LIRR: High volume to Citi Field playoff baseball game causes delays

The Long Island Rail Road's Port Washington Branch experienced delays of up to 15 minutes in both directions Tuesday evening but the snags were likely due to high passenger volume and unrelated to an earlier "track condition" that snarled transit earlier, officials said.

Salvatore Arena, a spokeman for the LIRR, said traffic on the line had slowed shortly before 7 p.m. -- likely as fans traveled on the line en route to the Mets playoff game with the Los Angeles Dodgers at Citi Field in Queens.

Earlier in the day, the track defect near the Mets-Willets Point Station had caused 30-minute delays, the railroad said in an alert about 2:30 p.m. That problem, officials said, had been resolved by 2 p.m. and was not suspected in the later snags.

"It's highly unlikely to return," Metropolitan Transportation Authority spokesman Aaron Donovan had said in an email about the track condition. "Midday rail inspections identified a minor defect, and the repair efforts caused the delays."

By John Valenti

john.valenti@newsday.com,zachary.dowdy@newsday.com

John Valenti, a reporter at Newsday since 1981, has been honored nationally by the Associated Press and Society of the Silurians for investigative, enterprise and breaking news reporting, as well as column writing, and is the author of “Swee'pea,” a book about former New York playground basketball star Lloyd Daniels. Valenti is featured in the Emmy Award-winning ESPN 30-for-30 film “Big Shot.”