Commuter Alert: NJ Transit and Amtrak delayed, with modified service to and from New York Penn Station

NEW YORK (WABC) — New Jersey Transit and Amtrak will resume service to New York Penn Station on Friday, albeit with a delay.

Previously, operations had been suspended for about two hours in the middle of the morning rush hour – after operations had already been suspended for about three hours during rush hour on Thursday evening.

Commuters were left panicking again Friday morning after an NJ Transit train got stuck in the tunnel at New York’s Penn Station – and the aftermath triggered a wave of delays and cancellations on both NJ Transit and Amtrak.

According to NJ Transit, train service to and from New York’s Penn Station has now resumed, but problems with Amtrak’s overhead line have caused delays of up to 45 minutes.

Amtrak said the train was operating on a modified schedule and could be delayed by up to 60 minutes on Friday morning.

Before Friday morning’s problems, Amtrak was already off to a rocky start, reporting that several trains were canceled “due to a previous service disruption” and the need to maintain equipment and reposition personnel. Announcements about cancellations of specific trains continued throughout the afternoon.

The changes come after a disastrous day of disruptions and cancellations to rail services on the Northeast Corridor on Thursday afternoon.

NJ Transit and Amtrak service was halted shortly before 3 p.m. Thursday due to power issues. A faulty circuit breaker caused the widespread problem, which led to a power outage on the tracks between New York Penn Station and Newark Penn Station.

According to NJ Transit, an unrelated brush fire in the area hampered repair efforts.

This was the latest in a series of incidents that have negatively impacted commuters. On Tuesday, NJ Transit and Amtrak commuters experienced delays and cancellations due to overhead wire problems in the morning and later a stalled train outside Penn Station.

NJ Transit and CEO Kevin Corbett released the following statement Friday afternoon, calling the problems “unacceptable.”

“We are as frustrated as our customers, and the frequency and impact of these issues on our customers’ quality of life is clearly unacceptable. Regarding today’s incident specifically, we have posted track maintenance supervisors at Newark Penn Station to inspect trains in light of recent incidents. The affected train was thoroughly inspected prior to departure from Newark, including the pantograph, and no deficiencies were found,” Corbett said. “We continue to work with Amtrak to determine the root cause of the recent spate of incidents on the Northeast Corridor (NEC), which include a number of issues. For example, Amtrak reported that yesterday’s incident was caused by one of their circuit breakers affecting power between Philadelphia and New Haven. What we can say is that we operate approximately 700 trains every weekday on hundreds of miles of track on 11 rail lines using the same equipment, and these incidents are primarily occurring on just this one section of track on the NEC between Newark and New York. We continue to offer Amtrak our assistance to resolve the issue.”

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