SFist: Got Cash? Stay Away From Church Station

zippy_monster

Fri, 16 May 2008 12:40:27 -0800

Daaaaan: I've had occasion to hop on a few buses recently. All of them have had operational TransLink readers. Despite the "ZOMG WE ARE TESTING DO NOT USE" hand waving, everything seems to be pretty darn close to operational.

Belgand

Thu, 15 May 2008 23:47:34 -0800

Indeed. My girlfriend used to work in Oakland and would take BART every day. Since we live within close walking distance of a BART stop it didn't make any financial sense to buy a FastPass. FastPasses are a great idea, but at present the way they're priced they only make sense if you're going to use it twice a day every weekday. Plus our whole pass and transfer system is amazingly archaic. TransLink makes sense although it seems like it'll be incompatible with FastPass so that'll reduce it's utility significantly. What we need is a simple plastic card that can be reloaded automatically at a set limit or updated with a new FastPass automatically every month. Not a system that still relies on paper transfers manually handed to you and casually glanced at by drivers (thus easily allowing you to ride all day on one transfer most of the time) and paper passes that have to be bought off-site or ordered online monthly (and how long did it take until they finally let you order them online even?) and, again, manually inspected. Our subway network goes basically two places: Market and Nowhere (and I and a friend of mine both live along the N and M routes once you get past Inner Sunset there isn't much) and is a result of piggy-backing on other people's work almost exclusively. We rode BART's coattails to get the Market stops and we retrofitted the old streetcar lines to get the outer stops. So not only do the cars go very few places, but they have to make most of their trips above-ground and get stuck in traffic. Tonight on the N I was stuck so long the driver suggested we get out and walk because some douche lord had double-parked. BART is efficient and reliable, but it only really goes to the Mission and Market. Let's not even begin to discuss the terrible job Muni has done buying trains. For a small, very dense city with the traffic problems we have we seriously need a subway network. Instead we have a bus system that barely works and a half subway/half streetcar system cobbled together from what other people would do for free. The only real subway work being done is the hideously expensive and tourist-focused Central Subway and that's a complete fuckup from the beginning. We throw tons and tons of money at Muni and it continues to fail horribly. Something must be rotten to the core there. Do other major cities have these problems? To the same degree that we do?

SFist_Dan

Fri, 02 May 2008 13:38:18 -0800

I ride my bike to work downtown. I take MUNI four or five times per week, to go to SF State for class (biking over the hill at night is kind of iffy). Ergo, a fastpass makes no financial sense. And the N doesn't go to State. Does being logical make me a tourist? And shouldn't part of the point of public transportation be to encourage out-of-towners to shelve the car and walk/MUNI around?

innersunsetfog

Fri, 02 May 2008 13:03:01 -0800

if you dont have a fastpass, you're a tourist, and who cares if you have to walk to another station? just walk up to duboce and wait for an N. tourist.

Darkmoon

Fri, 02 May 2008 07:32:16 -0800

and now I only have 1 token left...... hopefully I never have to use it considering the horror stories I have heard , read, and scene.

Akit

Fri, 02 May 2008 02:18:18 -0800

It's not well posted but Muni decided to officially ignore the expiration dates on the token coupon books. Looks like the real tokens will never return.

zippy_monster

Thu, 01 May 2008 23:33:19 -0800

http://www.flickr.com/photos/19417968@N00/2458925902/ Sigh.

sagitta100

Thu, 01 May 2008 22:25:33 -0800

I should mention that the token booklets that I bought last week say they expire Dec 31, 2007. Muni doesn't seem to care, though.

SFHope

Thu, 01 May 2008 17:56:47 -0800

ievans -- the turnstiles also take dollar coins. I *hate* paper dollars and wish they would get rid of them. Actually, every so often I take my dollar bills and convert them all to dollar coins at the stamp machine in the post office. It will happily do arbitary amounts for even tiny stamp purchases, and it will even TAKE PENNIES. =) Regarding the token booklets -- they're really nice. You can buy them with Commuter Checks for an instant tax writeoff, or if your employer doesn't do CCs's you can still save your receipts and write them off when you do your taxes (Commuter Checks are way easier =p) I get $45 commuter checks. If it's a month where I'll be using MUNI/BART in the city a lot, I get a fast pass. If for some reason I don't, though, I use it to buy 3 10-ride booklets. Considering my tax bracket it's a nice instant discount. The booklets are also nice to hand to friends/relatives when they visit the city (just make sure they know not to detach the tokens until they are in front of the ticket agent).

pepelicious

Thu, 01 May 2008 16:41:26 -0800

murphstaho: Honestly, I wouldn't have an issue if, for the most part, the conducters I've seen weren't so surly. And, yes, I actually do think that people should get more involved in those situations that you mentioned instead of waiting for some overpaid lardass with an attitude problem to get on the scene. And I'll actually correct myself. I think BART drivers are the most useless jobs in the Bay Area. You could literally replace them with robots and no one would even know the difference.

Akit

Thu, 01 May 2008 16:05:23 -0800

Odd, aint it? Looks like Muni will never give out the real tokens anymore. They don't give a discount anymore! You use to save a quarter for every token.

sagitta100

Thu, 01 May 2008 15:46:20 -0800

A token booklet, good for 10 rides on Muni. I get it at the local pharmacy for $15.

The Angry Young Man

Thu, 01 May 2008 15:39:23 -0800

"This is why I always carry a Muni token booklet in my wallet." A who?

sagitta100

Thu, 01 May 2008 15:37:24 -0800

This is why I always carry a Muni token booklet in my wallet.

zippy_monster

Thu, 01 May 2008 15:25:05 -0800

Except that TL readers are being deployed on more MUNI buses. Certainly by the time I had stopped using TL, I noticed them on most of the buses I was on. As for non-working readers, just flash the thing at your friendly fare cop and you're home free. Explain to the driver your situation, etc. I've never been ticketed with my TL card.

SFist_Dan

Thu, 01 May 2008 14:53:24 -0800

Sometimes I take the bus. Ergo, Translink doesn't work for me. I think we went back and forth on this a long time ago - the system should work, and now it doesn't. That Translink works sometimes (the readers on the trains themselves are often down) does not help for the large percentage of MUNI customers who either bus it or get on the trains aboveground. I'll be happy to get Translink when it works on all MUNI vehicles. Until then, I'd like MUNI to allow me to board at stations with US currency. Seems like it shouldn't be all that hard.

zippy_monster

Thu, 01 May 2008 14:22:45 -0800

You can still use your TransLink in 2008. TL works just fine on the metro, and they're even retrofitting readers into the turnstiles. The problem, as I see it, with TL is that there's zero accountability. With my FasTrak I get a paper invoice every quarter. I can eyeball it and spot the $9 charge to cross the San Mateo bridge. I can then call them up and ask them to reduce that charge. They may even remove the whole charge. WIth TL, you've got none of that. No paper trail. No automated invoices. Nada. You can call them up all you want, but, too bad, so sad if you want any info older than a month(!).

aj

Thu, 01 May 2008 14:18:21 -0800

You could just use your Translink... in 2002

zippy_monster

Thu, 01 May 2008 13:36:06 -0800

Time for proper POP. Geeeez.

Tweety

Thu, 01 May 2008 12:11:31 -0800

Fuck MUNI! Who ever designed a transit system where 6 different metro lines all funnel through the same tunnel should be dragged through shards of glass and showered with lemon juice. Yeah Castro Station newspaperguy!

murphstahoe

Thu, 01 May 2008 11:54:18 -0800

Pepe - Tell me, if someone gets hit by the Caltrain, should the passengers go out and investigate the scene? Or should the overpaid conductors deal with it. Should the passengers self police drunks on the train? Most of the time, the job's pretty straightforward. But when it's not, whoa nelly...

burlives

Thu, 01 May 2008 11:49:59 -0800

This happened yesterday morning but the woman in the booth let me through. I paid on the train, slit a dollar bill and what I thought were two quarters into the machine. The driver turned around and told me that I had just put $3 in and offered me a pass good until 6:30 p.m.

Generic

Thu, 01 May 2008 11:48:26 -0800

Yeah the newspaper guy at Castro station is like, the nicest human being on the planet.

pepelicious

Thu, 01 May 2008 11:13:46 -0800

Man I had the same issues when CalTrains stopped letting you buy tickets on the train. I hadn't ridden the train in years and had to take it up to SF from Palo Alto one day. I get on the train and have my money out thinking that I could buy my ticket from the conductor like I had in the past. When I made the motion to hand the conductor my cash when he came by he went ballistic on me raising his voice and telling me that he was going to kick me off at the next stop, etc. When I told him that I hadn't ridden the train in at least 7 years and didn't know you had to buy your ticket ahead of time, he starts in with accusing me of copping attitude with him. It just baffled me that these people still have jobs. I mean they don't even sell tickets anymore. Literally their job consists of getting up off their asses every 10 minutes to open the train doors. Can't the train just automatically do that? They don't even check anyone's tickets either! A while after that incident I took the train every day up to SF for a month. Not once did the conductor come by to make sure I had bought a ticket before I boarded the train. These guys literally have the easiest job in the world. I bet they even got a raise out of it.

daithi

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:51:49 -0800

The newspaper guy at castro station is the nicest and most helpful I have ever come across. He goes out of his way to make change for folks, (no newspaper purchase required).

Ciaran

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:48:32 -0800

But the side gate is always left unlocked, so just walk on through. Even if there's someone in the booth, are they going to get off their ass and chase you?

Brock Keeling

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:44:01 -0800

fury-inducing. and when those ass machines work it takes, like, five minutes for them to spit out coins.

ievans

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:36:52 -0800

C.W. Nevius's column in the Chronicle is about Muni cheats. As usual, Muni gets you coming and going. I think most people that hobo hop the Muni aren't doing so because trying to buy passes or tickets is so damn inconvenient, but how's this for a major city's transportation system payment situation? Muni passes not sold at stations. They are sold at Walgreens and corner liquor stores, but you have to use cash. Quarter-only turnstiles in the station (yet the trains and buses accept dollar bills). To get quarters at BART/Muni stations, you have to compete with BART ticket buyers. TransLink e-payment system about to have its Bar Mitzvah without being in production yet. Transfers require a human to scan the ticket and manually punch you through the station turnstiles. No vending machines in the stations for daily or weekly passes. Frequently broken change machines at the stations that actually have them.

thrashr888

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:34:14 -0800

Just buy a freakin' car you hippies! Haha.

Darkmoon

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:34:03 -0800

As if I needed yet another reason not to use Muni. Thank goodness I bought a mountain bike a couple of months ago.

diction

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:29:29 -0800

i've been buzzed through and told to pay on the train. no problem at all. several times now.

Akit

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:12:45 -0800

Muni needs to replace the old faregates. Dump them all and do a POP program where you buy the tickets at the station.

rubylovesnorman

Thu, 01 May 2008 10:12:00 -0800

I'm sorry everyone, this may be my fault. I told someone the other day that "Muni couldn't get any worse" and I didn't knock on wood.

foobaresef

Thu, 01 May 2008 09:47:16 -0800

I'm sure that the change machine repairman is busy collecting overtime on some other fake project, travelling to a conference in Israel, or on long term disability.