Argh! 4 Car MFL trains Saturday night

Now that I'm riding SEPTA more frequently I am seeing firsthand how inept they can be. You'll recall that last week I reported overcrowding in the Subway-Surface tunnel during the Saturday evening post-shopping rush. Last night I was waiting at the 13th MFL station for a 69th St train. While waiting a Frankford train came through the station and only had 4 cars. Hmm, that's a bad sign. Sure enough, when my train came it was only 4 cars and packed to the rafters. Needless to say the stop was extremely long while everyone tried to jam in and the same occurred at 15th and 30th. Seats finally opened up after 52nd.

C'mon SEPTA, if you shorten the trains for some reason please add some extras scheduled to hit Center City between 7 and 8PM on Saturday.

Anyone know why consists were shortened?

Regards,

Bob

SEPTA has been doing this on and off on the weekends for a few months now. Doesen't seem to be any rhyme or reason as to when they do it. I guess when they figure nothing is going on and the weather is cold they can get away with it.

I rode the El first thing Sat morning hoping to get a seat and a quick snooze, but noooooo, there were no seats! Almost looked like a Monday morning with all the people standing.

I wonder how long it takes SEPTA to take whatever portion of the fleet and turn them into four car trains verses how much money is actually being saved. They're basically reducing capacity by 1/3.

What would make sense is if a certain portion of the fleet is idle at all times, why not have a small portion of trains setup as 4 car consists which would only be used say after 8pm or before 7am, or midday for that matter. If they're pinching pennies that much this would also save the expense of having yard crews cutting down train consists.

The opposite seems to hold true on regional rail where trains dont seem to be broken down anymore. You see this all the time on the Airport line where 3 car trains are the norm now. Sounds like a little too much micromanaging going on.

In any case, all the El riders I saw yesterday were disgusted.

jfrey40535 wrote: In any case, all the El riders I saw yesterday were disgusted.

The people in the car I was on were not too happy either. I ride SEPTA to work on Saturday as a choice. The company I work for has free parking in Center City yet I still choose the longer SEPTA trip so I can sit and relax in the early morning (usually on the 6:15AM el from 69th). If this crowding becomes a regular occurance you can bet I will switch to my car more often.

This certainly is not a way to attract new riders to the system.

This certainly is not a way to attract new riders to the system.

Therein seems to lie another organizational problem at SEPTA. I'm convinced they have no real enthusiasm for attracting more riders, which comes from their lack of desire to really run a mass transit system at all. What they need is a board of members that really believes in mass transit and has the vision to make it better, whereas it's all politics based now. Until that visionary board comes to power, you'll still have undersized consists, fare booths that don't give change, restoration projects that never come to fruition, etc.

Hey here's an idea...a board that has members that actually use the system!!!!

Woah, lets not get ahead of ourselves here. We need to conduct a feasibility study on that first.

As far back as 20 years ago, it seemed that SEPTA must have arcane rules in place somewhere that determine how many cars are put on a given run regardless of actual demand. It's a lot like the commissars who told collective farms when to harvest whether or not the fruit was ripe or the grain was mature.

In the mid-80s I rode the 7:10 R6 out of Norristown every morning. The consist was always two cars and was already SRO by the time we left the TC. We still had Conshy, Wissahickon and beyond, and a lot of mornings people were left standing at those stations.

A few of us went to the stationmaster and were told, sorry, the dispatcher had determined that 2 cars were adequate and no more would be assigned. Eventually, after almost 3 more years of complaints, a third car was added, then a fourth, and finally a fifth, just to hold all of the people that had been crammed onto the original two.

There's a great John Cleese routine about a dumb-@$$ shopkeeper who blows off a customer who asks for an out-of-stock item: "Madam, we do not carry any more of them and we have no plans to get any more! I don't know why everyone keeps bothering me. You're the tenth customer today, but I assure you, there is absolutely no demand for it!"

I again rode the 4 car sardine cans yesterday. When we got on at 13th Street, the operator apologized for the conditions and said it was due to the platform repairs being done at 13th Street. SEPTA is installing ceramic tile floors there, some of which have already been broken. Who specs this stuff out anyway? They look like Home Depot grade tiles too.

I think its crap because when they do projects that affect service, something is usually posted in the Metro which is another bad practice for those of us who get on the trains after all the Metros are gone. Just another way for them to not have to notify us with flyers that service changes are happening.

I actually lucked out on Saturday night. I walked to 11th instead of getting on at 15th (I know it makes no sense to backtrack so much to get to 69th but at least it was a change of scenery) and I walked to the head end of the platform. I stood in the first car next to the operator's door and at 13th got the railfan seat when it emptied out. The car filled up at 13th and 15th. Of course the extra walking put me on a later MFL train and I watched my 102 connection pull out of the terminal as I opened the door to the platform so I had to wait 15 minutes for the 109.

Regards,

Bob

PARailWiz wrote:Woah, lets not get ahead of ourselves here. We need to conduct a feasibility study on that first.

Wait a moment....we don't have funding for that feasibility study....push it to the back burner till FY 2020.....