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No more happy trails after B trolley derails
By adamg on Mon, 06/12/2023 - 3:15pm
Photo by Lipistickey.
It's buses all the way down as the T replaces B Line trolleys after one came off the rails at Packards Corner around 2:10 p.m. Lipistickey surveyed the damage, can only marvel: Whoops.
The trolley was still there at 5 p.m:
It’s still there…. pic.twitter.com/A7xR7aG1fa
— Amy Parks (@AmyCParks) June 12, 2023
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Comments
The middle of that train
apparently just wanted to take the A Line to Watertown.
(I saw a rerailing take place in fall 2021, but my old iPhone 6 battery died in the cold so I couldn't take a video. All the news channels were off somewhere else while I was trying to tell them "come get the shot of them pulling the car back onto the tracks!" That one was easier since the front truck had come off and they just pulled it backwards with a Type 7. And, yes, it was one of the more interesting things I've seen. Oh well, a few weeks later I got vaccinated and my 5G service improved i.e. I got a new phone.)
Don't believe your lying eyes
The T PR people will tell you the train did not derail it was disabled.
For those who have no clue
the MBTA is overrated.
how do trolleys derail
how do trolleys derail spontaneously?
Why do trolleys derail
Common causes - Speed (human error) to fast for the track condition or equipment, rail spread due to deteriorated wood ties, equipment=worn or broken wheels, truck binding and failed to swivel, hit debris, improperly lined switch, pass over a derail device intended to protect workers….
In this case
The answer is probably "was a Type 8."
The Type 8s are perhaps the worst procurement the T has ever undertaken (and that is a very high bar!). Full implementation took nearly a decade and they've been prone to derailments their entire life. The center truck (set of wheels), which is split between both ends of the articulated section, is unpowered and light, meaning that it doesn't take much jostling for it to basically bounce out of the gauge. Poor track maintenance doesn't help, but it's not an accident that most of the derailments involve the Type 8s.
Type 8
I will never forget one of the first times the Type 8 was running on the B Line and there were 2 MBTA officials on board near me. And one was talking up the new car to the seemingly more senior person.
I had already been annoyed by the car layout so I decided to speak up. I asked the younger guy how many people could fit in the Type 8 versus the Type 7. He confirmed they held fewer and also had fewer seats on top of that. I felt that was sufficient to my point.
Aside from the technical antics of the Type 8s derailing and breaking down too much, they also put them on one of the longest, slowest, densest lines...but hey, at least wheelchairs can roll on board (even if it'll then derail and not get them where they wanted to go).
Every single train requires accessible boarding
You act like the MBTA decided to decrease capacity on a whim, and then imply that wheel chair access is not a valid reason for doing so. Of course Type 8s run on the B-Line. They are required on every single Green Line set and appropriately so. Ignoring mobility challenged riders is not an acceptable option.
Absolutely
Because there was zero other options besides both decrease capacity AND let wheelchairs roll on board at middle doors...
None.
I mean it's not like wheelchairs can't get on the Type 7s or anything. I mean, there must be no way that a design consideration that maintained floor space, seats, and improved the stations (which they were doing anyways) for elevated entrances would work.
Best to just drop the floor between the wheels so you don't have to change the stations (which you're already upgrading anyways), make some of the most uncomfortable seats in the world crammed above wheel wells and beside MANDATORY stairs if you are onboarding at the front door, and then add all the technical failures to the wheels themselves on top of it while reducing crush volume.
Those crank lifts are a pain.
Those crank lifts are a pain. Have you ever seen one being used? The T's settlement of the big accessibility lawsuit resulted in a requirement for low-floor cars instead of using those lifts with Type 7s.
They can't!
I think you were going for sarcasm there, but in fact, there is no easy way for a wheel chair user to board a Type-7. That's why you will never see an all Type-7 train set or a Type-7 single operating on the Green Line. Way to double down, my dude!
"No easy way"
First, it wasn't easy but it was possible at stops with the elevated ramps and metal bridges and the conductor putting it all in place and tearing it down.
Second, whether you COULD on the Type 7s is all that matters, not whether it was easy, because they were built to house all passengers ABOVE the wheels where you could take full advantage of the sq footage.
Because that then means a hypothetical Type 8 designed to meet the needs of a wheelchair without lowering the floor between the wheels and destroying your floor space *was* possible. It just means making the platforms friendly to a raised flat entrance.
That was my point, not whether Type 7s should live forever as the epitome of a modern Green Line or something.
The stop-gap Type-7 approach wasn't scalable
You are trying to argue that a less than adequate solution was just fine. Anyway, the Type-10s will address all of these issues, and that procurement is already underway.
Italian
Breda is italian for 'hot garbage' . Cuz thats what these trains are. Yeah some of it the tracks but I can't recall a kinky car doing this (at least in my short memory span). But I think the Kinky cars are more tolerant of the T's track issues.
But then again, the T is fast tracking getting rid of these cars for the Type 10's. Just too many issues.
Kinky?
Surely there can't be someone who has a kink about riding the green line.