General MBTA Topics (Multi Modal, Budget, MassDOT)

F Line - any idea what is going on with the Orange Line tracks headed into North Station from the north? The past few weeks the trains all come to almost a complete stop after CC headed into the North Station tunnel. They used to go full speed into the tunnel and now they all come to a halt.
 
falcon42 said:
F Line - any idea what is going on with the Orange Line tracks headed into North Station from the north? The past few weeks the trains all come to almost a complete stop after CC headed into the North Station tunnel. They used to go full speed into the tunnel and now they all come to a halt.
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No idea...I haven't been north of State on Orange in months; my travels skew too much Red + B these days. Kind of late in the year to still be doing winter resiliency construction, so doubt it's that.
 
Bad rail condition, until it is replaced, 10 mph speed limit from Community College to a few 100 feet into the portal.
 
Interesting. I remember major delays a few weeks ago for track issues so that must be related.
 
Must be another track issue between Tufts and Back Bay; just saw a notice for speed restrictions there today.
 
The T might have found a Win Win Win proposition with signing the contract for Springfield-built Subway Cars

The BBJ reports that:
http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/n...ory-in-western-mass-could-helpmake-the-t.html
A new factory in western Mass. could help make the T more reliable
Dec 29, 2016, 7:01am EST

By Jim Kinney
Masslive.com

Besides supplying new subway cars for the MBTA, a gargantuan Chinese-owned rail car factory nearing completion in East Springfield might get work doing heavy maintenance on cars for the T, according to the state’s transportation secretary.

The T is digging itself out of a $7 billion differed maintenance hole and has no interest in climbing back down under a pile of breaking equipment anytime soon, Secretary Stephanie Pollack told reporters and editors at the Boston Business Journal’s sister publications, The Republican and MassLive, during a meeting Wednesday...

The T’s old maintenance plan was to run cars and do as little as possible to them until a major “mid-life” overhaul, Pollack said. The new plan is to treat the subway cars, buses and Green Line trolleys much more like careful owners treat their own automobiles: regular maintenance....

“We know that because the Red and Orange cars will come east from Springfield, we can just send them back out for maintenance,” Pollack said.

The desire to keep up with maintenance is one reason the MBTA is in discussions with CRRC about having CRRC do heavy maintenance on its fleet.
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^Sounds like a good idea. Just posted the same topic in the New Orange and Red Line Car Thread.
 
Noticed this for the first time in Porter today:

XOdGoW4h.jpg


The contact email seems to indicate that it might belong to Cambridge rather than the T, but regardless it's a nice addition.
 
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Uncivil_Engineer said:
Noticed this for the first time in Porter today:

XOdGoW4.jpg


The contact email seems to indicate that it might belong to Cambridge rather than the T, but regardless it's a nice addition.
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Correct. These were sponsored by the City of Cambridge.

My only problem with it (and others around the system) is that they are all different, shapes, sizes & their information is displayed in different color styles, fonts, sizes etc. There is no standard legibility. I'm a rider that uses Maverick that has a Solari-UDine info board. To me, I know that style of board will tell me MBTA info if I see others in the system (like Wonderland). If I go to Cambridge & see this kiosk, I have no way of knowing it is telling me T information. It could be selling me groceries or something for all I would know from afar. Maybe they could at least slap a T roundel on that red part at the flare on top.

The T should really standardize information kiosks. If they can't budget to put their standard model in Cambridge, then Cambridge should pitch in and the standard T board should be installed.
 
datadyne007 said:
Correct. These were sponsored by the City of Cambridge.

My only problem with it (and others around the system) is that they are all different, shapes, sizes & their information is displayed in different color styles, fonts, sizes etc. There is no standard legibility. I'm a rider that uses Maverick that has a Solari-UDine info board. To me, I know that style of board will tell me MBTA info if I see others in the system (like Wonderland). If I go to Cambridge & see this kiosk, I have no way of knowing it is telling me T information. It could be selling me groceries or something for all I would know from afar. Maybe they could at least slap a T roundel on that red part at the flare on top.

The T should really standardize information kiosks. If they can't budget to put their standard model in Cambridge, then Cambridge should pitch in and the standard T board should be installed.
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Unless it's just a trial. It would make a lot of sense to throw a bunch of these things from different vendors around the system to give them some real-world feedback...then coalesce on a consistent standard. It's early yet for doing up a kiosk system that's scalable systemwide in robust fashion to every tracking situation. Compared to other agencies they're very amenable to tech trials and exceptionally open with publicly sharing its data strams, so as long as City of Cambridge shares the feedback from this install the more the merrier.


FWIW...Cambridge has got a lot to gain from this too. I have a friend who works for the City's GIS department and helped design their 3D density database (i.e. mapping demographic density by parcel and height) 5-6 years ago, and their back-end repository is apparently a sight to behold.
 
I'm curious if anyone has any updates on the AFC 2.0 RFQ/P process and if the T is still anticipating a summer 2019 roll-out.
 
Uncivil_Engineer said:
Noticed this for the first time in Porter today:

XOdGoW4h.jpg


The contact email seems to indicate that it might belong to Cambridge rather than the T, but regardless it's a nice addition.
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Went for an up-close look at this thing yesterday. Kind of flimsy-construction. Secured to the pavement by only 2 bolts, and made of some sort of plastic composite. Apply some hand pressure on it and it wiggles. Definitely "trial"-quality hardware. Any permanent installations are going to have to be in a lot sturdier metal box than this. First major snowfall when they use small riding snowblowers or forklift plows to clear the plaza and this thing's going to get dinged up real good.

Solar-powered, and the LCD display is one of those ultra low-power grayscale "E-Ink" displays like early-generation Kindles used to have, where the image stays onscreen without power and only draws from battery when the image changes. Display is very high-contrast and sharp from all angles but couldn't tell in midday light if it had any sort of backlight on it. Will have to swing by after dark and see what kind of visibility it provides. That could be an issue if the solar cells aren't strong enough to charge more than just the E-Ink refresh, or if winter grime collected on the panels prevents the backlight from staying on all night through the dark of 5:00am start of service. From what little I could see of them at ground level the solar panels certainly didn't look like cells with any sort of high-power capability, as that would require a somewhat heavier frame.



It's simple and functional. The tracking info is very readable and refreshes regularly, so it's already extremely useful for commuters. Because of Porter's extreme depth it's a real boon to know how much time you have to rush downstairs to catch the next train. Too many people go sprinting dangerously down the escalators when they hear a train coming, and it's much better to be able to make that decision way up on the surface at the main entrance to save from temptation on engaging in risky last-second behavior. But the kiosk is definitely not constructed robustly enough to serve as any sort of systemwide template, so this is almost certainly a feedback-collection trial that'll go away and/or be replaced by something more production-quality in a matter of months.
 
I saw one of those going up in Dock Square this morning.
 
From Channel 5:

The MBTA will not renew its contract with Keolis Commuter Services, state Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack said Thursday.

The contract is set to expire in June 2022.

Officials said they plan to go back out to bid for a vendor to take over carrying millions of passengers over nearly 400 route miles each year.

"Our intention would be to begin a re-procurement process so that it could be completed and a transition -- if one were going to even take place -- would happen at the end of the current eight-year contract," Pollack told the State House News Service.

Signed in the final year of Deval Patrick's administration, the $2.69 billion eight-year Keolis contract included two two-year options to extend.
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http://www.wcvb.com/article/mbta-wont-renew-keolis-commuter-rail-contract-officials-say/8567161

Personal opinion - just time to bring it in house, but maybe put it under MassDOT proper instead of the MBTA?

To go to another vendor again after seeing continual decline.......isn't that the definition of insanity?
 
WormtownNative said:
To go to another vendor again after seeing continual decline.......isn't that the definition of insanity?
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Exactly. This isn't even Keolis' fault. They're doing the best job so far out of any of the previous ownership. Keolis inherits pathetic broken equipment from decades of underfunding the T only to get blamed for everything that is really the T's & legislatures' fault.
 
In house means union, which would make it a non-starter for the Baker administration.
 
I don't understand the point of Pollack's statements, unless they were twisted by the media. Even if you had no plans to renew a vendor, why would you state this at year 2 of an 8 year contract? They have a guaranteed 8 years (barring any extreme breaches of contract). There's such a thing as vendors tanking it when they know they're out. This is contract management 101. You play diplomacy until the moment you kick their ass out because you have no choice but for them to perform.

I have a hunch that this is as much about the contract terms as it is about Keolis. I bet there was a back channel conversation where Keolis was told that this is going out for re-bid and that they're welcome to bid.

(I am not defending Keolis...just saying, generically, you don't kick your vendor in the junk when they have 6 guaranteed years left)
 
I might be totally off-base, but don't they technically have to put it up for bid after the contract runs out? I thought MBCR just never had competition for the bidding...
 
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