OmniRide's Service on Wednesday, March 21
To OmniRide Passengers,
On Wednesday, March 21, just as we were beginning our afternoon Express service pull-out an out-of-control brushfire overtook property immediately adjacent to our Transit Center and bus yard. We evacuated our workforce but had to wait until the fires were under control before we could safety reach the fleet. We had multiple fire engines in our yard combatting the blaze, not to mention our own employees fighting the fire with utility hoses and fire extinguisher to help our first responders and protect our fleet. Staff had to be evacuated and our Transit Center bus service was moved to an alternate location. This created a delay in communication for us to adequately indicate which buses were late or missed due to the operational challenges we were facing.
OmniRide’s level and quality of service was also disrupted by several other events yesterday, which we realize had a negative effect on our passenger’s experience. The morning commute was impacted by the I-95 north express lanes not being open in time for the AM rush due to residual overnight construction. This caused major delays as our buses were forced to be in the northbound general-purpose lanes for a significant portion of their trip, causing delays getting into Washington D.C. and the Pentagon as well as delaying their second trips. OmniRide was also short of operators due to the Ramadan holiday.
Safe and reliable service is a priority at OmniRide and we know we missed the mark yesterday - for that we apologize. Yesterday’s circumstances challenged our ability to provide the service our customers deserve. We will continue to strive to improve the reliability and comfort of your commute through staff training on emergency management, improvement in the maintenance of vehicles and better communication with our passengers.
Thank you for your understanding.