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Nine injured when escalator suddenly reverses at Back Bay T station
By adamg on Sun, 09/26/2021 - 6:26pm
Boston EMS reports nine people had to be taken to local hospitals after an up escalator at Back Bay reversed and began going down, around 6 p.m.
All of the injuries were minor, EMS reports.
yea it happened as soon as i got up the stairs. heard a lot of people yelling behind me and i saw a pile of bodies down the escalator. firefighters and EMS are at Back Bay now assisting the injured. hope everyone is ok
— (@RipGodManny) September 26, 2021
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Get off twitter
AND CALL 911!
"firefighters and EMS are at
"firefighters and EMS are at Back Bay now assisting the injured." No reason to call 911 at that point.
Elected officials
Start practicing your 'shocked and horrified and demanding answers' faces now so you look good at the press conference tomorrow
Charlie doesn't care. He
Charlie doesn't care. He lives in a bubble
The T trials
Stairs at JFK collapse resulting in a mans death
Back Bay Escalator goes in reverse injuring dozens
Green Line Trolley speeding smashes into another trolley several injured
Young woman found dead in loft at Back Bay Station
Others die falling off roofs in parking garages
Several trespassers struck by trains
Commuter boats are running on time unfortunately very few passengers.
Stairs at JFK - Not The T's Fault
I would look to Mass DOT for that and a basic misunderstanding of signs and fences.
Young Woman Found Dead at Back Bay - Not T's Fault.
Falling From Roofs Of Parking Garages - Not T's Fault.
Trespassers Struck By Trains - Not T's Fault (See Signs and Fences Above).
You must be one of those people who likes to blame others and not the individual humans who are responsible for their own actions in these matters. Commonsense counts for a lot.
Commuter Boat ridership has been up since Labor Day. Don't blame the commuters when their companies are still telling people to work from home.
Get another hobby, or at least get your facts straight.
Check the Faqs
Stairs at JFK collapse resulting in a mans death
The stairs are adjacent to the MBTA property. They are the responsibility of the state highway department, not the City of Boston either.
Back Bay Escalator goes in reverse injuring dozens
To be investigated to determine what caused this. There are reverse direction and stop buttons accessible to the public to access in emergencies. Since no investigation has been completed we do not know what the cause was as yet.
Green Line Trolley speeding smashes into another trolley several injured
While the MBTA is moving to fire the operator, that is likely because he has been a problem in the past. What has yet to be determined is whether the vehicle had a mechanical function, or the operator was impaired medically otherwise. The termination proceedings are a convenient effort to show the public that something is being done, but the investigation by the MBTA and STB is still way-off with no conclusion pending as yet.
Young woman found dead in loft at Back Bay Station
In a hidden area in an apparent homeless set up. Clever set up but clearly no one knew it was there. Arrests of persons of interest happened. Some responsibility may be in order here, not for the death but for not finding the very-well hidden living space. Similar enclaves are along Mass & Cass. Any stray auto or an accident might run into one of these. Desperation results in unnecessary risk-taking, and sometimes we cannot fix that.
Others die falling off roofs in parking garages
The garages were adjacent to MBTA properties but owned by other entities. It is questionable whether T parking was allowed. Tragic deaths none the less, but not MBTA property
Several trespassers struck by trains
Sadly this will happen in any rail system, commuter or transit. Your statement answers the question -- "trespassers." There are plenty of signs stating no entry. If someone is set on committing suicide by train no signs will help them. Let's also consider people sometimes walk in front of moving autos or trucks on the street even though there are crosswalks. Systems cannot be dummied-down to a point of collapse.
Commuter boats are running on time unfortunately very few passengers.
And at times of the day the same is true of buses and trains. No issue here.
With all the new infrastructure funds
will we have enough to purchase an adequate supply of clown cars for MBTA management?
They should spend it all on
They should spend it all on pedestrian bridges and bike lanes and bus lanes. They should be pouring highway money on those same things too. Ebikes are here and they need the space. Put them in the plans. MBTA needs to compete but they are sadly already underwater. They should be working on East West rail if they're serious.
After Seven Years
You would think that some of this incompetence would reflect on Governor Baker who put this management team in and who keeps them in place.
We can do better, we need to do better.
Teflon Charlie
No, Charlie is never responsible for anything. Ever. He’ll win again if he runs.
I don’t get it.
It's a "human infrastructure"
It's a "human infrastructure" bill. So, no new clown cars, just new clowns.
lol wut?
The bill calls for "investing $110 billion for roads, bridges and major infrastructure projects" and "$39 billion to modernize public transit", more specifically to "repair and upgrade existing infrastructure, make stations accessible to all users, bring transit service to new communities and modernize rail and bus fleets, including replacing thousands of vehicles with zero-emission models".
So I'm not sure why you think it wouldn't be relevant here.
(Sourced from here: https://abc7chicago.com/infrastructure-bill-2021-biden-35/11047285/, which was the top link when I Googled "infrastructure bill 2021". Maybe try that sometime?)
Ain't gonna be any new infrastructure funds
Congressional Republicans have decided they'd rather see our bridges and roads crumble than let a Democratic President sign a popular bill, because hey, they have helicopters.
Yikes, a close call for me
I was on the inbound Orange Line with my bike this afternoon, trying to decide whether to get off at Mass. Ave. or Back Bay to go to Open Newbury Street. I'm glad I picked Mass. Ave.
Ouf
Lucky.
Also - this was the escalator coming up from the Commuter Rail.
Lucky twice, then
I had missed my commuter train at Readville by being on the wrong inbound platform, and therefore had to bike to Forest Hills to get the Orange Line. Had I made the Readville train, I might have been on that Back Bay escalator.
Bikes on escalators
As a fellow multimodal traveler, I suggest that you please please please don't take your bike on escalators. It's too easy to misstep or have someone bump into you and seriously injure yourself and others. Stairs are probably safer if you have to carry your bike because there's no elevator. Even in the tiny elevators, you can flip your bike vertically to make it work.
Bikes on escalators
I usually try to be last on the escalator if I am carrying a bike, for this reason. (But I don't always remember.)
Depends on the station and the crowding
I'm definitely not hauling my bike up the stairs at Porter.
I don't think the escalator is intrinsically any less safe than the stairs. If more people actually use the escalator, then there's more chance of accidents, but that's a situational thing. In fact, I'd argue that it might be *safer* to use the escalator all else held equal, since all you have to do is lock the brakes and hold the bike steady, rather than carrying all the weight of the bike and walking at the same time.
Like Ron, I might wait a bit, but I'm still going to use the escalator. (Not the elevator. Takes up too much room, people are usually waiting to use it for strollers.)
Of course, this is all a bit academic for me since it is very rare that I'm in a situation where I've needed to take my bike on the T.
I could see a bike getting
I could see a bike getting wedged in the escalator, and people piling up against it. Not a good situation.
Maybe some cyclists could keep this from happening most of the time, but that doesn't help the people who get injured when someone doesn't have full control of their bike.
That probably would have happened already
if it were even remotely possible. Never heard of it happening here, couldn't find any instances of it with a web search. I did find several articles about escalators designed for bikes, and a video of someone falling down an empty escalator after trying to bring his bike up while straddling it.
So, no, I don't think this is plausible or catastrophic enough to rise above the existing risk level of escalators, which already exhibit a number of failure modes including sliding backwards, suddenly reversing, catching shoes and shoelaces, etc.
That kid is ON his bike on the escalator
I would never think of doing that, and I hope none of you would, either.
I definitely considered it
for about 0.2 seconds the first time I took my bike up an escalator. Then I made a better decision.
Porter
I used to frequently travel through Porter. Elevator was almost always vacant. Even the few times I did have to wait for a second one, it’s better than taking the risk my bike and I go falling down 646369704772 steps and possibly onto other people.
Porter
All I can say is... I am so glad this didn't happen at Porter Square. Imagine being at the top and it going in reverse.. omg.. what a fall.
And considering how many times the escalators have been rebuilt there, I'd be very very surprised if it did.