MBTA Buses & Infrastructure

nyc.streetsblog.org

Power Outage: MTA Delays Bus Electrification Amid Manufacturer Challenges - Streetsblog New York City

American manufacturers have failed to create top-notch plug-in buses.
nyc.streetsblog.org nyc.streetsblog.org

Ruh-roh! New York MTA went in big for the same New Flyer XE40 make BEB's that the T is buying, and the reliability stats on that model have turned out pretty dire: 70% worse MTBF than the diesels they replaced, and only 60% of the fleet able to stay in-service for a full day's duty cycles due to excessive battery drain and other component issues. The agency has paused option orders of +500 more BEB's because of the issues with that fleet.

The T has acknowledged that they're having issues with their XE40's too, per the Board's decarbonization presentation a couple months ago, but they've been very tight-lipped about what exactly isn't going well and how bad.
 
Here's the local angle: the MBTA may have a second-mover advantage here, and so far, internal performance data doesn't indicate the same rate of failures that MTA has had:

While NYC Warns of Reliability Problems, the T Stays the Course On Electric Buses - Streetsblog Massachusetts

"Zero-emission buses are not where they need to be in terms of delivering reliable bus service," warned Jessie Lazarus, the MTA’s head of rolling stock procurement, at a June MTA board meeting.
mass.streetsblog.org mass.streetsblog.org
 
StreetsblogMASS said:
Here's the local angle: the MBTA may have a second-mover advantage here, and so far, internal performance data doesn't indicate the same rate of failures that MTA has had:

While NYC Warns of Reliability Problems, the T Stays the Course On Electric Buses - Streetsblog Massachusetts

"Zero-emission buses are not where they need to be in terms of delivering reliable bus service," warned Jessie Lazarus, the MTA’s head of rolling stock procurement, at a June MTA board meeting.
mass.streetsblog.org mass.streetsblog.org
Click to expand...
Thanks, as always, for the reporting. But a couple things look off here.

In the NYC Streetblog article, it says the MTA diesel buses average about 8,500 miles between failure, and the new battery-electric buses go 2,500. Your article says the MBTA's diesel buses go 30,574 miles and the battery-electric go 28,653 miles before failure. That doesn't make sense that the MBTA's diesel buses are 3-4 times more reliable than the MTA's. And it sounds too-good-to-be-true that some tweaks to the battery-electric buses make the MBTA's more than 10x more reliable. It makes me think there are maybe a couple different measurements or definitions they're using, and that can make it easier to lie with statistics. Are you sure about how the MBTA is using their numbers here? Something looks off.

That maybe doesn't matter as long as the T's measurements are internally consistent. Importantly though, the new buses have only been in service here since the very end of February(?). They weren't used through the cold winter when they are expected to perform worse.

Still, these numbers are promising. I hope they hold.
 
ritchiew said:
Thanks, as always, for the reporting. But a couple things look off here.

In the NYC Streetblog article, it says the MTA diesel buses average about 8,500 miles between failure, and the new battery-electric buses go 2,500. Your article says the MBTA's diesel buses go 30,574 miles and the battery-electric go 28,653 miles before failure. That doesn't make sense that the MBTA's diesel buses are 3-4 times more reliable than the MTA's. And it sounds too-good-to-be-true that some tweaks to the battery-electric buses make the MBTA's more than 10x more reliable. It makes me think there are maybe a couple different measurements or definitions they're using, and that can make it easier to lie with statistics. Are you sure about how the MBTA is using their numbers here? Something looks off.

That maybe doesn't matter as long as the T's measurements are internally consistent. Importantly though, the new buses have only been in service here since the very end of February(?). They weren't used through the cold winter when they are expected to perform worse.

Still, these numbers are promising. I hope they hold.
Click to expand...
It's basically impossible to get accurate MTBF stats on the fleet until North Cambridge garage reopens and the XE40's are running full-time. Charlestown garage only has a couple charging bays for a 37-bus (32 North Cambridge + 5 early-delivery Quincy) active BEB fleet, so most of them are idle on a daily basis while the hybrids continue to be load-bearing for the Harvard routes, they aren't running full duty cycles because of the deadheading distance to the Charlestown chargers, and the buses are being rotated very judiciously between idle periods to give the individual units sparse but semi-regular work. And while they're sitting idle in the yard they're being inspected religiously, something that would not happen if they were being regularly rotated from in-service to charging to in-service. And they're still (though the agency won't say what) having undisclosed teething problems despite the babying.

So, no, it's not equivalent to the problems the MTA is experiencing. Because with New York they were failing under full-bore duty cycles. We haven't yet collected stats for full-bore duty cycles.
 
I suspect we'll get more information pretty soon from our friends in Canada - up in TTC land, they've got 200 NF eBuses, so they're definitely running them enough in worse conditions that we are. They've most recently reporting MDBF of ~35,000km (~22,000mi) across their eBus fleet, but while mostly XE40s they've also got 140 Novas confounding the data, and I'd love to know how the +43% (!) reliability change came to be. I know they've had reliability issues of their own, cumulating in a couple of stop-delivery orders. Interestingly enough, their now-retired pilot fleet of gen1 XE40s ran an average of 70k MDBF, so it may just be that 2025 was just a bad year for NFI component quality as they ramped up volumes of eBuses.
Screenshot_20260708_134515_Chrome.jpg

Last year they took a green bus program update at the end of July, which contained a bunch of data - hopefully they'll repeat that this year, but at that time, their gen 2 eBus fleet was almost all XE40s and they were reporting ~35k km (22k mi) MDBF.
4837.jpg
 

Attachments

  • Screenshot_20260708_134819_Chrome.jpg
    Screenshot_20260708_134819_Chrome.jpg
    521.6 KB · Views: 7
  • English_Report_-_Zero_Emission_Bus_Program_Update.pdf
    198.9 KB · Views: 5
ritchiew said:
Thanks, as always, for the reporting. But a couple things look off here.

In the NYC Streetblog article, it says the MTA diesel buses average about 8,500 miles between failure, and the new battery-electric buses go 2,500. Your article says the MBTA's diesel buses go 30,574 miles and the battery-electric go 28,653 miles before failure. That doesn't make sense that the MBTA's diesel buses are 3-4 times more reliable than the MTA's. And it sounds too-good-to-be-true that some tweaks to the battery-electric buses make the MBTA's more than 10x more reliable. It makes me think there are maybe a couple different measurements or definitions they're using, and that can make it easier to lie with statistics. Are you sure about how the MBTA is using their numbers here? Something looks off.

That maybe doesn't matter as long as the T's measurements are internally consistent. Importantly though, the new buses have only been in service here since the very end of February(?). They weren't used through the cold winter when they are expected to perform worse.

Still, these numbers are promising. I hope they hold.
Click to expand...

I was confused about the differences in NYC vs. MBTA as well, but I'm just passing on the numbers that were reported to me. I suspect that the two agencies might have different standards for "failure", and MTA buses obviously operate in a much different environment as well.

But the main point holds: that by whatever standards the MBTA is using, the failure rate of the BEBs so far is pretty close to the failure rate of the fleet as a whole, albeit with a very small sample size.
 
I think that it's part of the Atc that's being installed. (automatic train control).
 
An editorial from Dot News. It points out that the bus on BHA serves more daily commuters than any branch of the Green Line. I would add that it serves more people than any 3 commuter rail lines combined.
www.dotnews.com

Weighing the pros, cons of Blue Hill Ave. redesign - Dorchester Reporter

Boston lawmakers weigh plans for Blue Hill Avenue redesign.
www.dotnews.com www.dotnews.com

Edit: And this about the level of public debate

www.dotnews.com

Analysis: Records show public has had say on plan for center bus lanes - Dorchester Reporter

One oft-repeated complaint made about the stuck-in-neutral Blue Hill Avenue improvement project is that there hasn’t been enough public input into the $135 million plan. But that refrain from opponents doesn’t pass the sniff test.
www.dotnews.com www.dotnews.com
 
Last edited:
Route 65 change should have been bundled with the Route 86 change. Brighton Center has to had to wait nearly 2 years to get an orange line connection restored.

The amount of frequency route improvements outside of Quincy remains a letdown for now.

Fall 2026 Better Bus Network Service Changes | Previous Service Changes | MBTA

Official website of the MBTA -- schedules, maps, and fare information for Greater Boston's public transportation system, including subway, commuter rail, bus routes, and boat lines.
www.mbta.com www.mbta.com
 
The EGE said:
The new BEBs are starting to see use on routes aside from the 71 and 73. I caught #4201 on route 75 today, and there was another BEB operating on route 74 as well.
View attachment 74152
Click to expand...
Seen this on Route 68 in Kendall all of a sudden too. Just one day but it was a surprise to se "ELECTRIC" on a bus passing by my office window.
 
brookline.news

Town board recommends scrapping one of the bus lanes near Brookline Village - Brookline.News

The pilot study of the bus only-lanes between Brookline Village and the Boston border was a mixed bag: The westbound lane worked well and is up to stay permanently, while the eastbound lane caused problems and set to be nixed.
brookline.news brookline.news
One of the bus-only lanes just south of Brookline Village could be removed after Brookline transportation staff and a key decision-making committee recommended scaling back the “Gateway East” project.
After a year-long pilot, followed by a six-month extension, the town and the MBTA say the westbound bus-only lane is working well, but driver compliance and other issues have plagued the eastbound lane heading into Boston.
The pilot entailed painting red bus-only lanes in both directions between Station Street and the Boston-Brookline border in an effort to speed up buses traveling through the frequently jammed intersection.
According to data presented at a Transportation Board meeting this week, the bus-only lane on Boylston Street helps commuters heading west into Brookline from the Longwood medical area. It’s speeding up buses while only having limited impacts on other drivers.
The board and town planners have recommended keeping that lane in place permanently.
However, there have been enough problems in the other direction that the board voted to recommend removing the bulk of eastbound bus-only lane on Boylston Street, while keeping a sliver of red paint eastbound between Station and Boylston Streets.
Click to expand...
 
So car drivers violate the lane with impunity, and the conclusion is that the lane shouldn't be there? How about a conclusion that enforcement or physical barriers are needed instead? The point of bus lanes is that they do, in fact, inconvenience drivers in favor of bus riders. What are we even doing here, Brookline?
 
HenryAlan said:
So car drivers violate the lane with impunity, and the conclusion is that the lane shouldn't be there? How about a conclusion that enforcement or physical barriers are needed instead? The point of bus lanes is that they do, in fact, inconvenience drivers in favor of bus riders. What are we even doing here, Brookline?
Click to expand...
I haven't been through that often, but my impressions (+ from having rechecked my memory with Street View):

  • Signage sucks or is completely non-existent besides the markings on the road....which are usually completely covered up with other cars. A good number of people sitting in a car in that lane breaking the rules, have legitimately probably not seen a single word of signage that actually says they can't, or at least didn't before they were more or less stuck in it. Implementations I consider more successful warn you before it starts and frequently warn you with overhead signs that you're not supposed to be in this lane.
    • My guess is this also makes officers reluctant to enforce.
    • By my count, there are two small signs off to the right shoulder, as the only physical non-"paint in road" markings actually saying you can't be there - one after Walnut, one after Pond (on the final 50ft of it where it's basically pointless). Zero of these signs are before the lane starts, and so most people are already committed to their lane choice and stuck there by the time they'd see one.
      • I don't know that the MA drivers manual has anything in it about "red paint in a lane means bus lane so you should know as soon as you see a hint of paint".
    • Turning traffic has no indication there's a bus lane before their turn. Many are going to get to the corner of Washington or Pond, make their right turn into what looks like an open right-most lane, and only find out as they complete their turn that it's a bus lane. Or miss the sign entirely, since a driver completing their turn isn't likely looking over at the sidewalk once they're past the intersection/crosswalk line.
  • Much of it is a combo right turn + bus lane, and so many of the cars in the way are in the way at least semi-legitimately in that they're turning right. They may have hopped into it sooner than they should have but that's also at least in part because of all of ^^^.

-------------

Now, with that said, beyond the hopeless signage:

  • EB Boylston @ High St needs obstacles in the intersection to force the right turn lane to turn right. Much of the traffic there currently ignores the markings and continues straight in the previous traffic pattern + in violation of the current markings, which feeds this whole problem.
  • If you fixed the signage problems then you might be able to flex-post some sections of the lane for slightly better compliance.
 
millerm277 said:
I haven't been through that often, but my impressions (+ from having rechecked my memory with Street View):

  • Signage sucks or is completely non-existent besides the markings on the road....which are usually completely covered up with other cars. A good number of people sitting in a car in that lane breaking the rules, have legitimately probably not seen a single word of signage that actually says they can't, or at least didn't before they were more or less stuck in it. Implementations I consider more successful warn you before it starts and frequently warn you with overhead signs that you're not supposed to be in this lane.
    • My guess is this also makes officers reluctant to enforce.
    • By my count, there are two small signs off to the right shoulder, as the only physical non-"paint in road" markings actually saying you can't be there - one after Walnut, one after Pond (on the final 50ft of it where it's basically pointless). Zero of these signs are before the lane starts, and so most people are already committed to their lane choice and stuck there by the time they'd see one.
      • I don't know that the MA drivers manual has anything in it about "red paint in a lane means bus lane so you should know as soon as you see a hint of paint".
    • Turning traffic has no indication there's a bus lane before their turn. Many are going to get to the corner of Washington or Pond, make their right turn into what looks like an open right-most lane, and only find out as they complete their turn that it's a bus lane. Or miss the sign entirely, since a driver completing their turn isn't likely looking over at the sidewalk once they're past the intersection/crosswalk line.
  • Much of it is a combo right turn + bus lane, and so many of the cars in the way are in the way at least semi-legitimately in that they're turning right. They may have hopped into it sooner than they should have but that's also at least in part because of all of ^^^.

-------------

Now, with that said, beyond the hopeless signage:

  • EB Boylston @ High St needs obstacles in the intersection to force the right turn lane to turn right. Much of the traffic there currently ignores the markings and continues straight in the previous traffic pattern + in violation of the current markings, which feeds this whole problem.
  • If you fixed the signage problems then you might be able to flex-post some sections of the lane for slightly better compliance.
Click to expand...
The town asked for turn hardening but the state said no. This was an MBTA project so I am surprised they did not figure out the signage aspect of it. Firstly, it took 6 months for the signs to be installed and secondly there are far too few signs.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top