Third Decade cannot believe the MBTA has a spare $1.2 billion lying around to dig a bus tunnel to connect the two Silver Lines:
... [T]he MBTA is determined to build a tunnel where no one wants it for a transit route that the people who live near it don't even want. ...
Hilarity ensues when the power goes out and the substitute buses are routed to South Station:
... Another thing about the Silver Line is that all of the T employees were yelling at people not to board them when they arrived. This is pretty strange, considering the Airport station is not on its usual route. So apparently the MBTA were re-routing Silver-Line buses with the sole intention of taunting everyone late for work stuck in a huge crowd. ...
Yes, it's another episode of "Compare a busy, decaying Blue Line stop to the stunning, rarely used Courthouse stop on the Silver Line." Today's contestant: Fabulously Out There, who reports from the decaying steps leading from the Blue Line to the Orange Line at historic State Street station:
... There is a woman sitting on the stairs and a MBTA dude standing in front of her.
My immediate thought? A drunk? This early. Jesus christ. Then I noticed her business attire clothing and while I am walking down the stairs I am noticing several chunks of one of them crumbled on the floor.......then I pass the lady and she's in tears holding her ankle talking on her cell phone while the MBTA guy talks on his walkie-talkie. ...
Earlier:
Maverick vs. Courthouse.
To maintain their blood pressure, regular users of the Blue Line's Maverick station should probably avoid the Silver Line's beautiful, little used Courthouse station:
... The Maverick Station in East Boston that has a thousand times more use and serves the local public on a daily basis, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Now it has apparently been put on the back burner as the under funded, poor quality of materials and lack of oversight and caring of our local publicly elected officials should be in the spotlight. ...
A fight at a Silver Line bus stop at Melnea Cass Boulevard and Washington Street around 4:30 p.m. yesterday ended with the stabbing death of one man: Yiovany Gazmey, 37.
Two people who fled on a bus were arrested: Juan Ramirez, 25, will be charged with murder, and 29-year-old Aida Rodriquez will be charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon.
The knife fight came less than a day after two teenagers were stabbed at the Roxbury Crossing T stop (both are expected to live).
Miss von Schtoop, who works in the area, reports traffic was an absolute mess and wonders if the two incidents were related:
... Hopefully it's not just random. I walk in that direction to go to work and one time I did see a very angry man waving a big kitchen knife. I crossed the street and wound up walking the rest of the way home with a neighbor. ...
MBTA police say violent and theft-related crime in the transit system dropped 10% last year, but that non-violent crime, such as public drunkeness and lewdness, vandalism and mouthing off (a.k.a. "simple assault") went up 12%.
In terms of percentages, the Blue Line was the most peaceful line, barely beating out the Green Line. Surprisingly, commuter rail had almost as many violent incidents per 100,000 riders as the Orange Line, although in both cases, the odds of getting attacked or robbed were still fairly small (0.45 incidents per 100,000 riders on the Orange Line; 0.41 on commuter rail).
The MBTA formally announces its new effort to blast your brain with music and ads while you idly wonder why flames are shooting out from under that Red Line train.
Poll: T-Radio: Yay or nay?
T riders without earbuds or headphones will soon have no choice but to listen to T Radio on the Orange and Green Line platforms at North Station, the Red and Silver Line platforms at South Station and at Airport Station:
Imagine you are the governor of Massachusetts. The head of your mass transit agency comes to you with a plan to spend over a billion dollars on something nobody in the community wants, something that will require you to destroy a huge swath of one of the most famous parks in the world, along with some intact, perfectly useable infrastructure that will cost you $600 Million to replace with a lower-capacity alternative.
Now imagine that you have another plan that will bring reliable, high-quality, high-capacity service to a community that really, desperately wants it.
Gallop Pole reports on a T cop who wanted to know "what kind of outfit that was" when he spotted her taking photos at the Court House Silver Line stop.
The Convention Authority wants to double the size of the parking garage beneath Boston Common, extending it all the way down to Boylston Street. This will require just about everything in its path to be dug up and removed - including the 50 trees that sit in the cross-hairs of the construction.
Zolok was on an SL 2 bus last night when the driver just zoomed past a knot of 20 or so people. He continues:
... But then it gets even stranger, the driver pulls up to the very next stop and lets on a single solitary well insulated passenger, just as the doors whooshed open the cheery electronic voice intoned "Please report any unattended packages or suspicious behavior to the bus-driver".
Which put me in a quandary, how can I report the bus-driver's suspicious behavior to...the bus-driver? ...
Iron Bowl and company drove to South Station today to hop on the Silver Line to see the USS John F. Kennedy, docked in South Boston, but after they paid their fares, they learned the T had suspended Silver Line service in that direction, because too many people were already trying to get on the ship:
... We could not even get a refund. ...
When the T was deciding which company to chose to build new bus and trolley fare boxes, it basically had a choice between a model that would let riders throw change in all at once (like they'd been doing forever) or one that would force riders to put coins in one at a time. Green Line riders know which one the T chose. Charlie on the MBTA details the differences in a post that lets you know what he thinks of the choice: The new T bus/trolley fareboxes are a complete disaster
Yeah, City Hall sucks and yeah, the South Boston waterfront is just so buildalicious, and yeah, the city might get $300 million for the old building. But a key point of a city hall is accessibility to the people who pay for it. Does a City Hall reachable only by bus meet that criterion?
Tommy Von: haha. E-Z access out there:
I'm sure everyone would be thrilled to take the silver line everyday.
David Bernstein: "But think of the view from the Mayor's office!
Atlrvr might be willing to consider the move if the building became a great public space:
I just have a problem taking city hall out of the center of the city, where it is easily accessible to most everyone, and sticking it somewhat out of the way. It seems like the city is so committed to the South Boston Waterfront (BRA's aggressive entitlement, new courthouse, relocated ICA, new Conventrion Center, etc....) but they fail to take the most basic aspect into account. ACCESSIBILITY!!!! ...
John Keith: Menino hits the bottle, big time.
Matt Margolis can't stand City Hall, but doesn't want to see more waterfront space given over to government buildings.
Bruce wonders why this is news:
Boston City Hall, the Massachusetts State House and the Attorney General's office have been for sale for decades now.
But Ian offers five reasons to move City Hall, including:
Because we will finally be able to get rid of a building which is quite possibly The Worst Example Of Public Archetecture In The Whole Entire World.
Chris Webb gets annoyed when he reads a quote from state officials that East Boston doesn't need the Blue Line connected to the Red Line, because it's already served by the Silver Line bus. He says that's true only if East Boston residents first get themselves to the airport, where the bus goes:
Sean McCarthy loves it AND hates it:
... Rush hour and Logan are great reasons to rely on the Silver Line.
But after rush hour ends, the Silver Line loses its grasp on reality (and reliability). Those digital red messages that say Buses Arrive Every Six to Nine Minutes, or Seven to Ten Minutes? Don't believe them. After 7 p.m., it seems as though those Silver Line messages are merely suggestions. ...
Stray Bullet Hits MBTA Bus In Boston.
Made for one hella commute, Mike Hillwig reports:
... First, the silver line bus I was on went out of service because its route was blocked by a police barricade.
I tried getting on the Orange line, but the trains weren't running. I believe it was because the entire system went into lockdown.
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