Five weeks after an RTD light-rail train derailed as it sped into a curve at a road intersection in Aurora, the R-Line hasn’t resumed running on that segment, and there’s still no sign of repairs.
That is more than three times as long as the 10 days it took a transit provider in an outer borough of London to restore service in 2016 after a tram derailed on a curve it entered too fast.
And it’s nearly six times as long as the downtime — which lasted six days — on a busy stretch of rail outside Philadelphia in 2015 after an Amtrak train going more than 100 mph jumped the tracks on a curve, requiring around-the-clock repairs.
The only signal given so far by metro Denver’s Regional Transportation District is that the wait is going to be a lot longer. It said Wednesday that service would resume between the Florida and 13th Avenue stations “no earlier than December.” That would be well over two months after the Sept. 21 derailment at South Sable Boulevard and East Exposition Avenue — an unusual outage duration for a crash.
While the investigation by the agency and Aurora police into the cause is still underway, RTD has shed little light on its plans to repair the damage. For the last week, RTD officials have brushed off The Denver Post’s repeated questions for details of repairs and a reopening timeline.
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