Search results

  1. TheRatmeister

    MBTA Fare System (Charlie, AFC 2.0, Zone, Discounts)

    The MTicket passes aren't valid on bus/subway so for like 90% of people it's not worth saving the $10/month. Yay splintered fare system!
  2. TheRatmeister

    Reasonable Transit Pitches

    I'm not super duper familiar with Germany so there might be some exceptions but in general there is a national infrastructure company (Network Rail, Prorail, DB InfraGo, etc), a national rail operator (DB, Renfe, SNCF, NS, PKP, etc), concession operators (Arriva, Transdev, Keolis, Abellio, etc)...
  3. TheRatmeister

    Reasonable Transit Pitches

    These already have unified ticketing, at least mostly. You can buy a single ticket from Springfield to Grand Central. I believe for Metro North it only applies to New Haven trains, not Waterbury, Danbury, Stamford, or New Canaan services. Or bike-and-rides, to my great annoyance.
  4. TheRatmeister

    Reasonable Transit Pitches

    The UK is hardly the only one to have integrated ticketing, the other two European countries (I'm aware of) that make extensive use of franchising and (semi) private operators are Germany and the Netherlands, and they both have integrated ticketing. Granted nearly 0 people will use anything...
  5. TheRatmeister

    Crazy Transit Pitches

    If you can actually do cost controls it shouldn't, at least in theory. I haven't counted everything up but it's around 2,000 miles of new or significantly improved line, plus something like 550 new stations and some amount of rolling stock. At $50m per mile that's $100bn in rails, at $20m per...
  6. TheRatmeister

    Multi-Family Zoning Requirements for MBTA Communities

    Probably not a good idea, land use is not something you can just apply a formula to, it's a very individual thing. I don't think there's a shortcut to the state making a new, integrated, state-wide zoning map.
  7. TheRatmeister

    Crazy Transit Pitches

    Thank you! I believe I've been working on this for a month and a half now? I looked at a few other interurban routes for Providence but nothing really made sense to me. Obviously you could also design a light rail or maybe even metro system for Providence, but that felt very out of scope and a...
  8. TheRatmeister

    Crazy Transit Pitches

    I wanted to add that but there is functionally no existing ROW. The Cape Cod Main Line north of Wellfleet is so extremely, thoroughly encroached upon to the point of being unusable. If you want rail service to Provincetown you'd probably need to build a new line next to Rt 6, either adjacent to...
  9. TheRatmeister

    Crazy Transit Pitches

    I went over everything on google earth, plotting routes and station locations. Unless I made a mistake (which is entirely possible), there should be no major developments that would need demolishing. I think in a few places you need to get rid of one or two buildings or deviate behind a new...
  10. TheRatmeister

    Crazy Transit Pitches

    I'm keeping this in Crazy Transit Pitches because I'd argue over the timescale you'd be seeing anywhere near a full-build at, it's could possibly maybe not be that expensive. SMART is building rail in California at $30m per mile today. But yes, it does involve a total (if gradual) total...
  11. TheRatmeister

    MBTA Fare System (Charlie, AFC 2.0, Zone, Discounts)

    The red-jackets are outsourced, paid minimum wage and get minimal training. It shouldn't be too hard to figure out from that why having them do fare enforcement would be a bad idea, but it's roughly in the same category of why retail workers are told not to confront shoplifters, for example.
  12. TheRatmeister

    Metro photos from around the world

    Here's one that really surprised me, the Lille Metro: Colbert Tourcoing Centre Mercure Lille Europe Wazemmes Rihour Wasquehal Pavé de Lille Mons Sarts Montbello (fish!) Port de Lille Mitterie République Beaux Arts
  13. TheRatmeister

    Reasonable Transit Pitches

    Generally the best approach but it's also worth considering that intersections are sometimes destinations, with attractions and businesses concentrated around them. They also might be built up more, with higher buildings than other parts of the street which compounds with the light-blocking of...
  14. TheRatmeister

    Reasonable Transit Pitches

    You have options. If you have an open plot you can do a ground level station building on one side, you could take add entrances on each sidewalk by removing some street parking and shifting the travel lanes, or you can put the entrance in the median and again take some street parking away for a...
  15. TheRatmeister

    Reasonable Transit Pitches

    By being significantly wider, and with good street design. Curb-to-curb Columbia Rd is about 85 feet wide. For comparison the 'wide' parts of Washington St are 70 feet across, the narrow parts about 40 feet. Between stations the viaduct would be about 30 feet across, the supports underneath are...
  16. TheRatmeister

    Reasonable Transit Pitches

    I was in NYC a few years back and had just gone to see Coney Island because it felt like a thing I should do at least once, but I didn't want to pay that much for food so I took the D up to somewhere, and yeah the views out the train were amazing. And then I got off the train, went down to...
  17. TheRatmeister

    Logan Airport Capital Projects

    What I think might be the most interesting part of the history is that it's a much more... uncomfortable case of urban renewal/land repurposing than the more well known examples. I think most people at this point would be in agreement that the destruction of Scollay Sq, the West End, and the...
  18. TheRatmeister

    Boston Alt History

    Fun prompt I've wonder about for a while, would transport in Boston look different if MA had a local rolling stock manufacturer in the 1900s? Say the St Louis Car Company (the largest PCC streetcar manufacturer along with most NYC subway cars until the 1970s) was based in Springfield instead...
  19. TheRatmeister

    Boston transit pics

    Taken January 11th of this year and posted in the Photo of the Day thread previously, but I feel like it fits here too.
  20. TheRatmeister

    Fantasy T maps

    Some poor soul on the reddit seems to have paid $27 for a printed copy of an extremely unfinished version of my first fantasy map from Amazon.

Back
Top