One year ago, the Globe’s Shirley Leung wrote this:
Our transportation budget was starved by the Great Recession, billions of dollars in Big Dig debt, and critical bridge repairs. Review capital investments made over the past five years, and you’ll find the state spent $2.5 billion on the MBTA, rail, and transit, a fraction what it is now proposing.
The Patrick years have been long and delay-prone for MBTA riders. My favorite complaint: subways and commuter trains that can’t seem to operate in frigid weather, which tends to happen here.
My emphasis.
Can I ask a question? If you’re a legislator — say, Speaker of the House — and especially if your first name is Robert, and your last name begins with D — lean in real, real, close:
Is it not completely insane that in Massachusetts of all places, our commuter rail and subway trains are delayed by cold?
Leung praised Gov. Patrick’s plan last year to spend $6.6B on mass transit, but it’s nowhere near enough to make both the expansions that we need, to the South Shore for instance, and the maintenance and upkeep necessary to get people to work on time. DeLeo knows this — everybody should know this — and yet two years ago he turned down Governor Patrick’s ambitious no, adequate plan for upkeep of our infrastructure. Yes, it costs. But so does being late to work:
Increased congestion translates into greater travel times, diverting valuable time from productive work or the non-work activities that support a high quality of life. By 2030, these losses in travel time are expected to cost the Massachusetts‘ economy between $11.1 and $14.9 billion (in discounted 2008 dollars).
That’s from a 2013 report by The Boston Foundation, entitled “The Cost of Doing Nothing — The Case for Transportation Investment in Massachusetts.” A good read if you can still turn pages with your frozen hands.
Sorry Massachusetts, Bob DeLeo decided it’s too expensive to get you to work on time. Hope you enjoy waiting in the cold for your late or cancelled train. That’s the cost of doing nothing.
State House # is (617) 722-2000.
(Psst Gov. Baker: Hero opportunity for you.)
SomervilleTom says
This is more than your run-of-the-mill hero opportunity. Imagine the political consequences of a newly-elected Governor Baker somehow steamrolling a solution to this problem through the legislature.
The phrase “making the trains run on time” has epitomized excellence in administration and management since the 19th century. What happens to the Democratic Party narrative about “good governance” if it is Charlie Baker who makes the trains run on time?
stomv says
It seems to me that if the legislature thought Governor Baker was going to get positive press for an MBTA improvement that the legislators would line up along side and share credit.
Not dissimilar from Romneycare.
TheBestDefense says
Let’s not be so fast to embrace an expansion of commuter rail to the South Coast. And let’s be clear that the South Coast is NOT the South Shore; they are different parts of the state.
South Coast rail almost certainly does not qualify for federal funding of the construction so the $3 billion price tag will be born by the taxpayers of Massachusetts. And then the operating costs will have to be taken from the existing MBTA budget, unless anyone thinks that we need another fare increase or the no-new-taxes Gov Baker will change his mind.
I write this from my home on the South Coast. Rail would make my life easier. It would also ruin the MBTA. Build the Green Line extension. Fix the Blue Line. Expand the rail connection to from CT to Springfield. Make the Fitchburg line work. Make all of the system work well and on time. Don’t pull a Deval on us and claim you will expand the system to the South Coast by getting federal funding, and operating funds from a man behind the curtain, the worst lies of his candidacy, and the way he remained competitive down here. If the voters of Massachusetts knew the preposterous lie he told to South Coasters he would never have been elected.
Mass transit advocates have to live with the same rules that all government programs face. Unless you can answer the questions about where the money comes from, don’t say we just need leadership. Look how far Deval got us with that on South Coast rail.
petr says
…Without pretense to expertise or knowledge I wonder if this might be the technical root of the problem: the MBTA shuts down every night. Do cities that run a 24 hour transit system have the same problems?
For instance, on particularly cold nights the MBTA ends up fueling up and running the commuter rail trains idle to avoid possible morning startup issues in the cold. That is to say a temporary 24 hour schedule. If they don’t do this they have delays. If they do this, do they increase the engine hours enough to disturb the maintenance cycle? increasing the chances of “normal’ equipment failure (and therefore delays)? While this seems like a simple preventative measure is it both A) an expense outside the normal operating budget? and 2) engine hours ahead of the projected maintenance schedule (that is to say, decreasing the margins on equipment failure rate)? It is also unclear if simply idling the engine is sufficient to prevent cold related failures on the rest of the train (couplings, fluids, wheels, etc) that would, under actual operation heat up.
So yeah, ‘doing nothing’ is built into the MBTA DNA and, indeed, might have a cost.
stomv says
To my knowledge, New York City is the only city in America with overnight service. Many NYC tunnels have 4 tracks, not two. This allows the reduced service to be routed in the same tunnel as work is being performed — something the MBTA cannot do.
dca-bos says
The blue line and the red line in Chicago also run 24 hours, though a good amount of it is above ground with subway service only downtown.
jconway says
While I wouldn’t hold the CTA up as a laudable system either (just look at the Ventra fiasco), I strongly back 24 hour transit-particularly if we were to have direct airport connections.
Well, maybe we will suddenly see the Leg pass the Patrick package now that a Republican Governor can take credit and DeLeo can get some Olympic pork in his district.
petr says
…24 hour subway service (they already run some buses 24/7) in response to actual demands from riders and business.
The first article does say that NY and Chicago are the only other US cities with 24 hr service.
stomv says
See: TVA, WAPA, Santee Cooper, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the Town of Hull, etc.
ISO-NE is constructed to be a competitive marketplace for energy (MWh) and capacity (MW). I’m not sure how a fully funded government financed power plant interacts with that construct.
P.S. The MBTA consumes about 1/4 of the expected Cape Wind output, and is the state’s largest single consumer. I wonder: are there enough federal, state, regional, and local government agencies that they could pool their own purchasing to procure something like Cape Wind? I’m not arguing that they should single-handedly foot any additional nominal cost to supply public benefits (I’m not interested in transit riders subsidizing the clean air of drivers, for example), but… it’s a thought. It’s not about competing with private suppliers, instead in this construct it’s about government supplying it’s own energy for it’s own use. Fundamentally no different than some solar panels on a city hall.
stomv says
This was meant for the Cape Wind thread, not the MBTA is cold thread, but let’s go with it!
Bob Neer says
In a relatively near future, as some have argued here. But I agree with the general sentiment: the legislature’s failure to ante up on infrastructure spending when the Governor offered it — replacing small dollars with a significant investment — will hurt the long-term competitiveness of Massachusetts, as anyone who has traveled abroad to countries like China, Korea, Taiwan and northern Europe knows.
TheBestDefense says
Do you mean that the catastrophic effects of climate change, including the flooding of the entire underground MBTA system, mean we will not have a subway? Oh yeah, now I get it and am laughing. Har har har.
Bob Neer says
I do think climate change is likely to produce fewer cold days in Boston in the future, which will resolve some of Charlie’s immediate concerns. It is also likely to create far worse problems, as you suggest. More interestingly, I think one reason the vast majority of the US population ranks climate change very low on their list of priorities (second to last of 20 issues in 2014, according to Pew) is because many think it will have some benefits as well as costs. Personally, I think they are misguided: the costs are likely to outstrip any gains, and the risk is potentially catastrophic. Nonetheless, this is an element of the discussion, which is why I was only part joking.
stomv says
Seriously Bob — do you “think” this as in you believe you’ve read this in credible reporting, or you “think” this because you think that if the average temperature goes up that means that the temperature also increases for the coldest days?
I have no idea if climate change means that the coldest days in Massachusetts won’t be as cold as they’ve been historically, or if climate change means that, in addition to an increased mean temperature, the extreme events like heat waves, cold fronts, storms, etc. simply get more erratic.
So, for reals Bob… which part was serious? Do you have any credible sources that indicate that New England’s coldest days will be less cold under a future with increased CO2 in the atmosphere?
Trickle up says
Grabauskas managed it pretty well, and now there is all sorts of nifty real-time data to improve over that.
But today bus performance is just pathetic. So some real low-hanging fruit for someone.
Christopher says
…or is this a matter of adjusting timetables to reflect reality?
Trickle up says
Grabauskas controlled for only one, making the buses leave on time, and it made a huge difference. This is not rocket science, it’s management.
Another factor is the on long routes lumpiness is an inherent behavior. Buses run at different rates and once one bus catches up with another there are various things that naturally prevent them from separating.
Grabauskas did nothing for this other than make the buses leave on time, but (a) just that made a meaningful difference and (b) there are other practices that could defeat lumpiness.
I don’t know that the timetables are especially out of whack, if you mean that they do not allocate enough time to complete each route, but maybe they are. I don’t think that is the case generally for the 8 bus routes that serve my town.
stomv says
To a first approximation, bus stops are spaced every 0.2 miles apart. But how does the city/town and the MBTA decide precisely where to put the stop. The old school method: put it at the fire hydrant, so that we maximize on street parking spaces. Makes sense.
No it doesn’t. The problem is that when the hydrant is on the “near side” of the intersection (as you’re driving, before the intersection), what happens? The bus arrives at a red light, and is 8 vehicles back. It waits 60-90 seconds. Then it pulls up to the intersection, and stops to let people on and off. Just missed the light now, so its another 100-120 seconds after the green to get another. Because of the location of the bus stop, the bus had to wait 100-120 seconds longer than necessary at a red light. This means that the delay for bad luck (catching a few reds in a row) is amplified. Putting the bus stop on the far side of the intersection results in both faster and more predictable route times.
Once you’ve done that, you’re half way there. Now, here’s the fun bit: let’s say the bus is approaching the light and it’s about to turn yellow. There’s 50 people on that bus. Why not “hold” that green for an extra 2 seconds to let the bus get through? Not only does it make the average run faster, it again reduces the variability that results in bunching (see trickle-up). We have the technology to do this — the buses have beacons, we just need to install a gadget in the traffic control box. It’s not trivial (it costs money and engineering time), but it would do wonders. It also need not be installed everywhere — let’s start with key routes like Mass Ave, Comm Ave, etc.
You can’t have a fixed timetable reflecting “reality” when the reality of motor vehicle congestion varies widely due to weather, current events, and luck.
Trickle up says
and demand-green lights for buses, sure
They’ve been doing this, actually, though the full-Monte treatment where you replace traffic signals and move fire hydrants (to maximize parking spots) requires coordination with local governments.
In my town we happened to be replacing signals and moving hydrants along a stretch of Mass. Ave anyway, so this level of coordination was possible (sort like a lost-opportunity in energy-efficiency retrofits).
Real-time data now permits centralized dispatch of buses, too, which can be used to keep buses on track. Also route corrections (where a pair or trio of buses traveling together are separated by having one bus stop for 5 minutes) can break up lump of buses. Both of these ideas have been resisted at the T for institutional reasons.
So hooray for that. But if some of this stuff is like a retrofit opportunity, making the buses leave the gate on schedule is like closing the windows in the winter time.
Even with all the other things that ought to be fixed, that simple step would improve performance overall.
PS You’ll be pleased to know that having bus stops “farside” (of intersection) is generally recognized as better than “nearside,” but there are many other factors and the T lets local governments decide.
PPS If you are going to dream big with priority green, what about dedicated bus lanes?
stomv says
I don’t disagree with any of that.
Regarding the PS: That’s true, but the MBTA could (and IMO should) work some bus routes (based on use, propensity to get behind, or a number of other factors) and approach cities or towns to work together on those routes for improvement. The city or town might not pick up the ball on its own, but working in partnership, good things could happen.
Regarding the PPS: The challenge is its impact on parking. Most communities aren’t willing to entertain the idea of losing all the parallel parking spots on one side of the street. Sometimes a dedicated bus lane can be squeezed in without removing parking (or a lane for moving autos), but it’s pretty rare. It ends up being a much bigger “ask” than tweaking the bus stops themselves. Much bigger reward, but tougher to get.
SomervilleTom says
The reason people use the MBTA in bad weather is that traffic in the Boston area is a disaster while the weather is bad. Even rain — never mind snow, sleet, freezing rain, and all the other variants we enjoy — turns our already overcrowded streets and highways into parking lots.
Buses offer NO alternative in these cases. When it takes six or more hours to get from the Longwood Medical Area to Coolidge Corner (yes, that happened during a snow emergency not too many years ago), the buses are paralyzed along with the cars.
The ONLY viable alternative during bad weather is a reliable and well-maintained MBTA. This is a basic lunch-bucket issue. Workers who can’t get to their jobs don’t get paid.
Trickle up says
I don’t follow you Tom, sorry.
Buses are no panacea, but they are a critical part of the transportation system. And it would be trivial to improve how well they work.
By the way, in bad weather it is especially useful that buses arrive and depart at scheduled times. Then you can avoid standing out in the weather for an indeterminate amount of time hoping one will decide to show up.
Also, I think that if bus service were better, more people could rely on it, which would ease traffic. Maybe permit some dedicated bus lanes (like in other cities) and a virtuous cycle of mass-transit use edging out cars.
But maybe not, and that’s not actually my point, which is only that it would be easy to make things better.
SomervilleTom says
You write “By the way, in bad weather it is especially useful that buses arrive and depart at scheduled times.”
This is a physical impossibility for buses that share city streets and highways with vehicles. When Harvard Avenue is a bumper-to-bumper parking lot for its entire length through Brookline, the 66 bus is NOT going to “arrive and depart and scheduled times”. It can’t. No matter how many vehicles leave the origin, each will be stuck in the same traffic jam as all the cars (and all the other 66 buses).
Buses are a necessary adjunct to rail. It is NOT trivial — in fact, it is impossible — to improve how well they work in bad weather short of building a separate and underground infrastructure for them.
It is not helpful to advocate “solutions” that are literally impossible to accomplish.
petr says
.. a (perhaps) narrow band along the spectrum of “bad weather” that excludes weather so bad it forces the tapering off of other traffic. Buses are, or ought to be constant traffic: out there “no matter what.” This not, necessarily, true for cars. At some point, along the range of weather severity, the other traffic goes away and the bus travels easier, ultimately either alone or sharing the road with clearing equipment like plows and salt/sand tossers.
SomervilleTom says
The only time that automobile traffic is removed during severe weather is when the governor imposes a state of emergency banning personal vehicles.
How many times has that happened in the last fifty years? I can remember less than half a dozen — the Blizzard of 1978, some time during the “Snowmageddon” of a few years ago (I think), maybe one or two others.
As a practical matter, it snows, rains, sleets, and so on EVERY winter. This is, after all, New England.
The reality is that for 99 out of 100 severe weather events, the bus system is paralyzed by the traffic created by that severe weather. The same should not be true for rail.
The fact remains that when ordinary New England weather interferes with rail transportation, it means that the rail transportation system is broken.
chris-rich says
It’s not just any wimpy light rail either but full dress hog heavy rail with a few locomotives involved.
I wonder how we compare with Chicago? Probably not well.
I’m liking Keolis.
TheBestDefense says
A lot of us choose to not drive during inclement weather and use mass transit to get around, including private for-profit bus services like Plymouth & Brockton. My vehicle is definitely off of the road in snowy weather, by my choice. I don’t need a governor to tell me it is a bad idea to drive in the snow.
chris-rich says
But they are only as good as the routes they roll on.
I love the T bus system and use it extensively. You can beat commuter rail fare by using bus transfers in so many places, which is handy when you are deliberately poor.
There is also an elaborate system of regional bus authorities that vary in quality that were a bunch of privatization plums handed off to various suitors.
The Lawrence one is killer and the Lowell one isn’t bad. The Metro West system is pretty half assed.
The fares are all lower than the T and all work with Charlie Cards.
SomervilleTom says
I agree with all this.
Still, the topic of this discussion is buses as an alternative to cars during severe weather.
chris-rich says
And probably because we can’t run rail everywhere. That’s the “they extend coverage significantly” part.
That way you can let people suffer more efficiently during those rush hour blizzard surges.
At the end of the day, rush hour here is vile and the only real answer is living within walking distance from work. Bicycles come to mind as well.
My commute usually involves walking down a flight of stairs. But I ride the bus a lot for my avocation and am pretty satisfied with it other than rush hour.
In Seattle they don’t really have a heavy rail subway system and only got some kind of light rail after I left. But their bus system is great and very well run. Tacoma was similar.
Besides, aren’t you supposed to blow off work at the onset of a blizzard? That’s why they have school closures… right?
SomervilleTom says
The winters in Seattle and Tacoma are nowhere near as severe as here. Alternatives that work there do not work here.
I find it hilariously ironic that we fill our roads with 4WD SUVs and trucks “because of the winters” — and STILL close our schools each time we get even an inch or two of snow. Perhaps the drivers of those vehicles are figuring out that 4WD is no help at all in stopping a vehicle.
An enormous number of people can’t afford to “blow off work” at the onset of even a blizzard. When half the population is one paycheck away from poverty, that half of the population is going to try very hard to get to and from their job.
chris-rich says
Since 1955.
Out West the whole system shuts down if they get an inch of snow. They have very steep hills due to tectonic shenanigans.
Data… we need data. How many average hell blizzards at rush hour height do we usually get per year?
In the remembered winters I survived here between 1960 and 1998, I was generally aware that the sky didn’t fall, much as it may seem to be. I was stranded in Brookline in 78 but shoveled out elderly people.
And those of more recent memory and return from 2006 and now I noticed that the sky didn’t fall then and I’ll never even own or drive a car. And when my shoelace breaks while walking I just tie it again.
So if you got any hard hardship numbers, maybes some documentation or stats on lost work that would be great.
Percentage of people who aren’t allowed sick or snow days by their jobs would also work to better convey this injustice epidemic.
This is more of that strange GOP style finger wagging shtick.. “you’re irresponsible and your callous lazy outlook is what’s wrong with the world today.”
Can you at least wag over a more weighty callous transgression? I’m sure I’ll come up with one so you don’t have such thin gruel.
How are you people ever going to promulgate a stirring sense of the world that strangers might want to emulate and admire when you are lost in the weeds like this?
I’m trying to be helpful here.
Trickle up says
Buses work in Seattle because the system is well run, the buses go to lots of places, and there are dedicated bus lanes at rush hour.
We could do that too.
Every metro area has its own challenges and Seattle is surely no pan-urban panacea. But reifying our own lack of will and competence into lame excuses about the weather serves no good purpose.
“It’s cold” is not a valid reason.
Trickle up says
The first is the regular and predictable arrival of any bus (not any particular bus) at a stop, under most conditions.
This is doable, and where not doable, this can still be improved upon in several ways. The simplest way is to cause the buses to depart their gates at the scheduled time. So even if buses are creeping along with traffic, they are still going to arrive at regular intervals.
Now the question of any particular bus arriving at its terminus on schedule is more difficult (though still subject to improvement). But it is a different issue.
Extreme weather conditions are a whole other thing entirely.
Back to leaving on schedule: This would be so easy to do, and confer so many benefits, that it really ought to be done right away.
SomervilleTom says
I agree that leaving on schedule is a great thing.
This thread is about the “whole other thing entirely” — what happens to our public transportation system during extreme weather events.
When traffic is at a stand-still because of extreme weather, then NO buses arrive at any stop, no matter how many depart their origin.