Broken rail causes delay for RTD A Line riders; repairs to rail completed Thursday afternoon

DENVER – Commuters heading to or from the airport experienced delays of up to an hour Thursday morning because of a broken rail near Central Park Station on the University of Colorado A Line.

A bus had to shuttle passengers from Union Station to Denver International Airport. 

Crews worked into the afternoon to repair the damaged rail. RTD has not said what caused the damage.

RTD said just before 4 p.m. that repairs were complete and trains were back on schedule.

Update: Repairs on the CU A line have been completed. Trains are back on schedule. https://t.co/m695ErZg9q

— RTD (@RideRTD) December 8, 2016

The commuter rail line to the airport has been plagued with problems since opening earlier this year. The line has been shut down or delayed in the past because of power issues and problems with several crossing arms along the route. 

Today's trouble lead to Ashley Luna missing her flight.

"I'm pretty upset because I'm meeting my family in Mexico," said Luna.

Had Ashley known the extent of the delay, she said she would have grabbed a cab.

"No one communicated with us when we were sitting outside for 45 minutes, so that was unfortunate as well," she said.

Denver7 reporter Marc Stewart talked to an RTD spokesman about the lack of updates.

"People who were on the train, who were at the station, do not feel RTD gave updates in a timely manner. What do you say to them?” asked Stewart.

“That's something we're still working on, in the moment," said spokesman Nate Currey.

“We do have isolated incidents like this and I think that’s to be expected. I think the large endemic issues that we’ve experienced before are largely addressed and with a new program like this there’s going to be things that come up like that.  We just ask the public’s patience,” he said.

Ashley is rebooked for tomorrow.

How she'll get to get to the airport is still to be determined.

"This is the first time this has happened to me. I don't know if I'm going to take it tomorrow, just because I don't want to miss my flight again,” she said. “But I mean I understand that things like this happen and I don't think it will prevent me from taking it in the future."