Green Line Extension to Medford & Union Sq

Delvin4519 said:
GLX repair work and Lechmere Viaduct repair work to run from November 27th to December 22nd as early access work. This work will coincide with the Government Center Garage demolition. It will also complete the lifting of the Lechmere Viaduct speed restriction.
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Updated recently to state that the bypass-only of Haymarket will be shorter, only through the 10th of December
 
TheRatmeister said:
Proof-of-payment is a better system anyways. We should really just switch to that and then stop dealing with fare gates.
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While proof-of-payment certainly has its benefits, I believe that's part of my question. GLX essentially uses a "proof-of-payment" system today, just a terribly executed one.

The GLX is already designed to reap most benefits of proof-of-payment systems, most notably all-door boarding. If they're indeed beneficial for GLX, the answer to my question should be a resounding no. But that would require the (economic and social) benefits of not having riders go through fare gates to outweigh harms of fare evasion, and that seems hard to analyze.

In an AFC 2.0 world, I imagine the main difference will be that there will be more visible tap-to-pay card readers at station entrances, instead of CharlieCard machines for fare validation. They'll certainly serve as a reminder for riders to pay, but the question is whether they'll actually tap. At least with the current implementation, many or most riders don't, based on the observations of myself and others here. And once riders develop the habit of evading fares and knowing they'll face no consequences, it can be hard to change.

I do think AFC 2.0 will be crucial for Green Line surface stations and buses, but GLX seems like a different case (edit: at least if patrolling is as non-existent as today).
 
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It's an interesting converstation to have. I initially -- maybe from December 12 last year (yup, I was one of those weirdos who woke up crazy-early on a frigid day to be on the first train...) though to March or so -- paid dutifully b/c I know the T is bleeding financially and I want it to improve and once again be the best urban public transit in the land, but when literally every single person walking by me *doesn't* pay, at a certain point it's hard not to feel like a chump.

So, most of the time for the past many months I haven't paid if I'm getting on after (outbound) or before (inbound) Lechmere.

Hopping on the B line going outbound after Kenmore is free (or it was. Has that changed?). Why was/is that the outlier in the system? Purely to accomodate BU and BC kids? If so, Tufts/Harvard kids should/could be reason to make all of the GLX (after Lechmere) free, too(?).
 
Teban54 said:
While proof-of-payment certainly has its benefits, I believe that's part of my question. GLX essentially uses a "proof-of-payment" system today, just a terribly executed one.

The GLX is already designed to reap most benefits of proof-of-payment systems, most notably all-door boarding. If they're indeed beneficial for GLX, the answer to my question should be a resounding no. But that would require the (economic and social) benefits of not having riders go through fare gates to outweigh harms of fare evasion, and that seems hard to analyze.

In an AFC 2.0 world, I imagine the main difference will be that there will be more visible tap-to-pay card readers at station entrances, instead of CharlieCard machines for fare validation. They'll certainly serve as a reminder for riders to pay, but the question is whether they'll actually tap. At least with the current implementation, many or most riders don't, based on the observations of myself and others here. And once riders develop the habit of evading fares and knowing they'll face no consequences, it can be hard to change.

I do think AFC 2.0 will be crucial for Green Line surface stations and buses, but GLX seems like a different case (edit: at least if patrolling is as non-existent as today).
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Is it really proof of payment if you never check? I'm not really sure it is. We have a bunch of transit police officers, maybe it's time to actually give them some work to do. There should be some room in the budget if we decide not to replace all those fare gates once they reach the end of their useful lives.
 
chrisbrat said:
It's an interesting converstation to have. I initially -- maybe from December 12 last year (yup, I was one of those weirdos who woke up crazy-early on a frigid day to be on the first train...) though to March or so -- paid dutifully b/c I know the T is bleeding financially and I want it to improve and once again be the best urban public transit in the land, but when literally every single person walking by me *doesn't* pay, at a certain point it's hard not to feel like a chump.

So, most of the time for the past many months I haven't paid if I'm getting on after (outbound) or before (inbound) Lechmere.

Hopping on the B line going outbound after Kenmore is free (or it was. Has that changed?). Why was/is that the outlier in the system? Purely to accomodate BU and BC kids? If so, Tufts/Harvard kids should/could be reason to make all of the GLX (after Lechmere) free, too(?).
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My understanding is what's actually happening is that in order to not slow down boarding massively the drivers just open all the doors and wave people on, It's not actually free.
 
Teban54 said:
Random thought: Has the lost revenue from fare evasion on GLX outweighed the cost of installing fare gates as part of the original project?
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In the post-COVID world a lot of people who used to have monthly passes have switched to paying per-ride, which might have been a flaw in their assumptions.
In the 2018 version of the passenger survey, 24% of Green Line riders paid per-ride.
In the 2022 version of the passenger survey, 34% of Green Line riders paid per-ride.
 
737900er said:
In the post-COVID world a lot of people who used to have monthly passes have switched to paying per-ride, which might have been a flaw in their assumptions.
In the 2018 version of the passenger survey, 24% of Green Line riders paid per-ride.
In the 2022 version of the passenger survey, 34% of Green Line riders paid per-ride.
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Yeah, and I'd say that even without Covid, if a substantial number of GLX riders found out that they can almost always get a free ride in one direction, it affects the calculus of whether a monthly pass is worth it for them.
 
chrisbrat said:
Hopping on the B line going outbound after Kenmore is free (or it was. Has that changed?). Why was/is that the outlier in the system? Purely to accomodate BU and BC kids? If so, Tufts/Harvard kids should/could be reason to make all of the GLX (after Lechmere) free, too(?).
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It used to be actual policy, along with double fares for Braintree/Riverside, but both ended in 2006. Now it's officially fare evasion, though it's so pervasive it's pretty much standard, even going inbound.
 
Teban54 said:
While proof-of-payment certainly has its benefits, I believe that's part of my question. GLX essentially uses a "proof-of-payment" system today, just a terribly executed one.

The GLX is already designed to reap most benefits of proof-of-payment systems, most notably all-door boarding. If they're indeed beneficial for GLX, the answer to my question should be a resounding no. But that would require the (economic and social) benefits of not having riders go through fare gates to outweigh harms of fare evasion, and that seems hard to analyze.

In an AFC 2.0 world, I imagine the main difference will be that there will be more visible tap-to-pay card readers at station entrances, instead of CharlieCard machines for fare validation. They'll certainly serve as a reminder for riders to pay, but the question is whether they'll actually tap. At least with the current implementation, many or most riders don't, based on the observations of myself and others here. And once riders develop the habit of evading fares and knowing they'll face no consequences, it can be hard to change.

I do think AFC 2.0 will be crucial for Green Line surface stations and buses, but GLX seems like a different case (edit: at least if patrolling is as non-existent as today).
Click to expand...
My understanding is that the GLX stations will be treated like the surface stops on the western branches. That means, a rider taps on boarding rather than at a fare gate line.
 
TheRatmeister said:
We have a bunch of transit police officers, maybe it's time to actually give them some work to do.
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There are a lot of pros and cons for a proof-of-payment system, but this seems like by far the biggest downside. It's not good for anyone to set up regular confrontations between riders and the police. Cops don't want to have to bother people like that. People don't want to get regularly bothered by the police. Some people are justifiably scared of any interactions with the police. This is a massive downside that can be avoided by just using faregates.

Also, I don't know why you'd be eager to make work for people. I'm fine with transit police not doing much a lot of the time. It's fine if they're just there for emergencies like fights, threats, medical problems, whatever. Solving those quickly can keep people safe and keep trains moving. It's not somehow better to fill up supposed downtime with the kind of busy work that could be handled by an inanimate faregate.
 
as02143 said:
My understanding is that the GLX stations will be treated like the surface stops on the western branches. That means, a rider taps on boarding rather than at a fare gate line.
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In terms of payment, this is almost certainly not the case. The intended payment method is for riders to "validate" their fares at the CharlieCard machines (there's a special "validation" button at GLX stations that other stations don't have), then keep the receipt for inspection. You can pay on board, but that's intended for those who hadn't validated their fares.

The T made several social media posts and website pages explaining this when GLX opened. Many stations still have signboards reminding people to validate their fares (I know Lechmere does, not sure about others).
 
Teban54 said:
In terms of payment, this is almost certainly not the case. The intended payment method is for riders to "validate" their fares at the CharlieCard machines (there's a special "validation" button at GLX stations that other stations don't have), then keep the receipt for inspection. You can pay on board, but that's intended for those who hadn't validated their fares.

The T made several social media posts and website pages explaining this when GLX opened. Many stations still have signboards reminding people to validate their fares (I know Lechmere does, not sure about others).
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The whole thing is very confusing and not clear who needs to validate. I have a 1A pass so I never bother to do it. There's no logical reason anyone with a pass should need to validate apart from the T's own incompetence.

Unrelated, but I've always thought that there should be the option to validate at more stations throughout the system, like the do on Fairmount now, such as Aquarium for the Charlestown and East Boston ferries. If you have a LinkPass it's very annoying to have to pay extra simply because you have the wrong fare media because you don't regularly take those services.
 
Teban54 said:
In terms of payment, this is almost certainly not the case. The intended payment method is for riders to "validate" their fares at the CharlieCard machines (there's a special "validation" button at GLX stations that other stations don't have), then keep the receipt for inspection. You can pay on board, but that's intended for those who hadn't validated their fares.

The T made several social media posts and website pages explaining this when GLX opened. Many stations still have signboards reminding people to validate their fares (I know Lechmere does, not sure about others).
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That is a temporary measure until the phase of the AFC2/Fare Transformation project where they begin doing on-board GL fare collection.
 
HenryAlan said:
Yeah, it was the policy on all surface branches (maybe not the D-Line, didn't ride that much). It was free to ride outbound, and 125% of the usual fare to ride inbound.
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It was the policy on the D-Branch, too. I was a regular D-Brancher in the early-to-mid 2000s and I thought that policy ended in 2007, but I certainly believe it if it actually ended in 2006. My memory is fallable, afterall.
 
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