Great Expectations

I agree completely with email suggestion #1. Why do so many SEPTA employees act as if the customers are a burden rather than people who are helping to pay their salaries? I'm sure this generalization doesn't apply to everyone, but it has been my experience more often than not. Also, what kind of impression does this make on tourists who try to use the subway/bus only to find that it's difficult to get help when they have questions?

I should amend my comment. This has generally been my experience on the subway and buses in the city, where I was using both to get to work. The folks running the regional rail, even when getting on/off in the city, have usually been pretty friendly. Is there a different training system?

When you say that SEPTA is working toward a smart-card system, did they give any indication as to when it might actually happen...within a year? three years? five years?
Thanks.

Good question re training. I do not know the answer to that off the top of my hat.
I guess the core question is: is there any training?
My favorite SEPTA item is the folks who work the booths in the subway & el. They do not make change. They do not sell tokens.
One of my favorite pasttimes (in addition to watching people from New Jersey trying to parallel park in Chinatown) is watching out of towners go to the booths and ask for change or seek to buy a token and being told "we don't make change and we don't sell tokens."
Which leads to the question: Why are they there?
Answer: For two reasons: (1) to read the paper and (b) to laugh at the tourists who ask for change or tokens.

-- TF

Re Smart Cards.
No, but stayed tuned, SEPTA plans to hold a news conference within the next week or so to announce something re these cards, according to Dick Maloney, their PR guy (and ex-KYW reporter.)

-- TF

Has there ever been an efficiency study with regards to Septa? I ask because where I live in Media, there is the 101 Trolley, and about 3 bus routes that all go to the 69th Street Terminal. Why? We also have the regional rail that runs down to Market East. Now it seems to me that the buses would be better utilized as feeders for the trolley and regional rail thereby maximizing efficiency as opposed to having 3 buses and a trolley all going to the same place.

Other suggestions:

How about a permanent busway for center city? A street where there are no other conveyances, only buses.

How about expanding the hours of operation of the regional rail lines? I often want to use regional rail into the city but the service stops at an hour that doesn't make it convenient if you're going to theater.

Creative and virtually no-cost technique unknown to 99% of SEPTA riders is the coop venture w Philly Carshare - some carshare pods at SEPTA stations allow rider who connects w transit via carshare gets a discount. This kind of thing influences change at both rider / system ends of the issue in that fewer cars on roads puts more riders on transit; easier transit-car intermodal connections changes traveler use patterns faster.

I know this is peanuts (sm scale). But it sends a loud message across the region. (Pehaps Kerkstra or whoever wrote yesterday's article on carshare mentioned it...)

Lets talk low-risk super-creative solutions up and down entire range of transit-related topics!

...gotta go - call & scream at Babette J over this dumb position on the Open Records bill (WHO is she listening to!! Vitali?)

grump....

Bill Marston

Lessee, leverage the existing unused trolley tracks (route 23, most particularly). The re-liveried PCC cars on route 15 are great. Keep that going.

Get some kind of rail service to King of Prussia closer than the Gulph Mills stop; whether it's an extension of R6 or the Norristown High Speed it doesn't matter; it should have been done 20 years ago. It could have prevented years of shifting Route 202.

Can city bars gang together to pay for a final round of trains say 45 minutes after last call? Maybe just for Friday and Saturday nights?

Re a permanent busway for SEPTA.
When I was a kid, SEPTA (then Red Arrow) had a dedicated lane on West Chester pike than ran from 69th Street to West Chester. It also ran up Darby Rd. -- and along various back trails -- to Ardmore.
They gave that up at sometime in the late 1970's, but kept the dedicated bus lane. Then, they got rid of the bus lane as well.

I think alot of cities would kill for a trolley (now called Light Rail Vehicle) line that ran on dedicated track.

-- TF

Re light rail to K of P.
I should look up where SEPTA's Schuylkill River line stands. That would extend tracks west from the city, with a terminus not far from the present home of The Inquirer.
SEPTA, I think, would make a point that while it has not expanded service much, it has spent billions in recent years to upgrade rails, buses, trains, etc.
In fairness to the transit agency, when it took over for the PTF and Red Arrow, et al. it took over system that had deferred maintenance for years.

-- TF

Re: "Those who use an auto, buy a more efficient car we gas gets expensive, they don't demand that the government provide subsidized fuel."

Sorry, but gas and roads are subsidized. Roads are built by the various levels of government using tax dollars collected from many sources. Also gasoline taxes are very low. Maybe cars wouldn't be so cheap if you paid the true cost for gas and oil and for cleaning up the environmental degradation caused by automotive use.

SEPTA serves higher education in this country as a one stop system for having the best and worst features of a mass transit system. The urban and inter-urban components of rail, bus, trolley and now defunct trackless trolley grid are excellent. Other cities and students use it as a design model. If the earlier plans had been implemented, we would be talking about the crwon jewel of the American urban transit system. Unfortunately, political differences between the area counties have created a grid-lock that cannot be broken at this time.

For years, the Norristown high speed line was the model of a true high speed line. For decades it was one of the best examples of a modern, efficient transit line. It was designed to run on the same trolley gauge tracks as the Market-Frankford line. If the concept had been completed, passengers could have taken the Lehigh Valley Liberty liners from Allentown to Norristown and transferred to the route 100 for a ride to center city.

The Broad Street line had a marvelous design concept. The express tracks were to be used for an extension that ran under Roosevelt Boulevard from the city limit to center city. It was designed to interconnect with the Locust Street line to provide service from the far northeast to New Jersey by way of the Ben Franklin Bridge. If the Locust Street line, now PATCO, had been completed, the Board Street line would have had a branch line into West Philadelphia.

The Wayne Junction station on SEPTA is an excellent example of how to design a hub for mass transit. The station was a prime transit point for regional rail, bus, trolley and trackless trolley lines. In its prime, almost every mode of transit vehicle connected to this station. Transit systems in other cities use it as a model.

Politics and our inability to come together as region doom us to a mediocre system. Once in a while after complaints, SEPTA will provide a general cleaning of the City Station on the Broad Street line. Only after another accident will SEPTA maintain its escalators properly. We know where the problems are, but nothing is going to be done.

PATCO has great plans, but SEPTA does it best to block them. SEPTA also works overtime to make NJ Transit service into Philadelphia from New Jersey as painful as possible for riders.

SEPTA only moves under great political pressure. The last great moves occurred when Penn and the city forced the closure of Woodland Avenue and moving the trolleys underground. Penn was got the Market-Frankford line buried underground from the Schuylkill River to 46th Street. The next move came when PATCO was able to disconnect from the Broad Street line and got single service to New Jersey. The next move will come when the democratic Mayor of Philadelphia is able to sit down with the republican chief executives of the suburban counties and tell their representatives on the board of SEPTA to work together for the welfare of the public. Do not hold your breathe. There are no incentives to get our leaders to work together.

Here is an idea. Turn the major transit points in the system into shopping destinations. Although the Frankford terminal is not the best example, it shows what can happen it was run correctly. The profit income from the leases would make available money to provide a predictable annual income stream and reduce government subsidies. This could work if the private sector operated the sites on behalf of SEPTA and the public.

Email three overlooks that the govt gives a hugh subsidy for automobiles: A vast network of roads, highways, and interstates.

Any insight on the hideous mass transit mess known as PATCO? While I understand SEPTA dominates most of the city transportion issues, New Jersey continues to provide marginal - if not outright woeful - regional rail service to Philadelphia.

PATCO is outdated, provides marginal service, and is a poor substitute for a regional mass transit system into Philadelphia. The RiverLine is a noble effort. But it is limited in scope. And it is largely thwarted by the lack of regional rail integration - why should anyone have to change trains in Camden?

Hence, why is there no regional rail from Glassboro via Woodbury to the Philadelphia Airport via 30th Street? Or a regional rail through lower Burlington County? Both corridors are as heavily populated as any SEPTA regional rail line.

New Jersey simply has no "integration" in the Philadelphia "region" from a rail standpoint. The Atlantic City train has no connection with the Philadelphia airport when it easily could use the same SEPTA track and provide a more valuable commuter link.

For most of the past 50 years, Southern New Jersey appears to have been brain dead when it comes to developing alternative, effective mass transit. It's difficult to dump the entire fault on SEPTA, PATCO is an integral part of the same regional problem.

On a regional basis, a bus is a poor substitute for clean, efficient rail service which is inevitably faster, cleaner, and more pleasant.

Wow!
What great suggestions!!
Lotta smart peeps out there!!
How to harness this brain-power?!
Tks.

How to harness this brainpower?

Come to the next meeting of the Delaware Valley Association of Rail Passengers: Saturday, November 17, 1:00 at 1601 Walnut St., Suite 1129 (entrance on 16th St), e-mail mail@dvarp.org, or phone us at 215-RAILWAY.

I'll answer some more questions in this thread later.

Matthew Mitchell
DVARP

Allow me to roll up a bunch of answers into one long post. I’ll give them in the order they came up in the thread, so forgive any jumping from topic to topic.

Token sales: SEPTA does have a program for retailers to sell tokens and passes, and I thought Rite Aid was in it. It must be only some locations though. It’s up to the retailer to join the program, and requests from customers like you would help convince them to do so.

Reducing bus stops to speed up service: this has been high on our list of recommendations for a long time, and SEPTA agrees it would help, but every time it is proposed, City Council gets very upset and shoots it down. Unfortunately, under the Street Administration, we have ten chief transportation planners in the city--the district members of City Council. Until SEPTA, the Mayor, or someone else in power stands up to Council, we’re stuck with bus stops every block.

Subsidies: as other commenters have mentioned, the idea that auto drivers pay the full cost constructing and operating roads is a myth. Economist and former SEPTA Board member Dick Voith has done some good analyses of this.

Timetable for smart cards: SEPTA has not given details, but I would expect the project to take at least three years. There’s a lot more to it than just buying and installing vending machines and handing out new cards.

Subway cashiers: Tom’s observations are altogether too common, and they point to a huge management challenge in fare modernization that hasn’t gotten much coverage. Done right, a modern fare collection system should make a lot of these type of jobs unnecessary, and SEPTA _will not_ reap the savings it is counting on unless it confronts those issues head-on and either reduces the number of people employed in those jobs or redeploys them to other jobs within SEPTA.

So far, they’ve stuck their heads in the sand, not only here, but in other areas of the operation as well. When they opened the multi-million dollar control center, they did not reduce or redeploy the street supervisors driving around in SUVs, who in the days before radios on each bus monitored whether routes were running on time and did things like order buses to turn around or run express to get back on schedule. The lack of action on management’s part means lost opportunity to save millions of dollars in operating costs. You can see from the headcount pages in the SEPTA budget each year how stagnant SEPTA is.

Efficiency study: Yes, these are required by state law. The latest one was several years ago, and we reported in depth on it in our January 2005 newsletter (see the Newsletter page at www.dvarp.org for a link). In a nutshell, it concluded that SEPTA’s costs are in line with peer systems, but in some areas, productivity could be better. However, the study consultants were selected and paid by SEPTA, and they specifically avoided going into areas we said were ripe for an audit of this type (we met with the consultants a couple of times during the process).

A similar review was conducted for the Transportation Funding and Reform Commission. Again, it looked at SEPTA’s cost structure and compared it to peer systems rather than the private sector, and again the consultants declined to look at the areas where we thought SEPTA was mismanaged. So the audit was mostly a whitewash. SEPTA has not had a serious and independent external investigation since the blue ribbon commission that investigated SEPTA legal after the subway escalator accident.

Permanent busway: we had one on Chestnut Street for a coupla decades. Businesses hated it, and enforcement was shoddy, so it was somewhat of a failure.

Late night trains: we hear this suggestion a lot, and we think it comes from a well-meaning assumption from the people suggesting it that all SEPTA riders are like themselves. Actually, the late-night market is pretty small compared to other public transit markets like taking people to work. Agreed that more convenient service to South Street and the Delaware waterfront would be better and safer than driving, but the numbers aren’t there to make it pay for itself. If anyone would like to develop a serious proposal for it, they could submit it to SEPTA’s Annual Service Plan process next year, and they will evaluate the costs and benefits in an objective and transparent manner. The Annual Service Plan is one of the few SEPTA planning functions that works well, and it deserves your support and input.

King of Prussia: the Route 100 extension to the mall has been on the drawing board for decades: long enough that when SEPTA bought cars for the line in the 1990s, they bought enough to equip that extension. We think it is the most cost-effective rail expansion project in the region, and ought to be moved forward now, but it got dragged into the Schuylkill Valley Metro debacle and nobody at SEPTA is interested in resurrecting it as an independent project. It’s been bungled in other ways too.

Busways: The Route 103 busway on Hathaway Lane in Ardmore (you can see it from Ardmore Junction station) is still in use.

City Branch (the former freight track running to the Inquirer building): it was part of the Schuylkill Valley Metro as originally conceived, but other alignments in Center City make a lot more sense, so the SVM study focused on those alignments. The City Branch is too far away from the major employment centers of Center City, so while it’s cheap and available, it would not be as effective to invest in.

P&W (Norristown High-Speed Line, Route 100) through service: the NHSL is standard gauge (4 ft 8.25 in), and could never have connected to the El, which is broad gauge (5 ft 2.5 in). Maybe the poster was thinking about connecting the Media-Sharon Hill lines which was proposed in pre-SEPTA days. Short answer is that you would need to provide some place for those trains to turn back short of Frankford, and you would also need to do a lot of work to make the stations and trains compatible. This and the City Branch are good examples of effective transit planning being a lot more than just connecting lines on a map.

Stores in stations: SEPTA has a real estate department that tries to get these spaces leased out, and they can offer quite generous terms. However, it’s up to the private-sector merchants to take SEPTA up on their offer--SEPTA can’t force the stores to locate in their stations. And the economics are such that even if they do get more space leased out, it will not be a windfall to support cheaper transit fares and expanded service. If they can cover the station maintenance costs and a little more, then they’re doing OK.

PATCO: While the study was delayed because of the governors' standoff over dredging the river, the DRPA is in the planning process for a PATCO branch to Gloucester County. Information is on the DRPA web site. Right now, the best thing passengers can do is voice their support for the NJ-3 alignment that serves the center of communities like Pitman and Woodbury instead of the two freeway alignments which would be hard to get to without a car and would produce little benefit to the merchants and others in these communities. There's an independent group with a web site at www.nj3.org with more about why this is the best choice.

Thanks for all your constructive suggestions. You once again prove that SEPTA riders are knowledgeable and keenly interested in the system, and that it would be in SEPTA management’s interest to engage with them and listen to their suggestions rather than holing up in a bunker at 1234 Market Street sending Richard Maloney out to try and spin each piece of bad press.

Hope you will consider joining DVARP (form online at www.dvarp.org), though non-members are welcome at our meetings too. Our next meeting is Saturday, November 17, 1:00 to 4:00 at 1601 Walnut St., Suite 1129, in Philadelphia.

Matthew Mitchell
Newsletter Editor
Delaware Valley Association of Rail Passengers
www.dvarp.org
phone 215-RAILWAY
e-mail mitchell@dvarp.org

In San Diego, Park and Ride stations are are free with a ticket for the Transit system. The idea of mass transit is to reduce the number of cars ( most with only one person) driving into the city.

So many drivers I know claim they need their car, yet few, if any actually use it during the day. It sits in a parking lot.

My question is, why do drivers think they own the roads, and transit is for "poor people"?

My biggest complaint about SEPTA, is to be left standing at a bus stop, for a bus that never shows. Standing in the rain, or freezing weather for an hour, waiting for a bus that is every 20 minutes is outrageous, and few stops have any shade, let alone a shelter.

I don't have any special transportation expertise, but here are a couple of thoughts.

1) There are some places where improved connections between forms of transportation would make a big difference. It's appalling that there is no direct, underground connection between 30th Street and the subway.

2) There are some locations that are perfect targets for transportation-based development. Wayne Junction seems like a perfect place for this; lots of lines to the suburbs travel through there, permitting commuting in both directions. My understanding is that one of the lines connects to NYC. I would love to see a cooperative arrangement with NJ Transit or others to provide transit to NYC. One could reasonably commute to NYC from there, so this might help stimulate the area. The general point is that Wayne Junction is the meeting point for many destinations and the area around it could be redeveloped based on this terrific transportation infrastructure. I suppose redevelopment is beyond SEPTA, though it could build a nice station and lease space for a coffee shop, dry cleaner, and other commuter frieldly destinations.

I imagine that there are other stations with similar potential.

3) I live in the NW where there is still a vocal constituency in favor of reestablishing trolley service. Personally, I don't think would have the stimulative effects these people envision. It would be nice if SEPTA would just study the issue and make a final determination once and for all; I'm open to whatever is more cost-effective. I know that it might be difficult to be perceived to have reneged on the promise to reinstitute trolley service, but I think some finality would be good.

4) Clean the Broad Street Line station at City Hall and try to find humane ways to limit the homeless population in there. The station is disgusting.

5) I know it's scheduled and everyone knows this, but fix the fare collection situation (adopt Smartcard or equivalent). Use more machines to sell regional rail tickets.

HW

At the risk of sounding cynical, none of these great ideas will come to pass simply because SEPTA finally has a more-stable funding base. Yes, the Funding and Reform Commission finally recognized that Pennsylvania's transit operators cannot function on a hand-to-mouth basis where they are unable to plan more than a year at a time. But the Commission made a glaring error by not also recommending a thorough shakeup at 1234 Market.

Nowhere did the Commission's report address what many observers have characterized as a hidebound, go-it-alone corporate culture that engages in "bunker mentality" defensive behavior against any outside opinions. All one has to do is look at how SEPTA has handled two contentious issues related to its fare increase - its attempt to eliminate transfers for transit riders and the reintroduction of an onboard payment surcharge for Regional Rail passengers, or read Faye Moore's "stop criticizing us" screed on SEPTA's website, to see that the agency still cannot come to grips with the idea that it is providing a service rather than merely moving buses and trains from one place to another.

SEPTA is a large system with a long history of neglect so its problems aren't going to be remedied overnight. But what hope do we have if the agency's first step after getting new funding is to punish riders for its inability to install a modern fare system by trying to force us to pay double fares and surcharges for the next several years until they get around to attempting a fix? How can we expect improved service when the agency promises to restore trolley lines, then rips out the tracks and wires? The list goes on and on.

So long as SEPTA is still run by individuals who are content with mediocrity, our transit system will be no better than it has been in the past. The time for excuses is over; the riders deserve better.

Let me disagree with Tom and one of the recent posters: it was even more imperative on SEPTA to do good planning when their operating funding was threatened, and this message has been ignored by SEPTA since at least the mid 80s. One of the key considerations in getting that funding is to convince the legislature that the money it appropriates will be spent wisely, and another is to show the legislators that good things like new and improved service will be possible if they give SEPTA the money. Politicians like to cut ribbons and take credit for things.

Responding to the other poster:

Many of you recall that there once was an underground connection between 30th Street Station and the subway station. Restoring that is up to Amtrak, and would be very difficult now because of the parking garage in the space below the station.

The Wayne Junction to NYC connection would be through West Trenton. Passenger service north of West Trenton was suspended in 1981. NJ Transit is considering a restoration of service between West Trenton and Newark/Hoboken, but it is in the early planning stages. There may be some public meetings on the topic in the next few months: stay tuned to our web site and we’ll post any announcements we get.

Redevelopment around Wayne Junction would of course be desirable, but faces the usual problems, not the least of which is street crime in the area.

SEPTA has already reneged on its commitments to trolley service, and I would not trust any trolley study done by SEPTA. Studies by the city have shown that trolleys are more efficient because they have faster service speeds than buses (better acceleration, faster boarding) and carry more passengers (three trolleys can replace four buses), and as you know, the trolleys are preferred by the community (less noise and vibration, more visibility for public transit, etc.). The city had to drag SEPTA kicking and screaming to honor its commitment to restore Route 15, and you see how badly that project was [fouled] up. Any further trolley service restoration isn’t going to happen until attitudes of the SEPTA Board and top SEPTA management change.

SEPTA manages to do a pretty good job most of the time keeping vagrants out of its stations. The encampments in the concourse outside City Hall are the city’s responsibility.

That said, the time for excuses is indeed over, and SEPTA needs a visible change in attitude. So far, we haven't seen any change (and top managment hasn't come out of the bunker) since SEPTA got its funding.