Collision on the Red Line. An empty train rolled back into a populated one on the Red Line at Woodley Park station. Four people injured, the station and track are a mess, and a large portion of the Red Line is closed.

How do you do that, WMATA? How does an empty train lose power on the track and freely roll down the slope, without braking, back into the the station? What if the train at Woodley Park had not been stopped at the station and had collided while in motion? How many would have died?

This would be disastrous commuting news for me — if I weren’t already avoiding the Metro in favor of walking to and from work.

Update: Post story here, with photo of one train car atop the other.

Lines were slow and disorganized at the polling place today, and I made it almost to the front of the “E-K” queue before having to go the back of the “L-R” queue because its sign was obscured by a badly positioned “S-Z.” After the wait, though, it was smooth sailing: I showed my voter card, got my ballot, connected the arrows with a pencil, slid the ballot into the Optech Eagle with a satisfying beep, got the “I Voted” sticker, and picked up a free apple from a basket provided by the Lutheran Church whose basement served as my polling place.

It just wasn’t right, having to vote for a less-than-resolute, pro-abortion, Roman Catholic liberal; but it seemed far better than voting for a deficit-growing Sun Myung Moon / Pat Robertson endorsee who started a preemptive war based on botched intelligence at the expense of the general war on terror.

Photos from the polling place here.

Joel, The Dane, Rick, Smash, and Kottke voted. Valerie decided not to.

(Thanks to Tim, by the way, for the sticker image, which looks just like the one I got.)