A blast of record-breaking frigid air—a “polar vortex”—affected about 240 million people in an area from North Dakota to Texas and the Great Lakes to Maryland, temporarily closing public transit agencies or curtailing service on Monday and Tuesday, Jan. 6-7, and further complicating public transit travel following a recent major blizzard. Most public transit systems returned to normal schedules and hours as temperatures rose during the week.

The following summarizes some actions taken by agencies to continue operating during the deep freeze.

Cleveland. The rail lines of the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (RTA) experienced delays and cancellations starting Jan. 6. The agency began restoring limited service on the Blue and Green lines on Jan. 7, but sections of the Red Line remained closed, with shuttle buses providing some service to closed sections. Agency officials also reported that a number of buses were out of service because they wouldn’t start or had frozen air systems. Crews worked around the clock during minus-11-degree temperatures (with a wind chill of minus 40 degrees) to warm up rail switches and signals and thaw frozen buses. All agency routes returned to service by Wednesday morning, Jan. 8.

Indianapolis. IndyGo suspended bus service Jan. 6 and 7 but continued to honor reservations made for transportation to medical appointments on its paratransit service for certified riders needing to travel to dialysis appointments. In addition, the agency was minimally staffed with fixed route operators to support emergency management. (In emergency situations, IndyGo is set up to support evacuation efforts by transporting disaster victims to shelters and serve as mobile warming stations for victims and first responders.) The agency returned to normal service Jan. 8, with some delays and detours due to bad road conditions.

Chicago. Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) continued to operate virtually all its bus and rail service throughout the record cold, with only a handful of routes disrupted. Jammed switches and stuck doors caused some interruptions in rail service with delays of five to 15 minutes. Bus service remained mostly on schedule, however. Operations, repair, and infrastructure staff manually threw switches and worked around the clock to maintain or restore service. During the two coldest days, CTA provided more than 36,000 bus trips and about 4,000 rail trips. Normal schedules for all routes resumed on Tuesday afternoon.

About 80 miles west of Chicago, more than 500 Amtrak passengers spent the night of Jan. 6 aboard three trains stopped because of snowdrifts that reached five and six feet and minus-5-degree temperatures. The trains—staffed by Amtrak crews—were equipped with food and beverages (which the rail agency provided as a complimentary service), heat and light, restroom facilities, and train-side emergency support, including EMTs. On the morning of Jan. 7, Amtrak shuttled passengers from two trains back to its Princeton, IL, station, and transferred the remainder by charted buses to the Galesburg station. All passengers arrived in Chicago by early afternoon. No injuries were reported.

Toronto. The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) took 61 streetcars—about one-third of its rush-hour fleet—out of service on Jan. 6 when ice coated overhead wires and plunging temperatures froze pneumatic air systems. To restore service, the agency dispatched buses to supplement streetcar routes and sent 10 “storm cars” along all 11 downtown streetcar routes to thaw and repair switches. Some workers stood on trucks and used sticks to knock the ice from the overhead wires. As for its subway service, the TTC ran de-icing trains in the outdoor portions of the system and stored trains in tunnels overnight.

 
Photo courtesy of GCRTA
This train, operated by the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority, was stopped dead in its tracks by ice and snow during a “polar vortex” that blanketed the nation’s midsection with record-breaking frigid temperatures and high winds.