South Station Red Line, Evening Rush Hour

What does a crowded platform mean?  Is it a sign of success or a sign of failure?  When the MBTA compiles its ridership statistics, do they record the situation in the picture to the right as a roaring success?  Do they simply say “there were like a thousand people who boarded that train at South Station during the evening rush hour; hooray?”

There isn’t really any question in my mind how the patrons standing on the platform would have answered the question.  When you get down to it, there really isn’t much difference between sucking tailpipe emissions on Storrow Drive and becoming better-acquainted than you’d like with strangers on the subway.  Probably the main difference is scenery; there’s no advertising on Storrow Drive.

The T doesn’t usually give live feedback, but on the day of the picture the train driver gave passengers who boarded from the very crowded platform an unusually syrupy-sweet send off.  She knew the crowded platform was trouble.  But when the transit scribes meticulously record the events of the day, how will they see it?  I wonder.

Can you spot three things that are wrong with this picture?

Some days, riding on the T is such an adventure. February 12 was just such a day. I took a picture. Can you see what’s wrong with that picture?

First, the train is in the station and the doors are open. When that happens everyone is supposed to board for a quick ride into the city, right? Not this morning. The train is full and the platform is full too.

Second — this one is more subtle — no one is getting on and no one is trying to get off. An experienced rider knows that T patrons will crowd around the doors for endless minutes after a full train arrives, hoping that persistence will be rewarded with a two-foot square spot on the floor of the train. Sometimes it happens, sometimes not, but a big group of people always try. In the picture, no one is trying. Why, you might ask? Because by the time the picture was taken the train had been sitting at the platform with the doors open for at least ten minutes. After a time the conductor announced that there was a “disabled train” ahead.

Third … the train isn’t actually full. Okay, so it’s not clear from the picture but the rail car to the left is sealed and dark. The doors never opened and no one was allowed to ride in it. This also happens from time-to-time without explanation. In good circumstances everyone crowds into adjoining cars. In bad … they pack the platform shoulder-to-shoulder waiting for the next train.

The train in the picture left the station after a wait of perhaps ten minutes more, and the crowd at the station pictured (Porter Square) mostly was able to catch the second train after this one (meaning some caught the next train and the rest caught the second one after).  Riders waiting at stations closer to Boston, i.e., Central, probably had to watch three or four full trans go by before they were able to board.

It’s enough almost to make you want to sit in traffic!

Broadway Trolley Tunnel

Boston has been scrubbed clean over the years of its miscellaneous unused transit infrastructure.  In particular, the elevated railroads nearly all are gone.  Most recently, the sun shined on Causeway Street.  In the summer I stumbled onto one of the pieces of unused transit infrastructure that hasn’t been removed.

Tunnel

This tunnel entrance is located just southeast of the Fort Point Channel, facing the Red Line railyards.  It could be a lot of things.  I have a hunch that it is a trolley access for a disused upper level in Broadway Station.  Apparently several of the Red Line stations were built with trolley mezzenines that since have been abandoned.  If that was the tunnel’s use, then it wouldn’t ever have had a direct link into the Red Line tracks.

Former location of Unit 323, Ashmont Station (demolished in 2006)

At the end of 2007, the MBTA operated 167 escalators in 50 transit stations.  The MBTA believed that it operated one additional unit in one additional station at the end of 2007 (and it reported that to the Globe, among others), but that was not true.  Incidentally, that escalator also didn’t have a spotless operating record as the MBTA claimed.  The extra escalator (unit 323 in Ashmont Station) was dismantled before 2007.  Ooops.

I’ve long harbored suspicion that the MBTA’s analysis of its escalator statistics was imprecise or selective.  This project collects the MBTA’s escalator outage statistics so that they can be more carefully evaluated.  I’m also in the process of conducting an informal audit of the accuracy of the records.  Eventually, I hope to have some data reflecting how close the data matches reality.

2007 MBTA Escalator Data

As a starting point, I received from the MBTA a complete set of records for 2007 relating to elevator and escalator outages.  I have uploaded a more compact version of the escalator data, downloadable here as a 236kb tab-delimited text file.  The data contains a list of MBTA daily log entries for instances when an escalator was out of service; the station, unit number, beginning of the outage, and (if it ended the same day) the end of the outage.  For outages spanning multiple days, there are multiple entries.  One outage was more than three months.

What interesting nuggets have the data revealed?

Highest % of Time Out of Service in 2007

Unit 394, Aquarium station (outbound platform to mezzanine).  18.6% (68 days). This unit went out of service on May 21 and was not back online until July 25, when “98 steps” had been replaced.  Wasn’t that station renovated recently?

Unit 6, State Street station (northbound platform to paid lobby).  15.0% (55 days). This unit experienced three weeks-long outages.

Greatest Number of Separate Outages

Unit 113, Downtown Crossing (Red Line northbound platform to Hawley Street).  62 separate restarts after repairs.  Average time per outage: 9.6 hours.  In October and November, alone there were 21 separate outages.  Most often the unit wouldn’t start; occasionally it wouldn’t stop.  There were several notations about the handrail.  Apparently the problem was not easily located or fixed.

Unit 354, Alewife station (concourse to garage level 2).  56 separate restarts after repairs.  Average time per outage: 10.1 hours.  Sixteen separate outages in July, including 6 in two consecutive days.  The unit repeatedly shut itself off, inexplicably.

Most Reliable

Two units had no outages reported.  Both are doubtful and have been disqualified.  Unit 323, Ashmont station, was demolished before the year began and, contrary to MBTA daily reports, did not operate in 2007.  Unit 348, Quincy Adams station, serving the top level of the multi-story parking garage, had no outages reported, but in a visit in 2008, the unit was out of service and the attendant was not aware of the outage.  The most likely winners are as follows:

Unit 404, World Trade Center (outbound platform to lobby).  86 minutes out of service in 2007.

Unit 397, Aquarium station (1st landing to street).  287 minutes out of service in 2007.

Stations with Highest Rates Out of Service

Beachmont station, 2 escalators, 5.9% of time out of service.

Park Street station, 3 escalators, 5.2% of time out of service.

Porter Square station, 7 escalators, 5.1% of time out of service.

Stations with Lowest Rates Out of Service

Jackson Square station, 1 escalator, 0.1% of time out of service.

Wellington station, 2 escalators, 0.1% of time out of service.

Dishonorable mentions

Units 428 & 429, Maverick station (unpaid lobby to street).  These units were new and began service in October.  They don’t make escalators like they used to.  In their first month of operation, together the units accumulated 28 separate outages.  They finished 2007 ranked numbers 3 and 19 in highest percentage of time out of service (of 169 units).  The problem apparently was that the new units repeatedly would not start.

Unit 123, Andrew station (southbound platform to busway).  Highest differential between rush hour time out of service (12.4%) and general time out of service (9.8%).  The unit was often out of service, and especially at rush hour.

Units 326, 327, and 383, North Quincy station; Unit 125 Bowdoin station.  The MBTA reported superior reliability for each of these units when calculated on a standard 20-hour, 7-day a week schedule.  Kudos.  Except the facilities in which these units are located didn’t operate on a full schedule in 2007.  The areas where the escalators were located closed early each night and did not open on weekends.  Results should have been calculated on a 15-hour day (plus or minus) and a 5-day week.