Another Way to Make MARC Delay

Another Way to Make Delay

Aug 10, 2011. The BWI Rail Station platform got busy just before the 8:03 train pulled in to the station. Back along the platform sat two other passengers with wheelchairs. I knew this would be a busy morning. My jaded attitude made me believe that we would arrive on the 16 Track. The 16 has no high-level platform and requires the conductors to position a lift to get passengers with wheelchairs off the train at Union Station. My early assessment was well founded.

Due to constrained space, the three of us were in two different cars. I was at the head end of the train in an older single level car. The other cars are bi-levels. This fact will be important later. As usual the first car attracted a significant number of people who will stand in the aisle. This morning my Car 5 buddy, Trish, was with me and stood nearby as other passengers dragged their wheelie-bags across my feet.

At 8:42 we arrived at Union Station and on the 16 Track as I had figured. The passengers of the fist car were taking an inordinate amount of time to file out of the train due to the both the required use of the steps and the fact that the outer door did not open. Two cars full of passengers had to exit out one door and down the steps. I said good bye to Trish and a couple of others whom I know. Soon I was he only one still waiting to get off the train.

The Conductor, Alice, soon poked her head in the far doorway and said that they would be there shortly after handling the other two people who needed the lift. She came up and keyed the door to open it. It didn’t open. Repeated attempts at the key panel failed to open the door. The door mechanism inside the car could not be activated to open the door. After awhile another Conductor, Warren, arrived and said that in Baltimore “they locked out the door because it was not opening properly.” He did not know exactly what had been done, but it was not operational.

A train mechanic stopped by and boarded the train when he saw Alice’s bag sitting on the ground by the door. He was checking on her and that unusual situation. He worked on the door for a while, too. I told Alice that because the inter-car passage was from a single level car to a bi-level car the doorway was too narrow to pass my wheelchair. I suggested that sometime another conductor opens the door on the 15 track side of the train and I get out that way. Warren tried to do that but the electrical substation equipment and a heavy cart were in the way and there was insufficient width to turn a lift to get to the door.

Car 7747 Left side door. After about 10 more minutes the mechanic had gotten the stuck door half way open. It kept hitting something inside the door pocket and reclosing. With a few more tweaks and twists, the door finally opened. After 20 minutes I was on my way to work. As Warren poured sweat in the humid DC morning and cranked the lift down to track level, I told him that what MARC lacks in good reliable equipment they make up for with good personnel. Well almost. The personnel is good, but the equipment situation and the track assignments are huge problems. The yard controller directs trains in a manner that is convenient for the railroad and fails to address customer needs and comfort. The factor that is most disturbing is the fact that the door was purposefully disabled and was a disaster in the making had there been a need to evacuate the train. Fortunately such emergencies are rare, but they do happen. Newspapers are full of stories of nightclubs and other venues that lock and chain doors to keep gate crashers out only to have dozens of people trampled, crushed or burned trying unsuccessfully get out.

Today remained a good day.

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The Commute as Neighborhood

The neighborhood is a concept of human settlements that is loosely defines as the people who reside in the dwellings next to and in some proximity to your own dwelling space. It was the people on each side, across the street and in some cases, on the other side of your backyard. The extent of the neighborhood varied by individuals and might stretch for an entire block or street in all directions. Before the introduction of the automobile, neighborhoods were more compact and consisted of the people who you met on your way to and from daily destinations. Even in small towns neighborhoods developed and were defined by acceptance or rejection of new residents. Some residents were never part of the neighborhood even though the live within the geographic confines of the theoretical boundary of the neighborhood.

Many neighborhoods developed around ethnic affiliations and were very homogenous in their nature. Civil rights and efforts at desegregation coupled with the upward mobility of minorities stirred up many neighborhoods and diminished the dominant features of the settlement. The automobile allowed for people to economically stratify and populate outer regions beyond the old neighborhoods. People in their cars exited their home neighborhood, traveled through a irrelevant corridor and arrived at a second important neighborhood. It may be their work neighborhood. It might be their religious neighborhood. It might be the neighborhood of shopping. Whatever the other neighborhood was, it was arrived at after a solitary insular ride in a car.

While many Americans were traveling ever greater distances in their cars, others remained attached to the neighborhoods and saw the larger landscape as their neighborhood. When a person walks from home to store, the entire trip there and back is part of their larger neighborhood. They see and interact with many more people, both desirable and undesirable, along the way. When they ride in buses and subways they have a chance to see and meet people who would never be part of their experience otherwise. Anyone who eschews public transportation modes because of the perception of the frequency “undesirable” interactions are themselves complicit in diminishing the level of “desirable” interactions. The automobile created a filter effect that removed higher socio-economic persons from the public spaces of cities.

I have commuted by train into DC from Baltimore for 16 years. I ride with a man who has done it for 20 years and a woman who has for 11, although we have only known each other for a few of them. The ride is made with anywhere from 800 to 1000 people each way each day during the morning and afternoon rush hours. Ninety-eight percent of them I never have spoken with because they were merely passing through the traincar to get to somewhere else. Those people may be the huge fellow with a backpack that rivals his belly. Maybe it’s a woman towing a wheelie-bag filled with all her important work stuff that must be at hand every day. It could be the anxious man who must be at the vestibule door five minutes before we all arrive at the station so he can be out the door and ahead of the throng who will follow. There may be beautiful girls dressed more for a night out than for a day at work, but then I have no idea what their job might be. More people are centrist in their appearances, but there always is the type who is the transvestite man who feels more comfortable in his oddness than in men’s clothing. Some women are no different with their preferences. Short cropped hair, nose studs and a half dozen ear piercings sometimes does the advertising.

Then there is the man in his baggy suit who things he is well dressed. His satchel is overly stuffed with paperwork of dubious relevance. To him it is a sign of importance. I could describe archetypes for another dozen paragraphs, but the essential part is that these are people I have seen on and off for more than a decade and a half. I’ve watched people grow old, even as I myself was doing the same. I’ve seen new people arrive and stay. I’ve seen people move on and disappear. Some have gone to different jobs, different trains, or left this world all together. They are and were part of the neighborhood that is the transit corridor between Baltimore and DC.

When you more around at human speeds you get to see so much more than when you are confined to the metallic shell of a car on an increasingly confined highway. When you board a train for a 40 minute trip to work or home, there is a neighborhood that is created even for just that temporary interval.

The Car 5 Gang has been such a community for many years. We have seen people come and people go. Some are gone for good and seek not to ever gather again. Others go elsewhere and return as their circumstance permit. Some stay in touch and enjoy the continued albeit remote contact made possible by email, text messages, and websites. Others are not open to that communication. Everyone who happens by is a welcome part of the neighborhood. If they themselves are open to and compatible with the nature of the neighborhood, they stay. Otherwise they quickly move on.

Make no mistake about it, the train commute is an extension of the neighborhoods that each person lives in. While they may see hundreds of people on the street while walking to their place of work or back to the train, they get no time to interact in a social context. The train provides that dwell time when people are face to face and can be involved in a conversation and get to know each other. Then they get in their cars and drive alone to their house or apartment somewhere in the Baltimore region. It may be Baltimore City, Baltimore County, Harford, Anne Arundel or Howard counties. They will pass thousands of other solitary auto drivers in both directions and never interact with them except through expletives and digital gestures. Those people are not part of the neighborhood. They will never make you happy, share news of the arrival of a grandchild, grouse about a difficult boss or co-worker, hand you a cold beer on a hot Friday afternoon.

In the neighborhood, one person will say that Obama is the worst President we ever had, or that Congress is a bunch of spoiled brats who can’t get anything done. Others will say that the President inherited a bad situation from his predecessor and just can’t get the massive snowball turned around in a mere two years. Taxes are too high and kill jobs, while others say the taxes need to be raised to pay for the things we need, like jobs. Some people in the neighborhood are directly paid by taxes while others work for businesses who get paid by taxes. We need not agree on anything, ever, unless we want to. We can still talk about other common concerns and share a pizza and beer and get together at a cookout or a nightclub. Like neighbors.

Stormy Morning, Center Track at BWI Rail Station

It was a dark and stormy day...

Most people who travel through the BWI rail station in the valley below the BWI airport on a daily basis have at one time or another had to board or exit a train on that infamous center track. For them it is a nuisance that makes them queue up to walk to the far end of the platform and wait to walk down the steps there and up on to the train.

For the commuter who uses a wheelchair or is otherwise unable to negotiate the steps, the train that dwells a mere 10 feet away might as well be on the far side of the Grand Canyon. Actually being on the far side of the Grand Canyon would be far better because the view would be spectacular rather than this dreary morning. It is just another day in the life of a long-term commuter. BTW, I-95 had the two left lanes blocked this same morning due to an accident.

Although this location is not WMATA, per sa, Metro Fail riders were not spared the train malfunction at Fort Totten this morning that backlogged rail traffic to and from Shady Grove once again. The entire Metropolitan DC-Baltimore region is in failure mode and in need of major infrastructure improvements. Particularly in this time of nobody wanting to pay a tax to keep America on the move, and Congressional Freshmen all wrapped around the axle about not raising the debt limit, travel will get worse. Even as WMATA tries to overhaul its aging hardware, the money is getting pulled back by legislators who fail to see the Equals Sign in the equation.

The brighter side of the morning commute problems is that the people of the Car 5 Gang were concerned about my absence. Shortly after 5 o'clock a text message crossed the screen of my BlackBerry asking me if I was going to be there for the 5:20. Unfortunately, I was not. The following day I had the chance to explain. "Oh, yeah," was the realization. They didn't know that I decided to just go home.

The Ironies Metro Fubar

The Weather Personalities on TV were warning us all of the Killer Heatwave that was moving eastward across the nation in Mid-July. DC had not yet seen the peak temperatures that were to reach over 100 degrees. That notwithstanding the rail infrastructure in the region was already being stressed beyond it abilities to operate reliably.

MetroRail operations had suffered several single-tracking events due to rail misalignment and other systems failures. HVAC in some rail cars had failed and the summer tourists were making the cars extra crowded. MARC service had already experienced three 1-hour long afternoon delays on its Penn Line in July by the 20th.

MetroRail stations have been severely impacted by a major effort to overhaul its hundreds of aging escalators and elevators. At many locations where one escalator is being torn apart and rebuilt, passengers must walk the other stationary unit in both directions at the same time. Few people realize it, but they have the transit accessibility standards to thank for 40-inch wide escalators whet to people can actually pass each other in opposite directions. Just look at most private building escalators to see that most are only 24-inches wide. Those people who are unable to navigate the stationary steps with their bags, their baby strollers, bad knees and hips can thank the radicals who protecsted and sued WMATA to have elevators in every station not just the originally planned 1-in-3 scenario.

July 20th my afternoon commute started out relatively ordinary. I already knew to avoid the Metro Center West Entrance because the platform escalator would most assuredly be stopped. My daily commute requires the use of escalators while using a wheelchair. I freaks out some people but they have no idea that I have been doing that ride nearly every day for 16 years. The number of time I use a Metro escalator now tops 12,000 times.

My irritation with the state of MetroRail station hardware is more oriented with the escalators not working than with elevators not working. After all there is only one elevator at most stations to get anywhere. There are usually two or more escalators that all have to be stopped in order to reach the fubar status: You can't get there from here.

This particular afternoon the humidity was 100% and the temperature hovering around 95. I got to the Union Station train platform to find a barricade across the elevator door. The adjacent escalator to the left was one of the one that was being rebuilt. The one to the right was the two-way path that had a hundred foot queue waiting to get up. Even the people who were merely reluctant to walk the steps were doing so.

I turned around to go the far end of the station. The pair of escalators there were both stopped. The single one beyond them was also stopped. The only way out of the station was by rail car. The Station Manager told me I had to go to New York Avenue to get the shuttle back. I boarded the next train outbound to New York Ave. When there, that Station Manager knew nothing about the Union Station elevator outage or a planned shuttle bus. His call to Operations yielded the instruction that Judiciary Square was where they were going to stage the "bus bridge" back to Union Station.

I went back up to the platform to wait for the train. The Station Manager came up and said I had to look for the D6 bus because they hadn't gotten the shuttle set up yet.

I arrived on the street across from the National Building Museum just in time to miss the current D6 bus. But now the butterfly effect was setting in. The irony of fubars was about to kick into high gear. All I wanted to do was get up from the platform to the mezzanine of the station, a mere 25 feet of elevation and catch my accustomed 5:20 MARC train back to Baltimore.

Another Metro rider using a power wheelchair also needed to get back to Union Station. She was looking for the special shuttle. I knew the D6 bus would do the trick. We both boarded the bus after the driver clears the securement seating areas for our wheelchairs.

In a few minutes the bus was sitting across from Union Station ready to discharge passengers and the two of us. They who wanted to get off did and the driver began to deploy the lift. It stopped and stuck in the nearly down position and would not budge. He tried over and over to make it go. It didn't. He even tried the Microsoft Approach and shut off the bus and started it up again. Still nothing. He tugged it. He pushed it. He lifted it and tried again and again.

When the next D6 pulled up behind us the rest of the passengers abandoned ship. The driver called in to Operations for a maintenance truck. Soon he was calling again and got the, "we know your situation." We had to wait. At least the AC worked even though the door could not be closed. I had my Car 5 Gang buddies with which to send text messages with such that they were not holding a flip up seat open for me. Mike and Trish spread the word about my absence. What a great gang.

My fellow "detainee" was anxious to catch the next MARC Brunswick train at 7:15 because it was the last of the day for her. I could get trains as late as 11:00 if necessary. At 6:09 a supervisor and maintenance truck arrived. Out wait had been 40 minutes. She was already checking on hotel rooms for the night in necessary.

The driver and supervisor talked for a minute or so then the supervisor climbed into the bus and sat down. He fiddled with the buttons and switches for a minute and the lift started to run. In another minute the woman was out the door and on her way across the street to Union Station. On my descent, the lift failed again. "Do the laying-on-of-hands again and get this thing working," I said. He laughed.

The driver stood there looking a bit embarrassed. "What did you do," he asked the supervisor?

"I prayed on the way in," he said. I added that he laid on hands and drove the lift demon out. The driver and I crossed the circle together because he needed to use the restroom. "I really needed to go but couldn't leave you on the bus. There would have been hell to pay, if I had."
He left me with a parting thought. "You know, I choose that bus over another one today because the AC on the other one didn't work."

This entire episode was precipitated because every escalator in Union Station was stopped at the same time and the elevator failed. All the people who had already been on that bus were also delayed by the same equipment failure in the rail station.

A message to MARC passengers regarding the designation of a Quiet Car onboard MARC Trains?

A message to MARC passengers regarding the designation of a Quiet Car onboard MARC Trains?

While the use of the Quiet Cars is permitted on MARC trains, passengers are reminded that this must be done responsibly. We have seen an increase in the number of complaints about loud talking (that above a whisper) on trains and disruptive behavior that has included loud talking, profanity, and in some cases, physical altercations that has been associated with passengers trying to self-enforce the Quiet Cars rules.

Use of the Quiet Cars on MARC trains is a privilege, not a right. The MARC Train Service reserves the right to restrict usage of Quiet Cars if passenger behavior is not appropriate and remove from the train those individuals that fail to abide by MARC rules and guidelines. This includes the use of profanity, refusal to follow instructions from conductors, and intimidation or threats to other passengers. The incident of last Thursday exemplifies the problem. A passenger who was incensed by a conversation that he deemed too loud and inappropriate to MARC Quiet Car rules gave the offending passenger the finger. The passenger stood up and shouted, “Keep your shush-finger for your children.” Where upon a hissy-fit played out amongst several passengers ending with a swat to the nose and the train crew having to send the unruly passengers to opposite ends of the car for a time out.

If Quiet Car decorum cannot be maintained, MARC reserves the right to discontinue the designation. Passengers are also reminded that hissy-fits and driving do not mix--MTA, State and local law enforcement will enforce anti-hissy-fit driving laws.

We value you as customers and thank you for helping us maintain a safe and pleasant atmosphere on board our trains.

Hail, hail the gang is all here... well almost.

Months have flown by since the Gang had a quorum to hold a meeting. Unlike the Governor of Wisconsin, we held to the principles that a discussion and a vote must be taken at a duly approved meeting. That said, we postponed all official business until such time as we could all get back together.

The month of March seems to have has the power to influence personal work schedules, train time decisions and in some cases actual job choices. Bicycle Coast Guard Girl got a promotion to Mother with a new daughter, Amelia. After much initial confusion (by the Gang not the mother) the names Hanna and Amanda were but to rest as the name. Bicycle Coast Guard Girl must under go a similar renaming to Candice since she sold her folding bicycle and resigned the Guard to be the full-time mom. Her days as a Car 5 Commuter dwindled down each week as the final month of service obligation was fulfilled.

Amelia made a one-day commuting appearance due to papa's schedule conflict. We all gushed and fawned over the cuteness of the child. Grandpa George who had been circulating the baby pictures of his daughter's baby over the past few months felt the competition brought on by attention to baby-Amelia.

Baby pictures, typically of grandchildren, nephews and nieces get a place on the agenda at every turn. Child pictures are more than likely those of puppies and dogs since more folks have them than do they have toddler-aged human offspring to flaunt the pictures of.

And speaking of pictures, Mikey shared his recent global pictures from down-under. They represented both hemispheres and depicted the affect sea-floor spreading. We heard from alum Princess Carly from her temporary home-away-from-home in NC. Her gallery of pix proves that she is having a great time down there. Anyone wanting to nominate pictures of their own for inclusion in future Car 5 posts should send them to Car5Gang@Modalchoice.com saying that you would like to have them included. I don't want to assume.

The end of March brought about a return to the pizza and beer commute courtesy of Sandy. Attendance was light so we did not conduct business.

Commuting by MARC and Metro remains an adventure. The schedules received a major overhaul that has the entire system shook up, at least in the short term. Additional train times were added but they had to shorten some trainsets in order to make the new ones. Our beloved 5:20 express lost a car and sometimes two are out. This makes for more crowding in the mezzanines. Eventually, everyone will adjust and the pressures of timing and having to stand will redistribute the overload. An example is that the 5:20 no longer stops at Halethorpe after the BWI stop. This forced a lot of people to either the 5:10 or the newly created 5:25 Union Station Departures. A secondary affect has been that about a one parking level quantity of possibly Halethorpe commuters suddenly shifted to the BWI garage. I observed that on the same day that the schedules changed I had to begin parking on the fourth level instead of the third. Although that seems to have settled down a bit, there are many days where the number of people parked in the Number 1 garage is up. Could be those rising gas prices, too.

The elevator project is moving along, albeit slowly. We could be using the second set by the end of April, maybe. All the platform work at BWI is finally done, but the access ways to the new elevators have not yet been cut through the railing.

The connections at Union Station have been dismal for months lately. First they shut down the elevators for a twelve week overhaul. That actually did little to impede mine or most people's commutes. But then they closed the one escalator next to the elevator for its overhaul project. That closure created a huge backlog at the elevator. It amazes me how many women have bad knees and feel that they must announce it as a prelude to using the elevator while waiting for it or riding in it. Coupled with that is the number of people with wheelie carts who are unable to travel with that load without the benefits of electric stairs. Congestion relief will come when WMATA is finished overhauling the second escalator that is by the elevator. Each of the three projects has been scheduled for consecutive 12 week periods. Meanwhile my commute has been made ever the more complex and uncertain.

The prognostication I made at the start of 2011 was that this will be the worst year for Metro Rail operations. Essentially everything will get worse before it gets better. This fact is partly due to the maintenance of access that must be kept while the work progresses. The other part is that while they are doing the major scheduled overhaul work, other equipment will fail at unscheduled intervals. The third part is that everything has gotten a year older since the beginning of 2010. The upside is that work is getting done now.

WMATA has had its operational deficiencies, management deficiencies, funding deficiencies and deficiencies in the design and installation of essential mechanical systems. That all notwithstanding, moving forward from here is the important thing. The infrastructure of this entire country is in the same state of disrepair and decay. Therefore, I do not blame WMATA specifically for its poor condition. Everyone who uses the system daily has seen and knows that there have been unaddressed issues. The problem is that those people do not have the political influence to create adequate funding and demand excellent management.

DC Commuters 4 The Cure

To all our great members, past and present, let's get behind these dedicated members and provide support.

Bob

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Hey Car 5 Crew,

Good morning, there is something more powerful and life changing in the
world than breast cancer. You! Each year people come together for the
Komen Maryland Race for the Cure and create an unprecedented buzz of
hope and excitement. Survivors share their stories to help empower us,
volunteers keep the Race running smoothly, participants cross finish
lines and donors help change the face of breast cancer research.

Please take a moment to make a donation to the Komen Maryland 2010 Race
for the Cure, join a team or volunteer. Your contribution supports the
promise of saving lives and ending breast cancer forever by empowering
people, ensuring quality care for all and energizing science to find the
cures. Until there's a cure, there's Komen!

Thank you for helping make this year's Race for the Cure bigger and
better than ever before. Candice, Pam and I will be participating and
have formed a team, please follow the link to our team webpage, DC
Commuters 4 the Cure, to make a donation or join the team with us! It's
as simple as point and click.

www.komenmd.org/2010/dccommuters4thecure

Thank you,
Ericka Joseph