My advice right now is to cherish these next few days of commuting. Cherish the slight delays you may encounter. Record it on video, take a photo, hug a stranger, because after this week is over, we’re gonna be served up a mid-summer shit sandwich of delays and re-routed commutes. It will not be pretty. This will not be over quickly. You will not enjoy this.
I also want you to double down during this weekend because next week will be the longest five day stretch we’ve had since the winter. Go to your backyard, break out the BBQ, invite your closest family and friends, and throw down some alcoholic beverages. Someone should make a toast. “To the good times!” … raise your glass, because once the work week of June 17th 2019 begins, it’s your ass!
This coming Monday will in fact be ARMAGEDDON for the commuter community, in particular those that ride along the Montclair Booton Line, Morris & Essex and North Jersey Coast Line as AMTRAK has planned repair work for their entry to Penn Station (I think that’s what they’re doing, but who really knows).
As soon as I got the news of this scheduled “repair work” I immediately thought about the movie “Armageddon”, when Billy Bob Thornton got all the smartest people in the world in a room to talk about how the hell they were gonna stop the asteroid from smashing into Earth and destroying all of civilization as we know it ….
“You could fire every nuke you’ve got and she’ll just smile at you and keep on coming.”
Here’s how I envision all of us gathered in a room of misery after being sent this notice …
Unfortunately for all of you I’m not Bruce Willis, so I don’t have a team of commuters that will band together to help assist with the fixing of Penn Station. To start, I can’t even fathom what could possibly need repairs since every morning I see the AMTRAK train whiz by my train station at light speed. From the naked eye, everything just seems fine and dandy to me. Regardless though, none of that matters because theses repairs are coming as outlined below …
The work will require two tracks at PSNY to be taken out of service resulting in fewer tracks for Amtrak, NJ TRANSIT and Long Island Rail Road (LIRR). Amtrak will be repairing and renewing two railroad interlockings at the east end of PSNY which direct all three railroads in and out of the East River tunnels connecting to Sunnyside Yard in Queens. Access to Sunnyside Yard is critical to NJ TRANSIT operations at PSNY as it enables the maximum number of trains and number of cars per train to utilize the station platforms.
Now I’m no Scientist, but I do know that when you say tracks will be taken out of service that it means that not as many tracks will be available for trains to run on. This means that at some point service is going to get backed up during a rush hour, which means that thousands of people will be trying to re-route themselves in real time. A part of me is happy about this, because there are actually some people out there that think they WON’T be affected by these repairs because there “lines” aren’t listed on NJTRANSIT’s notice. To that I say, “you couldn’t be a bigger idiot.” I hate to break it to these losers, but where there’s smoke, there’s fire, and any time we’re working with limited tracks, you better have Smokey The Fucking Bear on speed dial because shit is about to pop off in the worst way possible. We’re talkin’ forest fires galore.
Don’t believe me yet? Well, how about the fact that on the notice that NJTRANSIT is highlighting the “Ferry option”. Right there is the red flag you need, because if they’re already trying to divert you to a fucking ship for your commute to work, what do you think is gonna happen? THEY DON’T EVEN WANT YOU ON LAND! THEY WANT YOU ON THE WATER. Not good.
… and this is about the time in the blog where I usually provide some advice, so here I go!
My strategy is to suck it up on Monday and then game plan for the rest of the week, because I won’t know what to do until I see it for myself. JUST BEING HONEST! It’s like Daenerys in Game Of Thrones … she didn’t believe jack shit about “The Dead” until she saw it for herself and I feel the exact same way. Until I’m face to armpit with a stranger in a vestibule, I’ll hold my thoughts tight to the chest. Not because I can’t breath, but because I don’t trust you guys enough to give you my ideas for a successful commute, that’s why! This announcement of repairs can only result in Hunger Games type stuff. It’s about self-preservation and unlike Bruce Willis, I ain’t sacrificing myself for the rest of you …. If I go down, WE ALL GO DOWN!
*I just YouTubed the scene and … and .. well … IS SOMEONE CUTTING FUCKING ONIONS IN HERE?!?!?!!?!?
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YOUR COMMUTE SUCKS 