General MBTA Topics (Multi Modal, Budget, MassDOT)

[bakgwailo]

Why even talk about BRT? There are very few places, especially along existing routes, in Boston where actual BRT could be implemented - just look at our best and completely half assed attempt in the Silver Line.

 

[tysmith95]

Why even talk about BRT? There are very few places, especially along existing routes, in Boston where actual BRT could be implemented - just look at our best and completely half assed attempt in the Silver Line.

I think BRT along Boylston could ease some Green Line capacity issues. Capacity issues will definitively get worse once fenway and the pike air parcels are built out. It could also extend up Brookline ave to Longwood.

Also the Chesla Silver Line extension shows how cheap BRT expansion can be. I hope that the MBTA can eventually improve the Silver Line way to I-90 transition and increase speeds in the Silver Line tunnel using some sort of automation.

 

[whighlander]

Why even talk about BRT? There are very few places, especially along existing routes, in Boston where actual BRT could be implemented - just look at our best and completely half assed attempt in the Silver Line.

Bakgwailo -- actually the Silver Line to the Seaport has turned out quite well with the exceptions of the failure to built an underground Harvard Bus Station like terminus at Silver Line Way. Well, OK the quality of the bumpy concrete busway and its affect on the ride.

Also - -while not yet completed -- It looks as if the Silver Line to Chelsea is coming along quite well

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

I think BRT along Boylston could ease some Green Line capacity issues. Capacity issues will definitively get worse once fenway and the pike air parcels are built out. It could also extend up Brookline ave to Longwood.

Also the Chesla Silver Line extension shows how cheap BRT expansion can be. I hope that the MBTA can eventually improve the Silver Line way to I-90 transition and increase speeds in the Silver Line tunnel using some sort of automation.

The problem is you have to pick the right corridors. And there just aren't very many. Scroll to the bottom of that Amateur Planner blog link that collects all of Ari's posts on ITDP. They've got a (very flawed) scoring of corridors in Boston that qualify as potential BRT fits. None of the evaluated corridors hit the scoring threshold for 'true' BRT. So outside of an Urban Ring down payment like SL-Gateway on an unusually spacious rail ROW we really aren't well-suited for it. At least not by the ITDP's own criteria for real-deal BRT.

The problem here isn't that we don't have good bus corridors. We do. Regular-old express buses like a completion of the aborted Crosstown network are exactly what the doctor ordered on these corridors. Regular old Yellow Line express routes with careful stop selection, signal priority, bus lanes where they'll fit, and Key Corridor features like fast-loading bumpouts. Like NYC's Select Bus Service. But that's not BRT and shouldn't be mistaken for it. The problem with BRT is the slippery slope: it starts with a Gold Standard (per ITDP's own scoring) based on that oft-referenced Bogota system...and then it gets whittled down and down and down. Until it's just an express bus (or not even that) done stupidly expensive for its compromises.

That phenomenon's got an official name: BRT Creep. Silver Line Washington is the textbook example of that. Unfortunately when you've got these astroturf groups lined with lobbying money it's all ultimately about modal warfare, so no amount of BRT Creep is too much to justify ITDP's "fucking rightness". Ari's blog cites Light Rail Now as the LRT-nihilist equivalent (although they're pretty much just an obnoxious website, not a front for thinktanks). BRT astroturfers were a lot more prevelant in the mid-90's and early-00's when they were lobbying the hell out of cities like Boston to do BRT everything. Unfortunately (fortunately?) they were a victim of the Silver Line's own notoriety, so ITDP is one of the anachronistic few that's still going strong. Other than the (now rapidly cooling off) flare-up of "DMU's for Everything!" study fad first half of this decade, for the most part sanity is prevailing with more thought to "all modes are tools in the toolbox" right-sizing.

If there's a good thing in that it's that ITDP can't get taken seriously if they publish work this half-assed. I don't want to unilaterally tar them because they have a lot of resources and a lot of interesting data. They could be doing much more valuable work if they just eased back on waving the BRT bloody shirt and just focused more agnostically on corridor studies. By sheer quantity most transit corridors in need of solutions are going to involve buses, so they don't have to get involved with other modes if that's not their thing. Jarret Walker of Human Transit is mainly a bus guy, but when he consults for cities he mainly sticks to his area of expertise and doesn't try to force-fit. It's this modal warfare nihilism that's a complete credibility-destroyer. I honestly don't know how the heads of ITDP expect to be taken seriously treating BRT like it's a cult membership. That is so 20 years ago, back in the dark ages before anyone knew how to conceptualize a transpo portfolio. They just look kind of silly making such easy/obvious fodder of themselves for instantaneous debunking. It's a waste of all good data collection they may have done. It's definitely a waste of MIT's talents.

 

[RandomWalk]

How long before this topic devolves into "Back.... and to the left... back... and to the left... back... and to the left..."?

 

[The EGE]

Another day, another Type 8 derailment. This was at the crossover just east of BC. I happened to be taking pictures of the Green Line, so I had my camera out moments after it happened.

 

[Jouhou]

Did it hit the other train too?

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Did it hit the other train too?

That's the second car, not another train. It split the switch and jumped clean over the opposite track, ripping the coupler off the attached Type 7 in the process.

 

[bakgwailo]

That's the second car, not another train. It split the switch and jumped clean over the opposite track, ripping the coupler off the attached Type 7 in the process.

At least it looks like that Type 7 was due for a rebuild anyways

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

At least it looks like that Type 7 was due for a rebuild anyways

Yeah. 3680's one of the last 6 cars still sporting its original 1986 coat of paint...and it wincingly shows. But couplers are designed to break away like that in a jacknife situation to keep the derailing car from pulling more cars off the rails with it, so it's an expendable part. If nothing was damaged on the underside by the force of the coupler being broken off, 3680 will probably be back in service within a couple days with a new coupler. If it sustained any lightish damage more serious than that...then it just gets promoted to be the next one Alstom picks up on a flatbed for the rebuild program. That's why every Type 7 on the property except for the wreck victims at Riverside awaiting pickup at the very end of the rebuild program is actively in-service right now. Any unit with the slightest crap-out requiring more than a few days' downtime just cuts to the front of the rebuild line.


This makes 12 Type 8's currently sidelined. 10 of them have been out long-term for weeks and months awaiting parts-and-labor, and with the dire staffing situation that dead line is not getting any smaller. Active 7's and 8's on the roster are now dead-even, despite 16-18 otherwise service-ready Kinkis being out at any given time for rebuild. If they can't get any of those sidelined Bredas repaired soon that means we're going to start seeing a lot more 7-7 consists this fall and winter that aren't accessible. Simply because attrition is taking such a toll on the Breda in-service numbers while the maint dept. buckles under the pressure.

At least we're very close to the halfway point on the rebuilds. As of today it's 37 rebuilt Kinkis and 44 non-rebuilds on the active roster. They're coming back much faster now because early on in the program they were dealing with some of the worst cases taking the most time to repair, and are now moving onto the healthier portion of the fleet. The first pilot car for the 18-year-old 3700 series just left the property for Alstom last week, so that's how fast the turnaround is accelerating on the 30-year-old 3600 series cars. By Xmas active roster should be outright-majority rebuilds, which'll help winter reliability a bit. Although not if the Bredas keep falling down and can't get up.

 

[winstonoboogie]

At least it looks like that Type 7 was due for a rebuild anyways

Type 7 coupler was not ripped off, in the first photo you can see the cars are still coupled and neither coupler is on the ground. 3680 was uncoupled and moved under its own power down to Reservoir carhouse before 3837 was placed fully back on the rail.

 

[statler]

You know what's annoying?
When the T announces delays on train you are riding.

You know what's infinitely more annoying than that?
The people who go into a loud, frothing rage as soon as they make the announcement.

 

[Jahvon09]

You know what's annoying?
When the T announces delays on train you are riding.

You know what's infinitely more annoying than that?
The people who go into a loud, frothing rage as soon as they make the announcement.

It IS definitely annoying.

Which is probably why they are contemplating replacing the entire Green & Red Line fleets with all new equipment.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

It IS definitely annoying.

Which is probably why they are contemplating replacing the entire Green & Red Line fleets with all new equipment.

Be careful what you wish for. The Blue Line cars--next-newest on the system--are incredibly chatty with all the superfluous and long-winded bus announcements at every stop. Frank really starts getting on your nerves after 7 or 8 stops.

 

[bakgwailo]

Wait - replace all the Green Line? Type 8s, sure, but why replace the Type 7s if they just got rebuilt? Shouldn't they last for a rather long time yet?

 

[statler]

Yeah, that one of the things I like and will miss about the old OL trains, the human announcements.

Except for that one guy who is fucking obsessed with the 'no bikes on the trains at rush hour' rule. It's a good rule but I don't think we need to be reminded of it 6 times over the course of 4 stops.

 

[winstonoboogie]

Wait - replace all the Green Line? Type 8s, sure, but why replace the Type 7s if they just got rebuilt? Shouldn't they last for a rather long time yet?

You need one low-floor car per train. The Type 7s will not be able to run with The Type 9s and future Type 10s, the Type 8s are the only low-floor cars they can trainline ith. When the Type 8s are phased out, the Type 7s will have to go with them.

 

[JumboBuc]

Yeah, that one of the things I like and will miss about the old OL trains, the human announcements.

Except for that one guy who is fucking obsessed with the 'no bikes on the trains at rush hour' rule. It's a good rule but I don't think we need to be reminded of it 6 times over the course of 4 stops.

Nothing will ever beat the "Have a 5-star day!" guy on the Red Line.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Nothing will ever beat the "Have a 5-star day!" guy on the Red Line.

I miss the singing B Line operator, who became a minor celebrity for that about 12 years ago. Used to catch his shift all the time on my commute; it just made you feel good. Think he got in trouble with management for the publicity it was generating, and that put the kibbosh on it.

Of course, been a long time since they've made their own announcements on Green. Bosses have also clamped down on the operators that override the ASA (though that thankfully silenced some of the "WATCH THE DAWRS, THE DAWRS ARE CLOWSING!!!6!" screamers).

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Nothing will ever beat the "Have a 5-star day!" guy on the Red Line.

I love that guy.


There was another Red operator a few years ago who liked to mimic the stereotypical airline pilot "This is your captain speaking..." voice used all the time in TV & movies.