On Thursday, Metro-North was operating on what it called an “enhanced Saturday schedule”, providing about 75 percent ridership capacity.
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Commuters received good news this morning as the Metro-North trains are running regularly again.
The blaze broke out Tuesday night at a garden centre underneath Metro-North tracks in Manhattan’s East Harlem section, north of Grand Central Terminal, halting train service for hours and damaging a centre column beneath a viaduct holding the elevated tracks.
The senator said he was relieved to hear no one was killed or seriously hurt in the fire but he said the blaze was “the last thing” Metro-North needed after collisions and disasters on its tracks in recent years. The New York City Fire Department ruled that the cause of the fire, involving elevated track at Park Avenue and 118th Street, was gasoline accidentally spilled on a hot generator at a garden supply store beneath the tracks.
An estimated 150,000 passengers endured overcrowded trains with limited service after the fire.
Metro-North Railroad is second largest commuter railroad in the nation.
Temporary columns have been installed and Metro-North officials say they performed a number of test runs to make sure all four tracks were safe and ready for service. Even then, trains would be moving at reduced speeds on some tracks into and out of Grand Central.
Metro-North Wednesday predicted the return of normal service by Friday at the earliest.
Officials are warning commuters to expect delays and extremely crowded conditions. Columns on the east and west sides of the viaduct, which were put in place by Metro-North in the 1990s, are a newer design consisting of single monolithic blocks; they were not damaged by the fire. During the morning rush, commuters packed into trains, leaving some on the platform.
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Metro-North reported 60- to 80-minute delays out of Grand Central heading into the Wednesday evening rush hour.
