I am a resident of Howard County who works in Washington and Baltimore. I take MARC and light rail when possible, even with the attendant problems of scheduling (especially on weekends) and parking.
While my husband and I are huge supporters of public transport, I wanted to share an experience that occurred recently that left a bad taste with many who are needed as supporters as the discussion turns to regional access to public means of transport in Baltimore ("O's fans mistreated by MTA," June 30).
Light rail made a big promotion to take the train to Camden Yards during games. When the Saturday night game was postponed until Sunday night, we thought we would have to drive as the light rail stops at 8 p.m. on Sunday. However, the light rail website proudly announced that trains would be available for this rescheduled game.
We left the game at the top of the 8th inning when the score was 8-0 and walked over to the station at Camden Yards only to learn that no light rail would run until the game ended, an estimated one hour later, according to the light rail controller. That was never communicated prior to the game. Hundreds of people stood on the platform waiting to go both north and south as it was 9:15 p.m. on a Sunday and people needed to get home. But they refused to run any trains until the game completely ended.
Happily, we not only won the game and clinched first place, the wait was only 45 minutes rather than one hour. But the refusal to run trains left many grumbles and "never again" from this largely suburban group going south. And the controller announced that everyone on the platform should change platforms which resulted in many teens walking on the tracks. This turned out to be misinformation that could have had dire consequences.
If we can't depend on public transport, why would anyone use it? And MARC only runs the Penn Line on the weekend so options are limited. We will drive to our next O's game.
Ellen Frishberg, Ellicott City
