In SEPTA's nerve center: Problems

About 11 a.m. yesterday, a two-car trolley lost power near the Stadium station on SEPTA's Norristown Speed Line.

Inside the agency's 19th-floor nerve center in Center City, Ron Hopkins, chief control-room officer, was monitoring the transit system on a huge white map with red and green LED lights, when he realized what just happened.

In the control room, decision-makers, in charge of operating each line or dispatching emergency crews, sat around an oval table fielding calls, solving problems and dispatching crews to trouble spots on buses, train and trolley lines.

Outside, the 34-mph blizzard conditions were anything but normal for SEPTA, as up to 20 inches of wet snow fell on parts of the region, disrupting lines of the system.

The weight of wet snow felled a tree, which landed on the tracks of the Norristown High Speed Line, blocking the 600-volt third rail that powers the trolleys.

With everyone talking, the din in the room was high, but Hopkins said the managers realized that they had to get a six-man crew with a professional tree-cutter to the spot where the tree had fallen.

They also had to notify the trolley operator and his 15 trapped passengers heading toward Norristown that they were working on the problem and would rescue them.

Quietly, Michael Zaleski, an assistant director, was listening to what was happening around him, and typing messages about the trolley mishap into his computer for SEPTA's Web site, to Twitter and to those who signed up for online updates called RSS feeds.

Soon, two more two-car trolleys, heading toward 69th Street also on the Norristown High Speed Line, lost power at the Beechwood Station.

Hopkins and the others realized that they had a bigger problem than the felled tree.

Once an emergency crew reached the first trolley, the crew confirmed what Hopkins and others feared.

All three two-car trolleys lost "shoes" underneath the cars, which connect with the third rail which powers the vehicles.

Meantime, operations managers had dispatched two trolleys to Beechwood to pick up the stranded passengers and take them back to 69th Street Station, Hopkins said.

The tree-cutting crew finally arrived and removed trunks and limbs from the tracks.

The 15 trapped passengers on the first trolley finally reached the Stadium Station about 12:30 p.m., and were able to continue their journey on another trolley.

Through the day, about 85 buses became stuck in the ice-covered snow in the five-county area, and those in the control room were dispatching crews to help them.

Zaleski took all the information in, and continued his updates. By 5 p.m., all buses were brought in, and only the Broad Street subway and Market-Frankford El were operating.

Those in the nerve center expected to work through the night, dispatching crews to clear snow from tracks, parking lots and stations so the system could be fully operational by 4:30 this morning.

Outside the control room was a cart with an empty pizza box, the last of 40 pizzas that SEPTA's general manager, Joseph Casey, had delivered for the troops.

"All the operators, engineers, conductors and crews are the real heroes of the day," said Casey.