambling for a ride.

[…]

“It’s stressful,” Jones said. “I like don’t really know what to do because there’s no buses that go up north where I need to go, so I kind of have to wait until Lyft lowers their prices a little bit … it’s a surge right now.”

“Might be a smidge late for work but almost the weekend so I guess it’s not too bad, but yeah, this is very unexpected,” commuter Jake Goodman said.

That sounds like a real pain in the ass, especially since Uber was charging quite a bit to customers trying to find a way into work.

That is a case of insult meeting injury right there. Luckily the problem was cleared up in time for the Thursday evening commute.