MBTA Buses & Infrastructure

[Arlington]

If you scroll back, you'll also see the next 90 Bus has a "crowd-o-meter" (a one person icon out of a possible three). This will be awesome when fully available, answering Transits perennial question: "when is the later bus and is it less crowded?"

 

[ra84970]

If you scroll back, you'll also see the next 90 Bus has a "crowd-o-meter" (a one person icon out of a possible three). This will be awesome when fully available, answering Transits perennial question: "when is the later bus and is it less crowded?"

I love that the T has "live" crowding information instead of the historic crowding information that a lot of other systems are able to calculate.

 

[chmeeee]

If you scroll back, you'll also see the next 90 Bus has a "crowd-o-meter" (a one person icon out of a possible three). This will be awesome when fully available, answering Transits perennial question: "when is the later bus and is it less crowded?"

They can deploy this just in time for the massive service cuts so the answer will be "in a long time and no, it's even more crowded"

 

[The EGE]

Yesterday's GM report indicates that a pilot of SB bus lane on the Tobin begins December 14.

 

[HelloBostonHi]

Relevant to this thread they also approved the somewhat controversial Silver Line fleet replacement: https://cdn.mbta.com/sites/default/...er-line-bus-fleet-replacements-accessible.pdf

The cons: likely the end of the trolley wires in the bus tunnel, using diesel hybrid instead of a trolley wire charged electric
The pros: even though it's switching from a dual mode, the new buses will be significantly more efficient and less polluting than the ones they replace overall simply because of larger batteries and improvements in hybrids. If you've ridden the silver line you know that off wire it runs full diesel all the time, these new buses will still be able to run hybrid with all the benefits that entails.

Also replacing some of the oldest buses in the fleet with some of the worst reliability, it had to happen soon. Any new bus would've had the same benefits but theoretically means the ability for better headways on the silver line, better passenger count data, and new buses with better accessibility features.

 

[HenryAlan]

I keep reading complaints that the new battery hybrids will lead to greater polluting in Chelsea and East Boston. Am I crazy, or does that not make any sense whatsoever?

 

[ra84970]

I keep reading complaints that the new battery hybrids will lead to greater polluting in Chelsea and East Boston. Am I crazy, or does that not make any sense whatsoever?

The new SL buses will be more efficient users of diesel, but will not eliminate MBTA's tailpipe emissions, which is what the Environmental Justice advocacy groups have been asking for when it comes to SL replacement vehicles. Given that Eastie and Chelsea already bear the burden of the airport noise/emissions, the natural gas facilities, and the motoring tailpipe emissions from the two regional highways cutting through to downtown Boston, they were hoping that the MBTA would completely remove themselves as a contributor to tailpipe emissions in the area.

Also, the EJ advocacy and transit advocacy groups have been asking the MBTA to consider extended-range trackless trolleys with inmotion charging as an alternative to the current diesel-electric hybrids on the SL to be able to provide better service and to remove tailpipe emissions from Chelsea and Eastie.

 

[millerm277]

Also, the EJ advocacy and transit advocacy groups have been asking the MBTA to consider extended-range trackless trolleys with inmotion charging as an alternative to the current diesel-electric hybrids on the SL to be able to provide better service and to remove tailpipe emissions from Chelsea and Eastie.

Is there any existing, proven product on the market in the US today that the MBTA can sign a contract for regarding those?

As far as I can tell that's something still at the pilot project stage in Europe, rather than anything ready for a fleet replacement contract that's already seemingly overdue.

 

[chmeeee]

San Francisco has a new fleet of extended range trackless trolleys.

Zero emissions transit vehicles in San Francisco: In Motion Charging technology from Kiepe Electric essential part of the concept — Kiepe Electric GmbH

▪ 185 New Flyer XT40 electric buses for San Francisco ▪ All electric busses are equipped with In Motion Charging (IMC) technology from Kiepe Electric ▪ Kiepe traction control (KTC) helps reduce energy consumption and maintenance cost ▪ Kiepe Electric now one of the leading suppliers of traction...

www.kiepe.knorr-bremse.com

 

[ra84970]

Since 2014, New Flyer (Canadian-owned) based in Minneapolis has produced trackless trolleies for Seattle and San Francisco that have energy storage systems. You can see the specifications sheet here:

https://flic.kr/p/pG9bHF

Some more general information here:

New Flyer Industries XT40 - CPTDB Wiki

cptdb.ca

That being said, I think these 2014 models would not be able to run from Silver Line Way to Market Basket and back. However, with New Flyer installing battery packs today that can go up to 225 mi in good weather conditions, I would imagine that it wouldn't be too difficult to engineer a new solution that would allow for 15-20 miles of off-wire use on a regular basis.

 

[ra84970]

Dayton, OH -- the smallest system in the US with trackless trollies -- also purchased 45 trackless trollies with energy storage for off-wire use.

https://www.bizjournals.com/dayton/news/2018/04/24/greater-dayton-rta-unveils-design-for-electric.html

 

[Tallguy]

Dayton's new IMCs have 15-20 mile range and space for double the batteries. They are 40fters

 

[cden4]

When the Board asked about using IMC buses, the Engineering department replied that they had not analyzed whether they could run on the system. The big question is why they weren't asked to do this sooner. The Engineering department and even Secretary Pollack both have a real distain for overhead wires. They constantly complain that they are a pain to maintain and have been pushing to remove them altogether (including the trolleybus routes in Cambridge, Watertown, and Belmont) and even resist electrifying the commuter rail because of this. It's just a sign of pure laziness as far as I'm concerned. There are transit systems all over the world that maintain overhead wires. They are the cleanest vehicles you can run! We should have more overhead wires, not less. Advocates are proposing to replace the existing trackless trolleys with IMC buses, which would charge when running on the wired portions and then run from the batteries on other routes or extensions of the routes.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

When the Board asked about using IMC buses, the Engineering department replied that they had not analyzed whether they could run on the system. The big question is why they weren't asked to do this sooner. The Engineering department and even Secretary Pollack both have a real distain for overhead wires. They constantly complain that they are a pain to maintain and have been pushing to remove them altogether (including the trolleybus routes in Cambridge, Watertown, and Belmont) and even resist electrifying the commuter rail because of this. It's just a sign of pure laziness as far as I'm concerned. There are transit systems all over the world that maintain overhead wires. They are the cleanest vehicles you can run! We should have more overhead wires, not less. Advocates are proposing to replace the existing trackless trolleys with IMC buses, which would charge when running on the wired portions and then run from the batteries on other routes or extensions of the routes.

Yep. Other cities are literally beating them over the head with leveraging their TT networks for in-wire charging solving the range issue while keeping their costs low win+win. The research papers from actual-factual revenue implementation milestones are screaming that that's so very much the way Boston should go for max initial bang-for-buck on BEB rollout. And these clowns are bitching about wires and eliminating the OCS department, while setting up a too-obvious cut & run when the known-known BEB range limitations for this climate stymie the rollout all the same and force them to double-down on another generation of hybrids. Hell, literally the same guy who gave the very detailed/well-sourced and very pessimistic BEB follow-up report to the FCMB in September was the same one who two weeks ago suspended reality being the sock puppet announcing this plan. As if the freakin' FCMB members wouldn't immediately notice the difference (probably why it was buried to the last 15 minutes after the 4 hours of "Cutting Forward" death march). So faintest attempt at covering their tracks has *also* apparently succumbed to institutional laziness at the Secretary level on down.

I guess maybe they're at a point where they think if they don't have any actual substantive counterpoint that holds any weight against the mountain of evidence to the contrary, they might as well just double-down on ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ for the energy savings of not even trying to construct a plausible-deniability counterpoint. So straight to "wyrz R icky-", then completely check out instead of bothering to answer why they gave a non-answer. That's pretty much where we're at on this whole debacle. They know they're going to get taken to the woodshed for it by all the advocacy who's-who, have pre-numbed themselves for that imminent public opinion beatdown, and have chosen to go hiding in some personal Not Invented Here dreamland for self-medication purposes.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

One thing with the refinished busway that has irked me is the low curb reveal. I'm surprised it's acceptable as it seems like it would interfere with comfort for people in wheelchairs and mobility devices.

Bar none the single most disappointing/infuriating reveal of the other finished Harvard busway tunnel when I visited it on reopening week last year. Like...how could you resurface the whole effing platform concrete and not top it off for a bridge plate compatible slope/height interface?!?! Luxurious room to ramp up the concrete for the added height, too, and they didn't bother. Now we have that x2 with the other busway. A regular old street curb has less of a jarring step-up than this dedicated transfer platform. And it's not like that matters to just the handicapped; one big step after a series of consistently smaller ones can throw any healthy person off-balance if they're not fully anticipating the size of the drop (esp. while carrying things).

I don't know if this was just inexcusable brain fart or if they've been planning to bludgeon Cambridge service levels many years longer than the recent TT-replacement equipment ratio announcement foretells. I'm guessing former, since this smacks way more of "stupid-stupid" than "evil-stupid". At any rate with the 71 being an eminently BRT'able/60-footer'able future prospect it was doubleplusdumb shortsighting.

 

[ra84970]

Bar none the single most disappointing/infuriating reveal of the other finished Harvard busway tunnel when I visited it on reopening week last year. Like...how could you resurface the whole effing platform concrete and not top it off for a bridge plate compatible slope/height interface?!?! Luxurious room to ramp up the concrete for the added height, too, and they didn't bother. Now we have that x2 with the other busway. A regular old street curb has less of a jarring step-up than this dedicated transfer platform. And it's not like that matters to just the handicapped; one big step after a series of consistently smaller ones can throw any healthy person off-balance if they're not fully anticipating the size of the drop (esp. while carrying things).

I don't know if this was just inexcusable brain fart or if they've been planning to bludgeon Cambridge service levels many years longer than the recent TT-replacement equipment ratio announcement foretells. I'm guessing former, since this smacks way more of "stupid-stupid" than "evil-stupid". At any rate with the 71 being an eminently BRT'able/60-footer'able future prospect it was doubleplusdumb shortsighting.

I've heard from folks that Bus Ops and the like aren't keen on actual level boarding. Mostly near level boarding at like 6 or 7 inch reveal. Which is more evidence to the short sightedness option than the intentionally evil option.

 

[ra84970]

Out on my morning constitutional, I found the following new bus lane my neighborhood this is on Washington Street from Harvard approaching Union Square.

I guess I could also post this to the biking in Boston thread as well since there's some parking protected lanes up on the bridge.

I'm quite impressed at how fast the transportation networks in Somerville have shifted from motorist dominated ideas to multimodal and sustainable ideas.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

https://commonwealthmagazine.org/opinion/greenwashing-the-mbtas-hybrid-buses/

Perhaps missed during the holiday week, but Ari O. had a Comm Mag op-ed on the T's batt bus follies that's predictably unsparing in its indictment of their lax truthiness re: Silver Line and Cambridge fleet replacement. Published under his own byline instead of the TransitMatters brand, but essentially interchangeable with TM's official policy statement on the matter communicated via their website + Twitter feed.


Nothing really to comment about the op-ed. It's a succinct talking points primer on all the big-picture issues of enviro justice abdication, inferior cost management, and stealth service cut downsides raised by the T's incoherent and self-contradictory fleet strategy, as well as damning in its counter-citations of other cities actively doing electrics rollout worlds better than the "Not Invented Here" nabobs. Pretty much frames the script all of the other green and/or good-transpo advocacy groups will follow in taking them to the woodshed.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Past the halfway mark on the New Flyer XDE-40 option order: 31 in-service, 29 to go. Albany is now completely purged of retired Neoplans, and they've begun retirements of the Fellsway Neoplans with the first 6 reassignments of '06-07 -batch D40LF straight-diesels transferred from Lynn. Lynn's hybrids roster has now swelled to 38 (vs. 65 remaining straight-diesels). Note that a +40 option procurement item is still open in case they can go fishing for more discarded options from somebody else's XDE-40 order a la how this ongoing +60 order landed in their lap laundered via Virginia, so they may not be done padding out the roster if a quick-strike deal is to be had from somewhere else.

No scrap bids yet announced for the 71 retired Neoplans and other flotsam piled up at Everett, though with winter upon us any auctions now probably wouldn't be removed until Spring. Last time there was a bus scrapping this big they towed a bunch of them offsite to pile up in the back corner of the Kingston commuter rail station parking lot by the layover yard to keep the active local bus yards clear for snow removal, and just had the scrappers chow down on them from there. Possible could see a repeat of that M.O. given the seasonal match to the last set of mass-scrappings.

 

[HenryAlan]

The new SL buses will be more efficient users of diesel, but will not eliminate MBTA's tailpipe emissions, which is what the Environmental Justice advocacy groups have been asking for when it comes to SL replacement vehicles. Given that Eastie and Chelsea already bear the burden of the airport noise/emissions, the natural gas facilities, and the motoring tailpipe emissions from the two regional highways cutting through to downtown Boston, they were hoping that the MBTA would completely remove themselves as a contributor to tailpipe emissions in the area.

Also, the EJ advocacy and transit advocacy groups have been asking the MBTA to consider extended-range trackless trolleys with inmotion charging as an alternative to the current diesel-electric hybrids on the SL to be able to provide better service and to remove tailpipe emissions from Chelsea and Eastie.

Granted, this isn't what the EJ groups want, but it is not going to be more polluting than the current circumstance. They are claim it will actually be worse than the status quo, which is why I asked the question.