Orange Line

All but Orient Heights on the Blue Line and Charles/MGH now have electronic countdown clocks to let passengers know when the next train should arrive, the MBTA says.

The T adds it's improved the algorithms used to calculate arrival times, in particular at stations right at the beginning and end of lines, for "an elevated Countdown experience."

Orient Heights, currently under renovation, should get its clocks when overall renovations are done in 2014; Charles/MGH this fall.

The Green Line could get countdown clocks sometime before the end of the century.

A man convicted of beating up two women on the Orange Line in 2010 allegedly spent two months this year spitting racial insults at an MBTA worker at the Sullivan Square stop - and punched out a CharlieCard machine - the state Attorney General's office charges.

Joseph Balistreri, 39, faces three counts of violating a permanent injunction, two counts of making threats and one count of criminal harassment, according to the AG's office. In 2010, he was arrested for attacking two women on the Orange Line he accused of being lesbians.

In a statement, the Attorney General's office recounts what led to the new charges:

No, this has nothing to do with Big Dig financing or fare increases. Derek watched an actual shell game in action at Back Bay station tonight. He reports:

This is the first time I've seen a crew working the shell game on the MBTA. The crew suckered one woman, now they're working on a guy. He's not buying it, tho. Not yet at least.

Can three-card monte be far behind?

Transit Police report arresting a man from a Pittsburgh suburb at the Sullivan Square Orange Line stop last night before he could get the tar beaten out of him strangle a local following the end of the Penguins' O-4 series.

According to police, officers arrived at a disturbance around 11:30 p.m. at the station to find Ryan Baessler, 29, of Carnegie, PA, with his hands around another man's throat and screaming insults at him:

Orange Line service was halted around 8:45 this morning as police worked to remove a guy who for some reason decided to get on the tracks at Haymarket.

The Orange Line was shut in both directions after a woman was struck by an inbound train at Stony Brook around 2:45 p.m.

The station was evacuated and the T put together alternate bus service in both directions between Forest Hills and Ruggles.

Her death comes the day after riders at the Mass. Ave. station helped a man off the tracks after he'd fallen on them.

Update: Transit Police report the victim was white, apparently in her 30s and was near the south end of the station when hit.

UPDATE, 6:10 p.m. Service has resumed, but is a mess.

Around 9:45 p.m. on the outbound side of the Orange Line station.

Nakia Hill tweets:

Omg! I just witnessed some brave passengers help a [man] who fell on the train tracks as a train approached. They saved his life!

Curt Nickish also saw his rescue:

He's bleeding but being attended to.

Casey was right there:

He fell right in front of me. I almost told him not to step but couldn't. I keep thinking I could've stopped him. But there was no time. He didn't realize he was stepping off.

Happened around 5 p.m., service was halted in both directions. Cop got her kid, both got off the tracks and service resumed a few minutes later.

Transit Police report arresting a man on charges he tried to steal a woman's phone out of her hands at the Tufts Medical Center stop on the Orange Line last night.

According to police, Joaquin Armaiz, 43, went up to a woman walking towards the platform around 7:40 p.m., grabbed her by the shoulders and demanded her phone:

The victim refused, the male then forcefully attempted to rip the victim's cell phone from her hands. A struggle ensued which caused the victim to fall down a set of stairs resulting in minor abrasions to her facial area. The victim was able to maintain possession of her phone. The male attacker fled the station running out onto Washington Street.

Police say an officer spotted a man matching the victim's description at Tremont and Boylston. She was brought there, IDed him and Armaiz was bundled into a Transit Police cruiser for booking on a charge of unarmed assault to rob.

Transit Police report arresting an itinerant hot-dog vendor who tried opening up one of the food stands inside the Orange Line station this morning without a permit - but with several outstanding warrants.

Police say a T worker called police around 5 a.m. when he realized something wasn't kosher, because the guy setting up the carts was not one of its usual workers.

Officers managed to ketchup with and grill Dana Reis, 56, of Medford; in fact, he was still at the cart when they arrived:

The Supreme Judicial Court today upheld first-degree murder convictions for two men who decided to escalate an Orange Line staredown with a rival in 2003 by shooting him, only the guy with the gun missed and instead put a bullet into a woman whose baby was only two weeks from term.

The baby was delivered alive in an emergency Caesarian section, but died shortly after.

The state's highest court ruled Chimezie Akara and Andre Green got a fair trial and they can now spend the rest of their lives thinking about the evening of February 5, 2003, when they turned car 1205 on an inbound Orange Line train into a shooting gallery as it pulled into Mass. Ave.:

As I was riding by Oak Grove (on the commuter rail) on my way home earlier, I noted a change. One side of the platform is now closed off, complete with fake walls to block whatever's going on from view of the passengers.

Anybody have an idea as to what they are doing, and why they need to reduce the station capacity by fifty percent (both passengers and trains)to do it?

A study by a regional planning group says development along the Orange Line will means thousands of new jobs and housing units over the coming years, which could put thousands of more riders on a line that is already crammed to the gills and dependent on an increasingly cranky collection of past-their-expiration-date cars.

In its Orange Line Opportunity Corridor Study, released this week, the Metropolitan Area Planning Council writes:

McDepression hurts. Photo by Kate Ingalls.

Seems those ads promising help for people suffering from the Big Mac withdrawal symptoms were put on the T by McDonald's local ad agency without the hamburger chain's approval.

In a statement, Arnold President Pam Hamlin says:

Arnold apologizes for its mistake to McDonald's and to anyone who was offended by the ad. McDonald's did not approve the ad, and it's release was our unintended error. We've addressed the issue and have improved our approval process to ensure this does not happen in the future.

McDonald's and Arnold asked the T to pull the ads down (see the other ads).

David Yamada doesn't think much of the Orange Line ads that posit lack of a Big Mac stuffed in your mouth as the sort of mental issue that one more typically sees advertised on clinical-research ads between Forest Hills and Oak Grove:

I'm sorry, but the ad is just too close to the real thing to be funny.

Yesterday, the MBTA warned the tax increases proposed by the legislature were so small it could jeopardize $500 million or in anticipated federal aid for the Green Line extension. This morning, as A.P. Blake noted at 8:55 a.m.:

In the past two hours, every rapid transit line in Boston has suffered some delay due to mechanical/signal failure.

Transit Police report a man faces arraignment today on a charge of open and gross conduct for an incident last month in which he "directed his genitals" at a woman on the Orange Line.

According to police, around 6:20 p.m. on March 8, John McDonald, 48, dropped trou on an inbound train just before Mass. Ave. and then kept his junk pointed at the woman for roughly a minute. At Mass. Ave., he sauntered off the train, police say.

Police say McDonald was arrested yesterday at Ruggles after an officer recognized him from a wanted poster.

Innocent, etc.

Transit Police shut the Green Street stop on the Orange Line tonight and brought in the Boston Fire hazmat unit after discovering a white powder there. Police reopened the station around 8:20 p.m. after determining the powder was cornstarch.

Transit Police report arresting a Mattapan man on charges he masturbated on an Orange Line train on Tuesday afternoon.

Police say Ramon Antonio Baez, 25, got on an inbound train at Green Street shortly after 3:30 p.m., and sat across from a woman who'd boarded at Forest Hills:

A Charlestown District Court judge set bail at $300 today for Antwan Crawford on charges he kicked an eight-year-old girl at the Community College Orange Line stop last month, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

According to the DA's office:

Witnesses at the scene reported that, just prior to kicking the child, Crawford had been engaged in a verbal altercation with another passenger whom Crawford apparently believed had stepped on his sneakers. It was in the aftermath of that altercation that the child reported to her mother that Crawford kicked her in the leg. Using her phone, the mother snapped Crawford’s picture, which was recognized by police at Bunker Hill Community College, where Crawford had previously been arrested for trespassing.

In addition to bail, a judge ordered Crawford, 33, of the South End, to stay off the Orange Line until his case is resolved.

Innocent, etc.

Among the arrested in Boston yesterday: Patrick J. Kelly, 25, of Lowell, charged with assault and battery for an incident around 4:30 p.m. near the fare gates at the Downtown Crossing T station, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

Preliminary information suggests that Kelly was angry at the woman, whom he knew, because she didn't share his desire to drink at a bar after the St. Patrick’s Day parade.

Transit Police report:

Officers were alerted to a female victim who was lying on the ground near the fare gates holding her throat and crying. Officers immediately proceeded in her direction and assisted the victim to her feet. The victim pointed to a male. later identified as Patrick Kelley, 25 of Lowell, and stated to the officers Kelley had just kicked her in the throat. A witness present confirmed the victim's statement. Victim informed the officers she and Kelley had traveled to Boston with the same group and he assaulted her because she was too young to go drinking at a bar after the parade.

Arraignment scheduled for today in Boston Municipal Court. In addition to Kelly, roughly 30 people are scheduled for arraignment in South Boston District Court, mostly on disorderly-conduct charges for incidents along the parade route, the DA's office reports.

Innocent, etc.

The day started with loud, happy crowds; as Connie Chan shows, it ended with a man alone with his dreams, on the floor of a hurtling Orange Line car.

As of 6:45 p.m. yesterday, Boston Police say, officers had issued 336 citations for drinking in public along the St. Patrick's Day parade route - and made 26 arrests, mainly for disorderly conduct.

Updated.

Orange Line service came to a halt around 2 p.m. when somebody wound up under an outbound train at State Street station, Mike Moura and Ruddy S. report.

The victim was extricated, alive, put on a backboard and taken up to an ambulance around 2:40 p.m.

Full service on the Orange Line resumed around 3:30 p.m.

A T spokesman said the investigation into how the person wound up under the train is ongoing.

This was the tragic scene at the armored Best Buy machine at Forest Hills Sunday afternoon. Joe D., who came up with the headline, reports it was still like that this morning. Aaron Gallo, meanwhile, discovered the same problem at Back Bay.

Transit Police report a man waiting for an inbound Orange Line at Jackson Square was robbed around 12:50 p.m. on Saturday. After taking his iPad4 at gunpoint, the robber fled toward Bromley-Heath, police say.

He's described as black, between 18 and 22, with a medium build, wide cornrows, slight facial hair and an earring in his right ear. He wore gray stonewashed jeans with a large white belt and a black hoodie. If you see him, contact Transit Police at 617-222-1050 or text a tip to 873873.