General MBTA Topics (Multi Modal, Budget, MassDOT)

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Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Equilibria said:
Here's a nice pictorial from the Globe, funny how they seem to believe the line runs from Forest Hills to North Station...

http://www.boston.com/yourtown/boston/downtown/gallery/orange_line_111th_anniversary/?p1=News_links

You'd think that in 37 pictures you'd have room for more than 1 from the northern half of the line.
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Equilib -- I only saw a count of 32/32 -- but otherwise I thought it was a good review

By the way -- I counted more than 1 on the Northern part: old Sulivan2 aerial; Passengers at Malden Center
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

The rapid transit system could reach uninterrupted speeds of 40 miles per hour while road trolleys below could only manage 8-10 miles per hour on top of dealing with traffic signals.
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Some things never change. #BLine
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Why does it often take over 20 minutes for a Lechmere train to show up at Park St at night?
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

New Contract for Commuter Rail

Did anyone notice this?

State will cast wide net as it puts commuter rail operations out to bid
By Andy Metzger / State House News Service -- quoted in the Boston Herald
Sunday, May 27, 2012 - Added 2 weeks ago

...The MBTA has set in motion a process that could lead to a change the private company that provides commuter rail service by sometime next summer...

[RFP] hoping to attract the interest of the national and international railway companies capable of operating one of the largest commuter rail operations in the country.

The system carries 144,000 passengers per day, with service based at two downtown Boston hubs and running on 14 rail lines with ... 133 stations... over tracks controlled by the MBTA and three other, private railway companies...

Since 2003, the rail system has been run by MBCR ...a Boston-based private consortium .... partnership between French-based transportation company Veolia Transdev, Montreal-based manufacturer Bombardier and Boston-based transportation management company Alternate Concepts... MBCR’s original contract with the T was due to expire in 2008 but was extended until 2013.... MBCR would bid on the upcoming contract.

Whatever the terms, a contract will likely be worth several billion dollars if it runs 15 years, Regan said....the bidding process itself will cost $3 million. Regan said the review the state gave to the MBTA board about the process that will be used to pre-screen potential bidders is an unusual level of oversight.

...When the MBTA went out to bid about a decade ago, Amtrak decided not to try for it, Farmelant said. [Previously] Amtrak was making an 11.5 percent profit from the railways, but the new contract limited MBCR to 6.2 percent, he said.

.....In planning for its bidding process, the MBTA is considering a longer contract period of up to 15 years, instead of the more standard five to eight-year contract length. That might attract more bidders, according to a presentation by MassDOT to the MBTA board of directors on Tuesday.
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Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

That's already been passed over. MBCR is likely to be the next CR operator again...
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

HenryAlan said:
Some things never change. #BLine
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Sometimes I just band my head on the desk mumbling "signal prioritization, signal prioritization, signal prioritization."
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Oh boy it's time for Friday Afternoon MBTA rant and boy do I have a big one to get off my chest.

One of my biggest pet peeve and definitely the number 1 thing the MBTA does that drives me insane is when you plan to leave early to get to work or leave work because you have some time sensitive plans and the MBTA trolls the f*ck out of you by being so late that not only did you waste your time leaving earlier, but you end up later than if you left on-time and the bus came on-time.

Today, on a beautiful Friday, I decided to hurry home to get my gym clothes to go to the gym. I got out of work 30 minutes early because it was a slow day. I got to the Downtown bus stop for route #93, at 3:44 to catch the 3:45 bus. That bus didn't come. So I waited for the next one at 3:52, then the 3:58, then the 4:06 and then finally the bus arrives at 4:14. By then I can no longer go to the gym because I have to meet up with somebody 5:45 and instead of maybe getting an hour of working out at the gym, I get 30 minutes, not enough time to do much. TO make matters worse, the driver is a complete f*cking idiot. The bus arrives at Haymarket station, packed, and decides the best spot to let people off through the back door is to park it right next to the newspaper boxes. A senior passenger couldn't get off and while passengers are telling the bus driver to move up a bit, the bus sits for about 2 minutes before the drive could understand what is going and finally moves.

Seriously, what is the qualification required to be an MBTA worker besides being able to operate a vehicle? Must bring a deck of cards to work so that the bus drivers can play cards while hiding in their secret hideout at the expense of the customers? Sometimes I want to walk up to the driver while boarding and just say "why bother showing up?" Bus drivers don't deserved to be punched or spitted on but some of them are very damn close to it.

/rant
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

In other news, the Red Line caught on fire twice yesterday.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

KentXie said:
Seriously, what is the qualification required to be an MBTA worker besides being able to operate a vehicle?
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What do you expect? The MBTA is a jobs and benefit agency FIRST and a transit agency LAST. Performance and competence at set at a very low bar and very few transgressions can result in firing only after a long arbitration. Think of the MBTA as a pension fund which happens to have a hobby running some buses and trains.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Oh, I have another favorite fail: I was heading inbound to meet up with friends on Wednesday and when we pulled into Hynes, the second car operator wouldn't open all doors. The doors were working fine at Kenmore so I guess he was just too busy doing nothing and couldn't be bothered to press the second button.

There is literally no hope when your entire job is to sit there and push two stinking buttons to open three sets of doors, and you can't even manage to do that 100 percent of the time.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

That's sort of weird. They've also got popcorn sellers already too. Maybe they just don't want more ATMs/Popcorn? Maybe the don't want competition for the places they're already leasing to? I don't know. Just a guess.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

I could see ATMs like the existing one at Alewife and wherever else they have them, because stations like Alewife don't have ATMs on the street around them. Most stations through Cambridge and Boston have ATMs within a few minute walk of the station. I'd rather not have retail space inside stations eaten up by walk in ATMs.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Government Center has had a popcorn vendor for years, though I haven't been back in the station recently so I don't know if he's still there.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Downtown Crossing has a popcorn vendor at the Forest Hills platform, and it is also sold at the shop on the Alewife platform. Don't know about anywhere else.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Ron Newman said:
Government Center has had a popcorn vendor for years, though I haven't been back in the station recently so I don't know if he's still there.
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Indeed he is, but the popcorn is better at DTX. Quincy Adams also has a popcorn vendor.

Anyway, the T should just start filling any space they can on the concourses in the downtown core with retail. They are missing out on huge opportunities. There is also a vacant space in the Aquarium fare lobby (Faneuil side), but I can't see that one ever profitting from the current usage of Aquarium station (little to none).
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

They have a popcorn seller in North Station on the Lechmere bound side of the Green Line.
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

BussesAin'tTrains said:
I could see ATMs like the existing one at Alewife and wherever else they have them, because stations like Alewife don't have ATMs on the street around them. Most stations through Cambridge and Boston have ATMs within a few minute walk of the station. I'd rather not have retail space inside stations eaten up by walk in ATMs.
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One of the ATMs I was thinking of was a BofA ATM next to the store in the Park Street station on the Green Line northbound platform. Then again, that's a stand-alone ATM and is providing revenue that a staffed store would not. Should the T have spots for vending machines like those at the airport selling iPods and headphones?
 
Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos

Word from Uhub is they that popcorn sellers attract unwanted animals. Not sure if it's true or not, but that's the T's thinking. ATMs still seems to be a mystery.
 
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