General MBTA Topics (Multi Modal, Budget, MassDOT)

Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

You used to be able to buy them online. Minimum $10 I believe, and they'd mail them to you. I don't understand why they did away with that option. Makes things too easy for their customers, I guess.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

I was in and out of there in about 45 seconds when I had a ticket whose value I wanted to transfer to my card.

Everytime I've gone, the wait has been est. between 1-2 hours. The scene looked like an emergency room.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Where is this and what the heck is it about?

262640_4208305645532_159268625_n.jpg
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Thats hilarious.


But makes no sense. 12 and under rides free, its not height based.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Is that left over from the turnstiles? I can see them having a special turnstile or gate for children, like with people who are restricted to a wheelchair. Don't want little Timmy to get tangled in a turnstile.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Is that left over from the turnstiles? I can see them having a special turnstile or gate for children, like with people who are restricted to a wheelchair. Don't want little Timmy to get tangled in a turnstile.

There was only one turnstile size, kids would enter through the gate.

Currently, kids are supposed to use the wide gates as well, to walk in at the same time as parents.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

I was on a Green line B train last night which stopped at Kenmore Square as usual but the doors did not open. When people become vocal the driver said that we had to announce our stop (by touching the yellow line) so he proceeded onto the Blanchard stop to let us off. Since when has the Greenline become an MBTA bus? I never heard of having to announce a stop on the subway and I have been riding it since 1988!
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

I can only think of one time when I had something similar happen: last summer heading inbound at Hynes, the operator would not open the back doors. That is most certainly atypical. What time were you riding?
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

I was on a Green line B train last night which stopped at Kenmore Square as usual but the doors did not open. When people become vocal the driver said that we had to announce our stop (by touching the yellow line) so he proceeded onto the Blanchard stop to let us off. Since when has the Greenline become an MBTA bus? I never heard of having to announce a stop on the subway and I have been riding it since 1988!

Theyre supposed to do that on the surface, never the subway. Id write to the MBTA with the date and time and complain.

I once had a fun moment on a sardine packed green line, B, heading outbound. Packed to the brim with BU kids heading to west campus....but it skipped both stops after BU west because no one wrung the bell. At packards corner, 95% of the train got off.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Maybe this should form a good argument for Patrick and Davey on why we need to upgrade our transit infrastructure? Maybe to highlight the urgency to the public we can call it the 'transit cliff'?

Massachusetts is beginning to get the 'cream of the crop' in terms of a transit workers. :) Everyone who could leave and get a better job in the private sector did.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Massachusetts is beginning to get the 'cream of the crop' in terms of a transit workers. :) Everyone who could leave and get a better job in the private sector did.

Jobs are also determined by lottery
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

My friend finally replied to my question on her photo. It's at Lechmere. I knew it looked familiar.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Prior to the experiment with operating some three-car trains in Fall 2010, the Green Line peak headways for a portion of both the AM and PM peaks was every 5 minutes on the D and E, slightly shorter than every 5 minutes on the B (a 5/5/4 pattern) and slightly longer than every 5 on the C (5/6/6). If you stood on the platform at Copley outbound from 5 to 5:30 PM and counted the number of trains you saw each fay for that half-hour over a week, the average for the 30-minute observed period would have come out to about 24 trains. Since the scheduling of some three-car trains, there has been some reduction in that amount.

From a service perspective, reliably hitting 6-7 minute intervals on the branches with longer trains is much better than more trains, shorter headways and more bunching. Train throughput is only one part of the equation; if they're supposed to be hitting 5-minute intervals but perpetually missing them, it doesn't do anyone good since trains are expressed, short-turned or go out well above/below capacity.

There comes a point in a slow speed (because of other constraints), high-frequency operation when a CBTC system would not allow as close a spacing as line of sight. An extreme hypothetical example: CBTC would not have allowed for an operation like this had it existed 115 years ago:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/boston_public_library/5143673992/in/set-72157625136193751/

But I think this is losing sight of a main issue: the Green Line was never meant to operate the way it currently does with the technology it has. We need more three-car trains at regular intervals, not 48+ trains with the same messy, manual and perpetually reactionary scheduling.

Although the MBTA is scheduled (or was scheduled through Fall 2010) for 48 trains per hour during the busiest parts of the peak, the system has to be able to accommodate an even higher number when recovering from a delay. I have heard that in practice vs. theory, MUNI has found it difficult to schedule beyond 35 trains or so per hour on the 5 lines it runs (the K and T operate as a through service, in part because of capacity constaints). Note that MUNI metro is 100% high platform in the signalized tunnel (thus shorter dwell times), has longer station spacing in the subway vs. the Green Line, has higher operating speeds on relatively tangent track, and doesn’t have conflicting moves at flat junctions within the subway. All things that could dilute performance if an identical CBTC system to MUNI’s was installed on the Green Line.

The number of trains is almost a secondary concern to keeping consistent headways, something which the Green Line is abysmally terrible at. The reason why it is so overcrowded at times and normal at others is because they'll throw 5 trains down the line in rapid succession and have a gap of 6-10 minutes where no trains show up - during rush hour - meaning most trains are already packed by Park Street. At least with a CBTC system trains would be able to automatically adjust to congestion by moving with the blocks at a reduced speed (thus not using as much energy stopping and starting) and smoothing out the variances in headways much more easily.

I don’t think they have encountered too many problems operating them on the B and the D, but they do have concerns that too many 3-car trains in any one power section could blow a sub-station. That would require upgrades to the electrical system if they were to consistently operate more 3-car trains. The Heath St. loop can only hold a two car train, that would be a problem for operating them all the way on the E line. For the C line, the North Station turn-back would need the interlocking reconfigured so that a 3-car train changing ends would clear the interlocking. I also believe some of the platforms on Beacon St. might have to be extended to hold all of the doors on a three-car train.

A potential future operating scenario, with enough equipment and enough power avialable, would be to operate 3-car trains every five minutes on the B and the D and two-car trains every five on the C and E. I think the computer demand models for GLX service patterns make assumptions about three-car trains on the D Line.

I wasn't referring to them having problems operating 3-car trains, but rather operating all 3-car trains which, as you point out, would be impossible. You are correct that there are worries about electrical requirements on all lines and station lengths along the C and E are not adequate. Also, given that they've shifted away from 5-minute headways with just 32 daily 3-car trains, I'd say it is an impossibility for them to run 5-minute headways on an all 3-car operation anyway.

Also as we're talking about 3-car trains, I realized I haven't seen a 3-car on the E branch in quite some time - seems like they nixed the Brigham Circle short turns?
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

The majority of the Blue, Orange and Red Line stations now have the signs, which transit officials describe as "highly visible" and "highly accurate."

How "highly typical" that the Green Line is absent but could arguably benefit the most from this.

Curiously, I've noticed that the displays at Government Center are only showing the time in the upper right corner like they have with the new countdown setups. Anyone know if they have plans to roll this out on the Green Line?
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

How "highly typical" that the Green Line is absent but could arguably benefit the most from this.

Curiously, I've noticed that the displays at Government Center are only showing the time in the upper right corner like they have with the new countdown setups. Anyone know if they have plans to roll this out on the Green Line?

No. They can't do it.

The times are in the top right corner only in stations where there are connections to other lines, so it is merely a glitch due to them being tied in.


Unrelated: Green Line derailment at Packards Corner a little while ago.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

How "highly typical" that the Green Line is absent but could arguably benefit the most from this.

Curiously, I've noticed that the displays at Government Center are only showing the time in the upper right corner like they have with the new countdown setups. Anyone know if they have plans to roll this out on the Green Line?

The MBTA itself at 45 High St (the OCC) doesn't even know where its GL trains exactly are, let alone being able to release data to the public. Tracking is still done the same way it was 100 years ago, by verbal communication.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

The MBTA itself at 45 High St (the OCC) doesn't even know where its GL trains exactly are, let alone being able to release data to the public. Tracking is still done the same way it was 100 years ago, by verbal communication.

No way! Is that true? How could they not implement GPS tracking?!?! I looked at putting GPS tracking in my company's fleet of vehicles a little while back. It was reasonably priced and you could literally pull up a live feed map on your computer showing where every vehicle was, what speed it was moving at, etc. It was all web-based, super fast, easy install, etc.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

No way! Is that true? How could they not implement GPS tracking?!?! I looked at putting GPS tracking in my company's fleet of vehicles a little while back. It was reasonably priced and you could literally pull up a live feed map on your computer showing where every vehicle was, what speed it was moving at, etc. It was all web-based, super fast, easy install, etc.

I wish it weren't true, but it is. Field operator communication via radio is the only way trains are tracked. I don't understand why they don't stick GPS chips in them either. Even if they don't work well underground, surface data is the most important data anyways because you need to know if you should wait for a train or run to the closest bus stop. The central subway is less of an issue with trains arriving quite regularly.
 

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