"Is the commuter rail worth reviving"

in todays Boston Sunday Globe. January 22, in the globe's magazine, there is a 5 page article on the the commuter rail service and if it is worth investing in. one of the things mentioned in the article by the MBTA general manager is that the T's five year plan is: 38 new locomotives, 75 new coaches (does not mention if the new double deckers are included) and refurbishing 75 current coaches. if you have a chance today and if you have $2.50, i suggest that you go out and buy the globe today, it is a very nice article and it has many points of veiws on wheter the MBTA should continue to finance the commuter and stop adding more lines

it mentions about the advantages of bringing commuter rail to New Bedford and Fall river and that one day they hope to expand the Worcester line all the way to Springfield, MA. it mentions that the commuter rail fleet is old and it needs to be repaired so that people can depend on on-time service

i wonder what locomotives the MBTA would purchase?? what would some new engines be for commuter rail trains? MP36's??

MBTA F40PH-2C 1050 wrote:in todays Boston Sunday Globe. January 22, in the globe's magazine, there is a 5 page article on the the commuter rail service and if it is worth investing in. one of the things mentioned in the article by the MBTA general manager is that the T's five year plan is: 38 new locomotives, 75 new coaches (does not mention if the new double deckers are included) and refurbishing 75 current coaches. if you have a chance today and if you have $2.50, i suggest that you go out and buy the globe today, it is a very nice article and it has many points of veiws on wheter the MBTA should continue to finance the commuter and stop adding more lines

it mentions about the advantages of bringing commuter rail to New Bedford and Fall river and that one day they hope to expand the Worcester line all the way to Springfield, MA. it mentions that the commuter rail fleet is old and it needs to be repaired so that people can depend on on-time service

i wonder what locomotives the MBTA would purchase?? what would some new engines be for commuter rail trains? MP36's??

The article doesn't paint a very positve picture of the MBCR does it? Are they really that inefficient/incompetent? I surely hope not!

Most of the negativity in the article was unfortunately based in recent fact -- air conditioning problems that made some cars uninhabitable last summer, cars with opaque windows, too many late and cancelled trains, and CSX freight interference on the Worcester line. It didn't focus enough on the lack of available parking at many suburban stations as a big factor limiting ridership growth, or the way sanctimonious NIMBYs drove up the cost of the Greenbush extension (or are currently driving up the cost of the proposed New Bedford/Fall River extension). The author advocates improving service on existing lines before route expansion, which is a reasonable position. On the whole, the story was reasonably well done for the Globe, which kind of surprised me, given that paper's current dumbing-down.

jg greenwood wrote:

MBTA F40PH-2C 1050 wrote:in todays Boston Sunday Globe. January 22, in the globe's magazine, there is a 5 page article on the the commuter rail service and if it is worth investing in. one of the things mentioned in the article by the MBTA general manager is that the T's five year plan is: 38 new locomotives, 75 new coaches (does not mention if the new double deckers are included) and refurbishing 75 current coaches. if you have a chance today and if you have $2.50, i suggest that you go out and buy the globe today, it is a very nice article and it has many points of veiws on wheter the MBTA should continue to finance the commuter and stop adding more lines

it mentions about the advantages of bringing commuter rail to New Bedford and Fall river and that one day they hope to expand the Worcester line all the way to Springfield, MA. it mentions that the commuter rail fleet is old and it needs to be repaired so that people can depend on on-time service

i wonder what locomotives the MBTA would purchase?? what would some new engines be for commuter rail trains? MP36's??

The article doesn't paint a very positve picture of the MBCR does it? Are they really that inefficient/incompetent? I surely hope not!

Although I've certainly heard plenty of other sources bash MBCR, I tend to think that this article wasn't bashing them so much as the MBTA itself. To me, they identified old equipment and old, insufficient physcial plant, both pushed beyond its limits in daily service, as the leading factors. Keep in mind, its the T, not MBCR, that determines things like whether major trackwork projects are undertaken, or if a fleet of locomotives gets a rebuild or just a band-aid repair.

On a broader matter, one thing I think the article misses is in the notion of "eliminating congestion." It dances with the notion that since commuter rail hasn't ended suburban traffic jams, its not fufilling its role. This is dangerous thinking. Traffic congestion will not go away -- a fact that even some quoted in the article mention. What CR, like the rest of the T, does is give people the option to continue mobility in a congested city. Some, maybe even a lot, will continue to drive every day, but providing the option to get around without getting stuck in that traffic is, well, to quote MasterCard, priceless.

If you live in a city like Boston, there will always be traffic. Just without the option of taking the 7:05 into town, you'd be condemned to it. Fortunately, I don't think that the state would ever try that gamble.

The article has now been stuck online. You can read it here: http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazi ... rossroads/

It's a very interesting article. And I also like the new Route 128 station, especially with its modern facilities. The frequency of service at RTE is pretty good especially during rush hour, since it serves the Stoughton and Attleboro lines during the week.

I believe this is the biggest problem with the T.

From the article wrote:But winning over the car commuter has always been the challenge. Even Grabauskas, the MBTA's general manager who lives in Ipswich, a town served by commuter rail, usually drives to work. "Where I live in town is right off the highway," he says, "and my schedule is erratic enough that it tends not to be convenient for me."

In the future, the contracts for top MBTA officials should require them to ride the T to and from work a minimum number of times. I would say at least 10 times a month (unless they are travelling obviousl).

On a broader matter, one thing I think the article misses is in the notion of "eliminating congestion." It dances with the notion that since commuter rail hasn't ended suburban traffic jams, its not fufilling its role. This is dangerous thinking. Traffic congestion will not go away -- a fact that even some quoted in the article mention. What CR, like the rest of the T, does is give people the option to continue mobility in a congested city. Some, maybe even a lot, will continue to drive every day, but providing the option to get around without getting stuck in that traffic is, well, to quote MasterCard, priceless.

Amen to that. The solution to solving traffic congetion is more subsidies, and more frequent service, not to throw out the baby with the bathwater.

I only had to rely on the commuter rail one brief period, in the Fall semester of 2000, and that was just on Fridays, from Newberryport. I always found it easier to find a parking spot (and cheaper) than tyring to park in an outer lot like Revere or Malden, and the ride let me catch up on homeowrk, (or sleep, I was working a late shift at the time). I was only inconveninced once, during a ride home, when some idiot driver tried to run the gate. A poor conductor got hit too, while trying to find out what had happened.

The problem with this, and nearly all reporting, is that the reporters no longer like to actually think about the "facts" that they report.

Fact - "Commuter Rail has not eliminated congestion"
Meaning - More people can get into Boston w/out their cars, helping to eliminate the need to further add lanes to the highway system (and if you though NB/FR would be expensive...add another lane to the pike from Weston to Allston/Brighton!)

Fact - "whereas driving and parking would cost about $12.70 and save little time"
Meaning - I have a car that gets 45 mpg, parking costs $7.50, and I don't pay for any maintenance on the car.

Fact - "The cost of her daily commute increased marginally, by about $1.15,"
Meaning - That makes her round-trip commute cost $12.15. Obviously there are more people than we realize with super-efficient, no-maintence cars that cost next to nothing to park in Boston.

Don't get me wrong, the report brings up some very good points, but I always think it's shoddy reporting to talk about some numbers, get someone's input about what the numbers mean, then do no reality-checks on that information.

The problem with the notion that commuter rail or any form of mass transit is capable of 'eliminating' congestion is that the 'system' it is affecting is not static. If a fabulous new mass transit line opens and succeeds in taking cars off the highways, the automobile commute will become less strenuous, which in turn will lead to some transit commuters opting to go back to their cars. The system will eventually seek a balancing point.

Jim

I picked it up myself and it was very interesting.. just wondering is the MBTA station on the front cover really West Natick.. i didn't think it was single tracked through their

"Worth reviving" is a strange thing to put in a headline, given that the system has steadily increased its service over the past 20 years, adding service to Worcester, Providence, Newburyport, Kingston, MIddleboro, and soon Greenbush. There's also been a substantial increase in Saturday and Sunday runs.

Ron Newman wrote:"Worth reviving" is a strange thing to put in a headline, given that the system has steadily increased its service over the past 20 years.

And is, in a lot of respects, at a high point in the 175-odd years of investment in the rail infrastructure of the Boston area. 60-80 MPH trains, with far better on-board environments than the "good old days," and still a high level of service (practically every line runs seven days a week). Some of the author's arguments start to sound like throwing the baby out with the bathwater because of a couple negative years.

The short answer is -- where would we put 75,000 more cars coming into downtown Boston and Cambridge each day -- there aren't enough parking garages. There isn't enough highway capacity. It'd take a highway project that would dwarf the Big Dig, cost billions, and choke us in pollution, to do what commtuer rail does.

I wouldn't go quite that far, given that compared to the "good old days", we no longer have the Lexington branch, the Marblehead branch, the Essex branch, the Medford branch, the Woburn branch, the Stoneham branch, the Saugus branch, the Dedham branch, the Medway branch, the Central Mass. to Hudson and Clinton, or any service north of the NH state line. We've also lost stations in busy places like Somerville, Allston, and Newton Corner.

GP40MC 1116 wrote:I picked it up myself and it was very interesting.. just wondering is the MBTA station on the front cover really West Natick.. i didn't think it was single tracked through their

it is double track through West Natick station, if you look to the right of the page, you can see the other platform, and through the fence you can see the second track