L.A.-Bound Rail Riders Feel a Tug at Their Legs

Beleaguered pre-dawn commuters on Metrolink’s Riverside line traveling to L.A.’s Union Station on Thursday were treated to yet another on-the-seat flier announcing delays and convoluted route changes caused by Union Pacific track repairs.

But this latest update, printed on official-looking Metrolink stationery, was a fake.

The early April Fool’s prank riffed on the long delays that commuters to Los Angeles have had to endure while Union Pacific upgrades tracks across the region.

“It just goes to show you have to have a sense of humor to ride on the Riverside line,” said Metrolink spokeswoman Denise Tyrrell.

The phony fliers were waiting on seats when riders boarded the 4:42 a.m. train from Riverside to downtown L.A.

The bogus “Metrolink Commuter Update” described made-up problems of stresses to newly renovated tracks, explaining that the just-installed railroad ties would have to be outfitted with “poly-balatro resin” spikes. (The new ties use wire fasteners, not spikes.)

The flier then detailed elaborate route modifications, with odd- and even-numbered trains winding along different Rube Goldberg-like routes that included boarding buses and reboarding other trains.

And finally, written in teeny-weeny type at the bottom of the page: “Happy April Fools Day from Rider X.”

Rider X’s familiarity with actual repairs on the Riverside route, along with the almost weekly Metrolink fliers that are legitimate, indicates that X is “definitely a regular rider,” Tyrrell said.

But nobody was fooled, she said. “Everybody was awake enough on that train to get the joke,” although the conductor did announce to passengers that the flier was a silly stunt.