Photo by Chris O’Connor

Wednesday morning’s commute became one of the worst in quite a while for Metro riders after a switch near the Judiciary Square station had to unexpectedly be replaced during the middle of rush hour.

As a result, Red Line trains were placed on a single track between Union Station and Farragut North, a five-station stretch that is among the most heavily used parts of Metro’s rail network every morning. Metro reported the switch failure about 6 a.m., and within the hour, the backlog and bottlenecks along the affected route were epic. The transit authority advised riders to expect additional waits of 20 or 30 minutes; in reality, it took many much longer than that to reach their destinations.

Chris O’Connor, who takes Metro from Vienna to his workplace in Bethesda, switched as he usually does at Metro Center. Only when he transferred today, he encountered a platform jammed with more than 1,000 customers trying to press themselves into every arriving train. Before getting in that human jam on the Glenmont-bound side, O’Connor approached the empty platform and captured the madness.

You can see the full-sized version here.

Metro eventually restored two-track operations along the affected corridor about 8:35 a.m., but delays continued for at least another 45 minutes. O’Connor says he finally got to his office about an hour later than he usually arrives.