The LIRR's nightmare year

Perfect isn't possible, for any person or organization. There will always be mistakes. But the Long Island Rail Road has so many challenges to face with weather, mechanical failure and the extraordinary intricacies of its system that every precaution possible must be made to assure its equipment does what it's supposed to do and its employees do what they're supposed to do.

The LIRR released a 22-page report this week that acknowledges human error caused the majority of the inconvenience when first a portion, then the entire system went down after a lightning strike on Sept. 29. That report and the separate release of a customer satisfaction survey, showing the railroad has gone downhill in the eyes of riders in every possible category since last year, are adding up to a rough week for the one of the nation's busiest commuter railroads.

Here's how the LIRR got here. Its customers had endured significant service cuts and fare hikes announced in 2009, part of widespread Metropolitan Transportation Authority initiatives to help make up a $900-million deficit, just as the bad days started to pile up. Over the past 12 months more than a dozen serious service interruptions occurred. There was a fire in Jamaica, a tornado, numerous snowstorms, a threatened hurricane, an Amtrak derailment under the East River and, finally, the lightning that knocked out power on Sept. 29.

And the limited shutdown the lightning caused and the total shutdown the response caused should have been, according to the equipment manufacturer, impossible.

A shed in Jamaica holding the computers known as the Jay signal hut was supposed to be lightning-proof, but even if the server got knocked out, the backup server should have been unaffected. Both were knocked out. Then, when workers trying to repair everything from a third server typed in the wrong code, everything went down, and it took hours to realize why and correct it.

It was a disaster, seriously inconveniencing customers, some of whom were on their way to observe Rosh Hashanah, one of the most important Jewish holy days. Customers were right to be angry: They pay for and expect good service, quick fixes and all possible assistance when quick fixes aren't possible. They got little of this that night.

So what now?

The LIRR seems to be doing the right things. Officials say they are in serious talks with the equipment manufacturer to assure they have enough lightning protection, the server backup is truly a backup, the diagnostic tests in the system work and, perhaps, score a refund.

The organization has been transparent about the problems and instituted a "pledge" to provide information and aid when necessary, and professionalism, cleanliness and courtesy all the time. It is even considering restoring some canceled trains to the LIRR schedule.

All this plus a little less bad luck should, hopefully, add up to better results for the LIRR and its customers. The railroad can't be perfect, but it can be a lot better than it was over the past year, and that should be enough to please most commuters. hN