New Red and Orange Line Cars

[George_Apley]

Are there any remotely feasible tunnel routings between Central and Harvard that could straighten out the curve?

Not unless you're digging up Harvard Yard...

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Are there any remotely feasible tunnel routings between Central and Harvard that could straighten out the curve?

No. They had the build option in the 70's when the extension was being engineered to go deep-bore through the Square to straighten it all out between Holyoke and Church St.'s on a much gentler full-speed curve that slipped under building foundations in Harvard Yard. But they opted for less expensive cut-and-cover which locked them into the contours of Mass Ave. through the Square.

I don't think RL traffic ceilings in 2016 necessarily lead to conclusion that they made the wrong engineering decision in 1976. They had their reasons, some of them related to uncertainty of what nasty archeological and building mitigation surprises might've been buried under Harvard Yard. If the goal was reaching Porter and Davis before the 20th century was out, can't really argue 4 decades later with the fruits of that expediency.

 

[Jahvon09]

They are increasing the amount of trainsets on the orange line with the new order. I believe that they plan to lower headways to 5 mins during rush hour.

I believe that they plan to increase the amount of cars from 120 to 152. I'd argue that with all of the development at Assembly/Sullivan/Back Bay/JP they should increase it even more.

Especially since the new casino in Everett is officially u/c and is scheduled to open in a few years.

People planning to gamble there will need frequent highly efficient reliable service on the Orange Line.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Here's the FCMB presentation on this (PowerPoint): http://www.mbta.com/uploadedfiles/A...gs/Red Line Capacity Constraints Sept 19.pptx

They attribute dwell time improvements at Park and DTX as enabling performance improvements of up to 20%. That makes complete sense on the numbers; those two stops are where Red goes to die during rush from extreme variability of dwells inducing bunching. With SS catching up to the other two stops in alarming fashion. See chart on page 17 for the utterly depressing dwell numbers backing that all up.

However they don't say exactly what dwell time improvement means in terms of action items; that's punted to some future FCMB presentation. I don't see how small-money measures like taping more platforms with those door-marker hashmarks, assigning staff and more video cameras, engaging in some customer service outreach, or anything on the customer-facing side is going to herd that many cattle any faster. It might make the experience of standing shoulder-to-shoulder a little less stress-inducing, but it's not going to physically move bodies off the platform any faster and get the doors closed faster. The platforms are over-stuffed, physically constrained by width and old egresses, and don't empty fast enough because too many people have to pass through physically constrained spaces. These flow problems can't be attributed to the cattle not knowing where to stand in their daily routine or not having smart enough door sensors to know when to slam shut on a person standing at the yellow line vs. slamming shut on someone's designer purse. The universe of small-scale platform tweaks doesn't add up anywhere close to a 20% performance improvement on dwells. That's not physically possible when the dwells are a problem of physical constraints meeting too many people, and yearly increases of too many more people. That's only truly solvable by substantial and invasive capital investment on the stations' physical spaces. Or...*gasp!*...a load-diversion megaproject like the Red-Blue boogeyman.

They attribute the lack of difference in the ATO vs. CBTC signaling tech to the unsolved dwells. Well, duh...of course it's the dwells. Any signal system under the sun is going to get upended at peak load by platform dwells when too many people are squeezing through constrained stations to get on/off the train. We already see that every day of the week when the less crowded early-peak achieves better headways than peak-peak. Watch the headway vs. signaling line graph on p. 16 conform to the toilet clog on the downtown platforms in the dwells chart on p.17. Add more dwell load and both those signaling lines on the graph will keep inching upward with additional seconds added to their headways, warping the rest of the Red Line with it. Shocker: both ATO and CBTC are going to perform like matching cheeks on the same ass if the Park St. stairs are overstuffed with flesh and stuff a couple percent more flesh with each passing Blue Book revision. So why is this being framed in a way to pre-emptively table signaling improvements by treating the dwells as constant...but then on the other hand assuming a second TBD step of 20% dwell improvements fixes the glitch without those dwell improvements necessitating a re-drawing of the signal graph? Huh???


I'd like to see what they've got cooked up for the dwell improvements in that future presentation. But I fear this is the FCMB trying to convince itself that the all-world steal of a unit price they just got quoted by CRRC for the 01800's replacement is an excuse to package up some small-money resiliency-type improvements they'd already planned to do and sell the overall optics as some sort of perma-solve for Red's decay. So they don't have to comprehend the enormity of the $$$ it would really take to fix the downtown mobility choke, and so it'll be some other regime's problem when relentless ridership increases quickly re-erode their short-term performance tweaks back into a deficit. Something net-positive may come of these efforts (the improved braking distance on a full fleet of CRRC cars ain't chopped liver at contributing some genuine help). But the Board is still very much in kick-the-can mode when it comes to making eye contact with the reality that by 2030 economic growth is going to be imperiled by the downtown mobility choke...and that 2030 is only a few statewide election cycles away.

 

[winstonoboogie]

Here's the FCMB presentation on this (PowerPoint): http://www.mbta.com/uploadedfiles/A...gs/Red Line Capacity Constraints Sept 19.pptx


They attribute the lack of difference in the ATO vs. CBTC signaling tech to the unsolved dwells. .

They also state that "fixed constraints: including "civil design (curves etc) " is one of the factors limiting capacity to 20 tph. The curve at Harvard is one of the major constraints. CBTC is a waste if you can't get more than 20 tph through because of the civil constraints. Reducing dwell time would help operate a consistent 20 tph with the existing signals, and that is why they mention it as an issue to tackle.

 

[swtat]

There are pictures of various parts of an Orange Line pilot car as well as a 2/3 length mock-up and an interior mock-up in the COO's report to the FMCB today. From what I can tell by the picture of the roof, these new cars will utilize self-contained, easily removable HVAC units, greatly simplifying maintenance and minimizing the amount of time these cars spend in the shops for HVAC issues. One other thing I noticed is that the interior looks much more spacious than in the current #12 vehicles, even without taking into account the lower number of seats.

 

[datadyne007]

There are pictures of various parts of an Orange Line pilot car as well as a 2/3 length mock-up and an interior mock-up in the COO's report to the FMCB today. From what I can tell by the picture of the roof, these new cars will utilize self-contained, easily removable HVAC units, greatly simplifying maintenance and minimizing the amount of time these cars spend in the shops for HVAC issues. One other thing I noticed is that the interior looks much more spacious than in the current #12 vehicles, even without taking into account the lower number of seats.

 

[BuilditDenser]

Why is the price so much higher than the $566 bid? Am I missing something or did the cost just skyrocket?

 

[swtat]

This is just my guess, but that $728 million is the amount that is allocated in the budget for this project and not the full amount that will be paid to the contractor.

 

[The EGE]

I would guess the same. Wellington Carhouse is getting a 1-track expansion, Cabot is getting new lifts or something like that, etc.

 

[datadyne007]

This is just my guess, but that $728 million is the amount that is allocated in the budget for this project and not the full amount that will be paid to the contractor.

I believe this is the case. The CRRC bid ($566m) was like $162m below the MBTA's own low budget estimate they had set ($728m), so they are setting themselves up to brag about being $162m under budget if everything goes perfectly, or to have a contingency to eat up any losses and still say you came in under budget if something goes wrong.

 

[Equilibria]

Not a remotely important point, but that "T" logo in creamsicle orange isn't very clear. Black would work better.

 

[fattony]

Not a remotely important point, but that "T" logo in creamsicle orange isn't very clear. Black would work better.

The orange on black on the front of the car is clear, but orange on silver on the side is definitely not. The red, I feel, is the opposite.

Also, what is up with the low seat backs? Is that to discourage man-spreading? Encourage good posture?!?

 

[Equilibria]

The orange on black on the front of the car is clear, but orange on silver on the side is definitely not. The red, I feel, is the opposite.

Also, what is up with the low seat backs? Is that to discourage man-spreading? Encourage good posture?!?

It looks like that's just the orange portion of the seat back. I think there's a clear bar that runs above all the seats to complete the back.

 

[jass]

Why does it take less time to build a 50 story building than a suwbay car

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

It looks like that's just the orange portion of the seat back. I think there's a clear bar that runs above all the seats to complete the back.

Looks like the backs are padded, too. And the quasi-bench seating should address the main problem with the Blue 0700 cars' ass-hurty plastic seat cups.



The T logo and car numbers are just stickers, like they are on all stainless steel cars. That is changeable until the last moment. Send them a comment and they'll consider it, because I guarantee the renders and mockups to-date have been more about form than function.

Car number is definitely going to have to be changed for maximum contrast, because that's a safety feature. Riders, platform standees, staff, and emergency personnel all have to be able to see the car number both inside and out (and occasionally even from air) during an emergency for ID'ing location on the train or which train it is. That's why you've got it stamped on the front, next to the doors on the outside, in the interior by the end pass-thru/operator cabin doors, and above the emergency intercoms. That means bold white against a dark surface like the black/grey ends of those cars or on an end window, and bold black on the stainless steel carbody surface.

The logo I guess you could just make a graphic design + branding case for (probably easier to articulate for someone who does GD for a living). But if they need to change the contrast on the car numbers, they're probably going to end up using the same-color sticker for the logo.

So I bet we end up with regular old black-on-stainless steel and white-on-dark-background in the end. But it always helps to comment earlier the better.

 

[Arlington]

Question on the "Carshell Structural Testing" images (upthread)
1) Do the pictures show an actual MBTA shell (or just a "this is what components look like")
2) Any such carshell is going to be built in China, right? With US tooling/production only setup after the T approves the prototypes?

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

That's the two-thirds length mockup's carshell. Nothing for the pilot car has been fabricated yet.

 

[winstonoboogie]

Question on the "Carshell Structural Testing" images (upthread)
1) Do the pictures show an actual MBTA shell (or just a "this is what components look like")
2) Any such carshell is going to be built in China, right? With US tooling/production only setup after the T approves the prototypes?

All of the stainless steel shells will be built in China, the plant in Springfield will install the components to the shells to make a complete car. The first pilot trains will be built 100% in China including installation of components.

Those are sections of the shells that are produced to test before fabricating a complete shell.

 

[Jahvon09]

There are pictures of various parts of an Orange Line pilot car as well as a 2/3 length mock-up and an interior mock-up in the COO's report to the FMCB today. From what I can tell by the picture of the roof, these new cars will utilize self-contained, easily removable HVAC units, greatly simplifying maintenance and minimizing the amount of time these cars spend in the shops for HVAC issues. One other thing I noticed is that the interior looks much more spacious than in the current #12 vehicles, even without taking into account the lower number of seats.

The Blue Line cars have roof-mounted HVAC units also.