SFist: The T-Third S-Staggers to L-Life

Alex (the other one)

Fri, 20 Apr 2007 23:54:22 -0800

@motor: Sure, BART's got automated switches. MUNI's got shittier ones. It's that simple. The ATCS came in significantly over budget, past deadline, and has NEVER worked properly. Here's an example from '99 of what happens when the ATCS cocks up: www.lumiere.net/home/forums/archives/rescuemuni/1242.html Think about it for a second. Where do the trains get held up? Embarcadero? The newfangled turnback was designed to be completely under the ATCS control, as was the Castro crossover. Because the ATCS is so horrid, you get trains backing up at Castro and Embarcadero fairly often. Two things need to happen: manual control of the trains and boarding the trains three cars at a time. At this point, the latter is dependent upon the former. Manual control would allow for more flexibility so that inbound trains terminating at the Embarcadero could use both the MMT and the diamond thus speeding their return to service. Allowing three cars at a time to board just makes sense. As it stands, you've got 2/3rds to 3/4ths of a Market St. station remaining unused at any given time for no good reason.

Jerry Jarvis

Thu, 12 Apr 2007 17:40:27 -0800

On November 6th the voters have a chance to hold the person responsible for MUNI to be held accountable.Elect a new Mayor.

JC

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:55:26 -0800

One wonders how this happens. But, I'll give it to MUNI, they came up with a solution which angers both rail and bus riders equally. The only positive coming out of this is that it will kill any and all movement to turn the FD into a London-like pay-to-enter congestion area. In a recent interview, Mr. Ford was quoted as saying that yep, taking a 30 through Chinatown pretty much sucks. (Supe Peskin jumps in "that's why we need the Central Subway!"). So, let's kill the most reliable way to get through the FD and to SOMA east of Stockton. Makes perfect sense. With the death of the 15, forget about getting from North Beach or the Marina to the Financial District. Continuing to route the 9 down Stockton is one of the dumbest ideas I've ever heard. Whereas 5 or 6 years ago, one had the option of the current 10 (running 7 days a week and at night), the 42 Downtown Loop, or the 15, now we only have the 10, running every 15 minutes and only until 7 pm. When, by the way, the 41 and the 30X also are off-line. Basically, if you work in the FD or SOMA and need to get to NB or the Marina after 7, take a cab or drive. Those are now your only options. (That this hasn't gotten more play in the media or blogs amazes me. People do work after 7pm.) Easiest solution would be to either reactivate the 42 or run the 10 more often and later. (MUNI's website hints that "more often" may be the case, implying that extra 10s will be running from Stockton and Beach (what? Why not North Point and Van Ness?) during peak am and pm hours. Until it dies at 7. And maybe I'd feel better about this if the T actually was working but they've junked the 15 and don't have the drivers around to make the T work as planned.

Joel

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 12:10:23 -0800

Now I’m not exactly a math type of dude but I’m basically figuring out that our current rate of travel is gonna be a lot slower than walking down Market. Yeah, I didn't even bother trying to get on the F or a bus...it looked like Calcutta on those things, people hanging off the side, riding on the top, etc. I just walked 15 minutes and got on the BART at Civic Center. I only had to get off at Montgomery though, ya poor bastards. I thought I'd eventually adjust to Muni's "service" but I still find myself blown away by how bush league it is. San Francisco deserves much better.

andy

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 11:57:29 -0800

As someone who used to transfer from the J to the N every morning, I was hoping that having 2 lines which roll towards Caltrain would reduce the wait and make things a little smoother, while sticking it to all those N-Judah folks that thought they were all fancy for not having to transfer to get to past the Embarcadero..alas..twas not to be... Tuesday my commute went pretty much like this: Waited for the J at 24+church, around 9.05 which is pretty much around when I usually get there, maybe a few minutes later... Now in the good old days there would be a train around 8.55 and one around 9.10, followed by another one 2 or so minutes later which generally meant you wanted to be there around that time for the best chance of catching one and not waiting until the next group of trains at 9.30-9.40. (Knowing when to catch the bunched up train groups has always been tricky and takes some experimentation, so I wasn't really going to be surprised that the optimal bunch time may have changed. Last time was when daylight savings kicked in..) On this particular day, nothing comes by, while 3 trains go outbound, giving the good ol’ “Muni hat trick!” Whee! Added bonus: The second outbound train stops at 24th for like 4 or 5 minutes. “What’s that guy waiting for?” I start to think, basically because I’m getting kind of impatient after having stood around for about 25 minutes already and knowing that I’ve already chewed through my buffer for getting to work on time. A little voice in my head says “maybe they are making proactive efforts to not bunch up all the trains?” The answer is revealed as the driver runs back across the street.. Turns out he was getting coffee and donuts from the donut shop on the corner. Finally around 9.30 an inbound train shows up...Ooops..nope..not in service. 3 cars worth all chained together. This is sort of unusual, never seen 3 in a row before and never on Church. Then finally around 9.35 a J, F, and another J arrive, all back to back. The first J is of course sardine packed, so I wait and get on the next one along with a few other folks. Things are fairly uneventful until we get to Church and Duboce. The driver seems kind of resigned about the situation when he announces that he is being sent back outbound because traffic is heavy, and that we should get on the next J instead. Everyone piles off. Everyone sits on the next J for about 3 minutes, when they announce that it is also being sent outbound and we should take the next one. At this point everyone is sort of grumbling and confused, the drivers seem like they are almost as upset as the rest of us. Everyone gets off. As we approach the 3rd J car, they basically say "Don’t get on this one either. Take the F Market, because the tunnel is hell of busy." Now, I knew something was amiss because a giant crowd of folks from the N had just headed that way, and of course now there's a mob of around 150 people all trying to fit on the little island station where the F meets Church street. I wander around for a few minutes and see if I can catch a cab on market over by the Safeway but there aren't that many going by and every one has a passenger already. So I give up, call in to work to let ‘em know I’ll be pretty late, and head towards the F stop, of which by this time the crowd has thinned out to maybe 75 or so. After about 12-13 minutes, an F pulls up, and, hooray, it is completely full. The driver doesn't even open the doors. At this point it looks like there's another J pulled up to church and market, so a lot of the mob walks back over there. Packed like sardines, at least it seems like this train is going downtown finally! So then we pull into the tunnel...and sit..and sit...and sit...and sit... about 20-25 minutes later we arrive at Van Ness. Now I’m not exactly a math type of dude but I’m basically figuring out that our current rate of travel is gonna be a lot slower than walking down Market. But some weird sense of optimism overtakes me – it can’t be this slow all the way through the tunnel, I reason, it’s controlled by computers after all! I don’t get enough sleep and I’m not exactly the sharpest tack in the drawer until I’ve had some coffee or tea so what can I say, it seemed sensible at the time. Plus I’m kind of lazy and didn’t really want to walk, I mean, that’s pretty much why I use the trains instead of walking to begin with. Well, of course, in between every stop there's an insane delay all through the tunnel.. Not atypical for normal bad Muni day "embarcadero pileup champagne jam" style, although it seemed even worse than a usual one of those. I’m distracted by trying to check out a saucy lass who got on around Powell so at this point I’m not really even paying attention, and I know I already missed both of the meetings I had that morning at work so at this point it’s moot. Finally, we get to Embarcadero, and I stumble off the train to wait for a T line to finish the trip. Well, looks like I wasn't alone! There’s a huge crowd of people waiting for the T. Good times. Luckily there was one just a few trains behind the train I was on. I still don’t really understand why they show up as “K” trains on the train control board, but judging by the Atari 2600 style graphics on that system I figure changing a train label is probably a pretty high-tech type of upgrade which they just haven’t gotten around to doing yet. And finally I arrived at my destination at 2nd+king. Total travel time, 2 hours and 25 minutes. On the bright side, this morning it only took 1 hour and 25 minutes which actually was kind of a relief. That's an hour improvement in one day! For comparison, in the pre-T times a good run would be around 40-45minutes for the same trip. So there’s still some room for improvement – my optimism is gone, though, and I’m setting my alarm clock earlier tomorrow. I’m glad the T is supposed to help revitalize that part of the city, improve the economy, etc, but when you have thousands of people late for work across the town I can’t imagine that is really a good economic thing either.

jas

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 11:57:22 -0800

looks like we have a mr. negative in the house today.

Death to Muni

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 11:42:24 -0800

Let's see: This steaming turd cost over $650 million Service would be worse -- slower, less frequent -- in the Bayview along the 15's route EVEN IF Muni were able to run to any sort of schedule, which it hasn't and doesn't and won't and doesn't even pretend to. Once-marginally-OK service from the North Beach to Market Street on the 15 is COMPELTELY F*CKED. Whatever the 9X gained by running every day has been completely lost by making it take an exxtra 10 to 20 minutes running along Stockton Street, where San Francisco, of course, puts the interests of less than a hundred people ciricling for non-existent parking spaces ahead of those of TENS OF THOUSANDS delayed every single day on the packed 9/(15 RIP)/30/45/ buses. Muni has F*CKED up the route of the 10, by making it make stupid extra dogleg turns and AVOID AN EXISTING TRANSIT LANE. If you're trying to go to Caltrain -- which does run on a schedule --, simply forget about it. Walk. Ride a bike. Ride a scooter. Or pray for a 30/45 to arrive. The J-Church, already abysmal and having lost thousands of riders over the past decade due to Muni "service", has just compeltely disappeared into the crapper, with 40 minute service gaps almost routine. A train can take TEN MINUTES TO MOVE ACROSS ONE SINGLE INTERSECTION (4th&King -- I've seen it, more than once!!!!) while scores of single occupand vehicles pass by, thanks to the brilliant "engineering" of Muni, DPT, and associated sub-cretinous criminals. Multiple sardine-cans full of people just trying to travel just 200 feet get to watch their Caltrain depart without them because Muni simply doesn't give a flying f*ck whether it trains move or don't- and its union operators get paid either way. Nobody is responsible. Nat Ford, the new multi-hundred-thousand-a-year shill for Muni's contractors, employees and Mayor McSleazy, says "the problems weren't surprising, or that bad, given the complexity of pressing a new line into service." The exact same growd of incompetent losers now want A BILLION AND A HALF DOLLARS to build a far-worse-than-useless Central Subway -- and screw up the 30/45 buses even worse in the process. And once again: this steaming turd cost over $650 million Just another day in sleazy San Francisco, where failure is not only expected but handsomely rewarded. But don't worry about hundreds of millions of dollars sinking without a trace! Just think about how great things are now we have gay marriage!

andrew

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 11:41:48 -0800

SFist comments are like Muni trains - they take forever then arrive in bunches!

Clark

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 10:08:37 -0800

Ditto on Mr. West's comment -- I commute from the Wharf to the Sunset, and used to do so by taking the 15 to Market St., where I'd catch an N. Now the 15 is gone and the N might as well be, considering the half-hour I waited for it last night before giving up. Time to buy a car.

Clark

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 09:53:41 -0800

Clark

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 09:47:46 -0800

Nick

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 08:59:52 -0800

Utterly horrid service gaps, courtesy of Muni!

Jackson West

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 22:54:47 -0800

Thank you, Matt, for the infographics and stat porn! My personal peeve is that the 15 is no longer. I used to have a single route to my office in the Dogpatch from North Beach. Now, like Westsiders trying to get to Caltrain, I have to transfer -- which is always what kills my schedule. On top of that, the expanded 9X lines go down f**king Stockton, which takes at least five to ten minutes longer to get to Market than the 15 did because of the heavy ridership and traffic, both auto and pedestrian, through Chinatown and Union Square. I've taken many a trip on the 30 Stockton from Union and Columbus to Caltrain that averaged three miles an hour point to point. I can walk faster than that.

motor

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 22:13:20 -0800

Switches causing the problem? Nah.... BART's got a switch that moves at least as much at the Oakland Wye, and if it goes bad, BART goes to Hell. MUNI just let themselves spend $600m+ on a steamy turd. Many other places in the US, not scary Europe, can do so much better. Go to Portland, OR for the weekend and see.

Jeff Baker

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 21:01:07 -0800

You can say that again. Hey SFist: you have the worst comments system in the history of the Web. Multiple posts are not the fault of the user!

Alex

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 19:40:05 -0800

I've gotta agree with the first comment on the Chron's blog. It makes no sense whatsoever to add more trains to an already burdened system. It's a nice symbolic gesture perhaps, but little else. The reason why the trains bunch up, or at least my guess as to why, is that the switching gear is crap. As they said in the South Park movie, blame Canada. Alcatel Canada built this damned automatic train system (ATCS) and it has never worked as intended. Hell, the city SUED Alacatel and the damned thing still doesn't work. If you think about where the trains bunch up, it makes sense. The trains bunch up trying to get to Embaracadero, and they certainly bunch up at West Portal waiting for the blessed signal. Anywhere trains enter/exit the subway, or change direction, they're at the mercy of the computer (ATCS). If ATCS won't let a train do whatever, everything else behind it is stuck. And, of course, ATCS won't let passengers on/off the stuck trains. Compare this to the manual switching gear that you find on the streets (say at West Portal or 22nd & Taraval). The driver gets out, pries the tracks in the proper direction, and goes. Aside from the driver, there's not much left to chance. Scrap the damned automated garbage, and I bet you'd see service improve lots.

Alex

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 19:38:39 -0800

Alex

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 19:33:32 -0800

meinWestAdd

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 18:23:41 -0800

LOL. Like the readers *here* aren't a "mixed bag" of intelligent thoughts and what I will kindly call "other".

Michael

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 17:54:53 -0800

what accountability? The people who planned this out were long gone long ago.

kitchenbeard

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 17:52:29 -0800

Useless. The damned system is borderline useless. Can some one explain to me why we were standing 7 deep deep at Embracadero waiting to get out bound and getting told there was another 12 minutes before the next train and why there was absolutely no sign of any N trains? WHY IS THE MUNI SO INEPT that they can screw up their own system so badly that walking is faster? Where is the accountability??

kitchenbeard

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 17:17:19 -0800

abw

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 16:25:09 -0800

I think the reason service looks so bad on the downtown stretch is because the GPS is confused by trains in tunnels. It's probably not a very reliable measure of how they were actually doing, at least for that part of the route.

T.E. Lawrence

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 16:21:20 -0800

Seems like there is also a bottle neck at 4th and King... any word about that problem from Muni?

andrew

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 16:18:55 -0800

The irritating thing is that they ALREADY DID a beta test, running the thing in test mode with passengers for three months! And still they can't get the trains through 4th and King or Embarcadero at any reasonable rate of speed. Note: To get to Castro from 4th and King, take the 47 bus northbound and change to any streetcar at Van Ness. Good alternate route if streetcars are backed up.