VIRGINIA RAILWAY EXPRESS
Managers will be on the platform
The first VRE train departs at 5:15 a.m., the last at 7:50 a.m. Riders will probably get to meet a CSX manager as well.
CSX Assistant Vice President Jay Westbrook was on hand for the afternoon Meet the Management session in Crystal City in Arlington last month.
Stafford riders can meet the VRE management at the Leeland Road station on the morning of May 31 and at the Brooke station on June 14.
With VRE trains running on time more often, riders may have fewer complaints against VRE, and with gas prices climbing, many riders have probably forgotten about VRE's 6 percent fare increase at the end of June.
Still, broken-down trains, balky ticket machines and blank information displays are cause for some complaints.
And even when things are running smoothly, it takes some courage and a sense of public responsibility to go out and meet your passengers face to face.
In person and in monthly online chats, VRE's Chief Executive Officer Dale Zehner has done a decent job of fielding riders' complaints, questions and occasional compliments.
"Customers enjoy sharing their good riding experiences as well as the occasional goof-ups," says Pete Sklannik, former chief operating officer of VRE.
He has participated in Meet the Management sessions at the Long Island Rail Road in New York, at VRE and at Trinity Railway Express in Texas, where he heads up that commuter rail service between Dallas and Fort Worth. "In all three locations, customers expressed surprise that they were actually meeting the real railroad management, not just customer service reps," he said.
Meet the Management "venues also provided opportunities for railroad management to respond to a complaint right on the spot," Sklannik said.
Once, at New York's Penn Station, more than a dozen customers approached the Long Island Rail Road's President Chuck Hoppe, "and quite vocally complained about train delays departing east to Long Island," Sklannik said.
The cause was an Amtrak dispatching problem; Amtrak controls eastbound trains for the first few miles out of Penn Station. "Well, Chuck was more frustrated than the customers and stated, 'It's time [Amtrak President] Graham Claytor gets a phone call about this.'" Hoppe called Claytor. "Within 15 minutes, the delays cleared up and the [Long Island Rail Road's] customers were quite happy with Hoppe!" Sklannik said.
A less dramatic example occurred at a VRE Meet the Management session at the L'Enfant Plaza station. The ticket-vending and -validating machines stopped working while Sklannik was talking with passengers. "I was fortunate," he said. The "repair person was nearby and the problem was corrected before the next trains heading south."
Meet the Management "events help showcase management's commitment to customer service and remedial action when needed," Sklannik said. "Action speaks louder than apologies and excuses."
On Wednesday morning, VRE riders might not see any problems fixed on the spot, but they can expect forthright answers from VRE and even CSX: Westbrook candidly admits that CSX has done some "dumb" things, and seems to be genuinely trying to make the VRE-CSX relationship work. CSX and VRE are trying, but both have plenty of room for improvement, too. Let their managers know what you think on Wednesday morning.
STEVE DUNHAM commutes on Virginia Railway Express to Arlington . Write to him c/o Commuter Crossroads, The Free Lance-Star, 616 Amelia St., Fredericksburg, Va. 22401, or e-mail him at
Email: literalman@aol.com.