Enclose D-Line Stations

[F-Line to Dudley]

It's not even a "but the US is different!" type scenario, since there are many agencies right in this country that know how to implement POF systems. It is only the T that is "special" in this regard.

According to themselves less than a year ago, they're not even that special.

In October 2024, the MBTA hired and trained 16 Fare Engagement Representatives to answer rider questions about fares. Within the first several weeks, fare collection increased by up to as 35% at stations where the new Fare Engagement Representatives were on-site.

That level of compliance bump is more or less typical of fare enforcement best practices. And they got it the very first time they tried it, with just a trial program with a skeleton crew! No, it'll never be airtight like fare gates are more-or-less airtight, but you can't in good sense fare-gate every single stop on every single mode without bankrupting yourselves in the process so some sort of common-sense threshold-of-a'ightness needs to be pursued. And they were pursuing it! So what changed? Was the follow-through on the very common-sense thing they said they would implement so hard that now they're oh-so-special in their complete and utter learned helplessness? They haven't even hired any more Fare Engagement Reps since that first stab at it almost 2 years ago...the article says they're still at a woefully-inadequate 16 on-staff. Why--ahem, Boston Globe--are we supposed to surrender to that learned helplessness by throwing money down a deep dark pit for fare gates instead of...I don't know...striving for better with the best practices that transit agencies of all shapes and sizes nationwide and worldwide don't struggle with in the slightest.

I guess we'll never know, because nobody is asking the @#$% question.