Communication problems leave residents in the cold amid bus and electricity failures

Every snowfall brings its inconveniences and problems. Most of us depend on critical infrastructure that can’t keep running for everyone in bad weather. But communication problems compounded some already-frustrating service disruptions for Metrobus riders and Pepco electric customers yesterday.

Cold residents can’t get the bus in Glover Park

In Glover Park, the neighborhood streets pose a challenge when snow falls, because the streets are hilly and narrow. Side streets often take time to get plowed and become impassable to buses and cars.

The D2 bus, which runs through Glover Park, stopped venturing into the neighborhood during the day. By late afternoon, WMATA officials told Glover Park residents that the bus was running on a snow detour. But the information coming from the agency didn’t match what drivers were actually doing.

@Metrobusinfo we heard the buses were stopping at 35th street and going no further. A resident had to walk from Hardy Middle School.

— ANC 3B (@ANC3B) January 6, 2015

Instead of taking the planned snow detour, buses were stopping their routes at 35th Street and Whitehaven Parkway.

Ann Chisholm, Government Relations Officer for WMATA, told Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Jackie Blumenthal that drivers do not decide where to go; instead, they follow the prescribed route. On Twitter, @MetroBusInfo communicated the same detour. But the bus drivers found ice on 39th Street and told one another to turn back at 35th.

It is understandable that there are times when bus routes are blocked, but when the actual routes don’t match the information available, it leads residents to wait outside in the cold and snow for a bus that will never come.

Last year, after a very minor snowfall, buses stopped running on some major routes including Wisconsin Avenue. Crowds of riders lined up at the corner of Wisconsin and Calvert St. with no hope of getting on a bus. These types of stories are a constant for riders throughout the region.

Cold, power-free residents don’t know when they’ll have heat again

Dupont Circle, Logan Circle, and U Street usually don’t suffer from power outages because their lines are underground, but something happened at 18th and New Hampshire yesterday at 6:45 am, which resulted in smoke coming out of manhole covers and no power all the way to 13th and U or beyond.

These things happen, and Pepco quickly dispatched crews to the scene. However, the utility gave constantly-shifting time estimates for a fix: 11:00 am, 2:00 pm, 5:00, 7:00, 10:00, and finally 11:30. The power came back at 11:15 pm for all but a few blocks.

During the evening, many residents were tweeting with great apprehension about whether they would have enough heat to make it through the bitterly cold winter night.

Still no power. Very cold. Help me @PepcoConnect

— Madeline Marshall (@Maddie_Marshall) January 7, 2015

DC operated a warming center at Raymond Recreation Center, near Petworth Metro. But as several pointed out on Twitter, that’s over two miles from much of the affected area. This area has a lot of car-free households, and transit doesn’t operate all night.

Pepco’s official statement said, “Pepco recommends that customers monitor the estimated time of restoration and make their own decision whether to vacate their home based on their individual needs and circumstances.” But monitoring the estimated time wasn’t helpful when it had become fairly clear earlier in the day that the estimated time meant little.

Are the people who predicted Dewey defeats Truman the same people predicting @PepcoConnect restoration times? #wrong #fail #WorseThanComcast

— Keaton Brewer (@keatonb) January 7, 2015

Local resident Noah Bopp wrote in an email, “My family has options, but I think about older neighbors who may have depended on Pepco’s predictions and then were effectively trapped in freezing weather with no real means to get out. Anyone walking down [our] street last night knows how pitch-black-icy-treacherous it was. Expecting an aging resident to walk through that to hail a cab on Connecticut to go to the warming center is just crazy.”

There’s still scant information about what exactly happened in that manhole yesterday. But things do happen, and these neighborhoods are lucky not to have had many other power outages. Better estimates and fuller communication could have enabled everyone to make sound judgments and alternate plans. Without it, people are left cold, scared, and confused.