Parked trains cause pains for Chester County community

Trains keep parking on a stretch of tracks in a Chester County community, blocking lanes and causing big delays for people who need to get from one side of town to the other.

The delays because of the trains are causing headaches for residents, but even the local sheriff’s office says it could be a life or death issue. This has been an issue in Chester going back at least several years.

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Channel 9 was in Chester Thursday when we saw a train take about 30 minutes to pass the track over Gadsden Street.

At times, the train came to a complete stop on the tracks; other times, it rolled backwards, testing the patience of more than a dozen drivers.

“I don’t have any idea what’s going on,” said Gwen Hicks. “Sometimes I’ll turn around and take another route, but today I don’t feel like going through all them problems, so I’m just gonna sit here and wait ‘til the train moves.”

But even if Hicks had moved from that spot on Gadsden Street, there’s no guarantee she’d find a faster way around.

“A lot of these tracks are very connected, so you may be blocked at one point, think you can go around, and you’re blocked by the same train at a different point,” said Grant Suskin with the Chester County Sheriff’s Office.

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Suskin says the delays are creating a public safety issue.

“Some calls are life and death situations, those minutes it takes to go around the tracks to another location can mean the difference between life and death,” he said.