Back To The Same Old ****

One. bleeping. Day.

That's how long I was back in New York before the LIRR started bleeping me about.

I had spent the last nine days in Florida visiting with the Stevieling and just lazing about¹ but eventually was forced to return to Chateau Stevie, life and the LIRR. By Wednesday the LIRR had cost me several hours of my time by cancelling or delaying trains despite the fact that the weather was unseasonably mild and dry

And the reason it took so long for the LIRR to start wasting my time and costing me money? I took the Monday off to recuperate from the drive.

So when I say "one day" it was actually "no working days".

Tuesday was lost to "signal trouble"² and Wednesday to yet another track blockage caused by a derailed freight train³.

And what do these two problems have in common?

Neither would be mitigated in any way shape or form by adding a wildly expensive second track in the Pinelawn/Wyandanch Single-Track Chicane.

1. Actually, two of those days were spent driving at each end of the vacation but I was out of New York the whole time so the point stands↑
2. And never ask "Why, when the tax payers and commuters of NY bought the LIRR a new set of signal wires less than a decade ago?"↑
3. I suspect the bloody freight trains run overloaded gondolas over the light gauge rail (since passenger train derailments are few and far between and these sodding freight trains seem to derail four or five times a year, taking out the route for days on end). Any other railroad would impose ruinous monetary penalties for this sort of thing↑