mbta redesign
01.08.07 • comment (1) • trackback
Boston is the oldest major city in the country, and as a result is home to a lot of the nation’s firsts. First public playhouse, first private university, first First Night celebration. Also the first subway system, and it shows.
The T, as we call it, is an aging, lumbering beast in need of constant repair and refurbishment. The Green Line trains, which are trolley cars that constitute the oldest part of an old system, are particularly bad. Many trolleys currently in service proudly display the 1987 branding of their Japanese manufacturers (thanks, Reaganomics!). The Green Line is home to both Boston University and Northeastern University, which between the two of them have student bodies that total somewhere around 90,000 people. I only mention it because I find it strange that some of the trains are now older than many of the students who ride them.
The T has been undergoing some major renovations over the past few years: handicap-accessible trolleys, transition from tokens to cards (work in progress), the ability to see when you’re inside Boylston Station, and now, the new MBTA website.
It’s all shiny and new: attractive design, (reasonable) standards and accessibility compliance, useful trip planning, well organized and easy to read, Google Maps integration, etcetera. I think we can all agree that it’s a tremendous improvement over the previous ugly mess. The grouches over at BadTransit are, of course, angry about it, mostly over the purported $466,000 price tag. I’m no professional designer (though I occasionally shut my eyes and pretend I am), but the cost doesn’t strike me as terribly unreasonable, given that it represents a total overhaul. I even went out of my way to get some more professional opinions, and FYI, Jason said that the price is in the right ballpark, but the other Jason said it seemed too high. Mental note: other peoples’ opinions are never useful. Always believe in yourself.
Could the money for the redesign have gone towards something more useful, like station renovation? Maybe, but I doubt it really matters. I’m no engineer (I never shut my eyes and pretend), but the MBTA writes its budget in billions of dollars (granted, often conveniently ignoring little details like debt). $466,000 represents a drop in the bucket, and is absolutely worth it for the redesign. The websites of public services need to be kept current and useful.
01.08.07 #
I rode the T for the first time when I was in Boston a couple months ago and the way they were collecting passengers’ money was ridiculous. At a couple of the stations I stopped at, instead of buying a token you were just supposed to drop a dollar in this box they had out. Presumably this was an ugly middle stage between tokens and cards, but I still found it hilariously ghetto that Boston’s subway system was essentially using the same money-collecting principles as frats running keg parties. (Except at keg parties they are better at catching people who try to sneak through without paying.)
The T was also a much bumpier ride than the Metro we have here in DC, and there was less seating. Also, some of the stops’ names were downright ridiculous (Alewife? Wonderland?) All in all it made our Metro look like the paragon of efficiency and comfort, which is pretty pathetic.
I will say this for the T, though–it was a lot cheaper than Metro. And our fares are about to go up again.