Thursday Night Traffic Jam Explained

A Franklinite returning to town from Rhode Island Thursday evening ran into a lengthy traffic tied up on usually quiet Union Street.

As he tells it, "at just about 9:00 pm Thursday, the lights and gates were up at the crossing. The Train was stopped right in front of the crossing blowing its horn.Then it backed up about 20 or so feet, which was followed by more horn blowing [and it] then proceeded to cross and stopped again right in the middle of the crossing. There were more horns before it completed the crossing at walking speed and finally moved out .

"At that time there were a few workers lined up by the tracks with lights. Traffic was backed up almost to Rt.140 in one direction and a cars were stacked up on Washington St. and up the hill on Union.

"It took better than 20 minutes to go through the crossing," he added.

An inquiry Friday morning with Franklin Deputy Police Chief Jim West yielded a note from 8:23 pm indicating that the police were aware of a problem with the crossing gate.

An spokesperson from MBTA contractor, Keolis, filled in the blanks Friday evening. According to Alana Olsen Westwater, "Yesterday evening, the crossing at Union Street in Franklin experienced a mechanical issue, causing the gate arms to remain in the closed position. Keolis personnel responded and were able to address the issue and the crossing was returned to normal service later that evening. While the crossing was being repaired, trains approaching the crossing operated under safety procedures that require the conductor to walk the train across the crossing."

From other sources, we are told that when a crossing system has a mechanical issue, it causes the crossing to enter a safety mode where the crossing gates stay down and the lights flash

In that situation,  train crews are required to  adopt a safety procedure called “stop and protect,” where trains stop before they enter a crossing area, conductors exit the train to protect the crossing area and then walk the train through at a slow pace.

It will be remembered that a crossing gate malfunction  in Wilmington early in the year led to a collision between an MBTA train and a motorist, resulting in the death of the motor vehicle operator.