The T

A roving UHub photographer snapped a Green Line rider talking a bunch on his bananaphone today.

How has the MBTA changed / grown / shrunk during the past 117 years?

Check out the visualization below to see the birth of the Green Line in 1895, the expansion of the Red Line through 1985, and the "repositioning" of the Orange Line. Descriptions of the changes included under the map.

http://www.vanshnookenraggen.com/_index/2012/04/an-animated-history-of-the-mbta/

(Permission granted by author)

El Pelon Taqueria posted this photo of a track fire near Lake Street around 8 a.m.; not long after, the T exchanged buses for trolleys between BC and Babcock.

Jed Hresko captured a new train countdown clock at Mass. Ave. on the Orange Line tonight. The T began rolling out the service on the Red Line a few months ago. He reports:

Pretty sophisticated. The sign changes from ARR to BRD right as the train got halfway down the platform. The signs at the turnstiles announce both directions. Sadly, the voice is gone, now replaced by computer-speak - by necessity, considering the endless combinations that are now announced.

Keryn Egan reports the T had to take a train out of service at Broadway around 5:30 p.m. when a pack of 12-year-olds kicked out a window. She adds one of the doltlings almost followed the window out of the train. All together now: Awww.

Christoper tweets from Boylston this morning that a Sob Story Guy held a trolley door open and refused to let it close until somebody gave him some money.

Going my way?

A concerned citizen complains about the way the city placed new trash receptacles at the Silver Line stop on Atlantic Avenue:

This Big Belly is right in front of the loading zone for SL4 at South Station. Very poorly sited. We love the BBs but they are street furniture that should be placed - not plunked - appropriately.

A.P. Blake spotted this poster from the T Riders Union on the Blue Line today.

The MBTA said today it is firing the driver responsible for a collision at Boylston station last week that sent three dozen people to the hospital with minor injuries and caused $500,000 in damage to trolleys.

Acting MBTA General Manager Jonathan Davis said the driver told investigators he had come off a midnight-to-8 a.m. shift at another job when he started his first run of the day on the Green Line at 11 a.m. - about 45 minutes before the collision at Boylston.

Davis said he could not say if the driver, who had been driving for the T full time, fell asleep but that he was clearly "inattentive" when he ran his train into a stopped train at the station. He said the T's investigation had ruled out any physical problems with the tracks or trolleys and that the driver admitted everything seemed to be working fine in the moments before the collision.

Davis said the T has no policy against second jobs or requirements that workers inform managers about second jobs, but that drivers are expected to be fully alert while driving trains - and that the three-hour gap between the end of his second job and the start of his first run on the Green Line did not leave the driver enough time to get adequate sleep.

He declined to name the driver and the location and nature of the second job.

MBTA Transit Police report a guy who didn't feel like getting off the Orange Line at Forest Hills around 1:20 this morning started screaming at workers. And when they told him police were on the way, he screamed even louder, then punched a window on the train, causing a series of cracks.

Police say they caught up with Robert Coveney, 51, in the station's upper busway.

He was scheduled for arraignment today at West Roxbury District Court on a charge of malicious destruction of property, due to the estimated $300 to $500 cost to fix the window, police say.

Innocent, etc.

The MBTA has released this surveillance video of yesterday's incident at Boylston station. The Globe reports the T has ruled out equipment failure.

The Globe reports on the planned September, 2013 shutdown, which will include making the station ADA compliant and replacing the current bomb shelter of an entrance with something glassier.

Meanwhile, on Dec. 18, the Parks and Recreation Department holds a formal tree hearing on the T's request to chop down 21 trees along Cambridge Street to make way for the renovation project - 13 linden trees and 8 crabapple trees. The hearing starts at 10 a.m. in the department's 1010 Mass. Ave. offices.

NECN tweets:

They are now not expected to attend.

In other Green Line news, riders with AT&T phones report they now work in the tunnel between Kenmore and Park Street.

Passenger on way to ambulance. Photo by John Keith.

UPDATE, 2:36 p.m.: The MBTA reports the station and tracks are back in service and Green Line service has resumed with, of course, residual delays.

Emergency responders raced to Boylston station, where one outbound trolley rear-ended another around 11:50 a.m. Matthew Gamber, who was in the first car of the train that got hit, tweeted at 11:54:

B Line outbound at Boylston just came to screeching stop, tossing unsuspecting passengers. Not leaving station soon.

The Boston Fire Department reports at least six people were transported to local hospitals for evaluation. NECN tweets a total of 35 people were evaluated for injuries.

Seth Simonds reports hearing the following announcement on the Orange Line this morning:

Please step on the train. Teamwork makes the dream work. Thanks for riding the Orange Line.

Hmm, you think maybe the Orange Line got him in a trade for Angry Screaming Driver?

Starting tomorrow, riders on all commuter-rail and ferry lines will be able to use their Android or iOS phones instead of paper tickets. People who use the mobile tickets will get a $10 discount on monthly passes.

Still no integration with CharlieCards, however.

AlertNewEngland alerts us that a trash fire on the inbound Orange Line near Mass. Ave. means no service since the T has shut off power to let firefighters fight the fire in peace.

Dead train at Reservoir around 8 a.m. means no inbound service, natch. And no announcements on increasingly crowded platforms, either.

Some commuter-rail passengers didn't fare much better.

Stuart Spina photographed the scene on South Huntington Avenue this afternoon, when an MBTA bus up and died right on the trolley tracks, blocking a Green Line trolley behind it, at least until it could be towed out of the way.

UPDATE: Judge Mark Hart Summerville set bail for the watch case at $500 and denied a request from the DA's office to revoke Quiles's release on personal recognizance in the open drug case.

A man allowed freedom after the drug evidence against him turned out to have been tested by ex-chemist Annie Dookhan was arrested yesterday on charges he and a pal stole 13 watches from the Downtown Crossing Macy's.

Transit Police report officers' attention was aroused when they spotted two guys acting all suspicious on a platform at the Chinatown Orange Line stop around 10:15 a.m. yesterday:

Norm Vigeant posted a photo of three MBTA locomotives and a commuter-rail coach crossing a causeway at the Wachusett Reservoir in West Boylston on Saturday.

Normally, the T would use the Grand Junction bridge (the train bridge under the BU Bridge) to move cars from its repair facility in Somerville to points south, but the bridge was shut last Wednesday for some emergency repairs, changing what used to be a 7-mile trip into a 108-mile loop by way of Ayer and Worcester.

Via A.P. Blake, who says the bridge could be shut for another couple of weeks.

The Metro tweets the collision along Huntington Avenue by Longwood Avenue around 10 a.m. was "minor" and left nobody injured. However, it did shut down the E line.

Photo. Another photo.

The Globe reports on the turtle-like transit options available to people in the inner city - many of whom were promised a speedy alternative to the Orange Line when it was moved but who instead got a silver bus.

Staying on Track - Slides from a presentation on which the Globe story is based.

UPDATE: Unfortunately, Hoot was too badly hurt to be saved.

The MBTA reports workers found this owl huddled near Waban station on the Green Line this morning and named him Hoot, before transporting him to a local animal hospital.

Earlier:
Owl removed from Park Street station.

A.P. Blake reports a key part of the proposed route - the Grand Junction Bridge that spans the Charles under the BU Bridge - has had speed and weight limits put on it that are so severe the freight train that normally delivers produce to Chelsea couldn't go across it.