From: sean@think.com (Sean Colbath)
Newsgroups: ne.general
Subject: Re: Drinking and the MBTA was Re: Sunday Liquor Sales
Date: 15 Dec 1992 23:51:58 GMT
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge, MA (USA)
NNTP-Posting-Host: merlin.think.com

In article <HROSE.92Dec15171338@rocza.eff.org> hrose@eff.org (Helen Trillian Rose) writes:
>Betsy> == Elizabeth Schwartz <betsys@cs.umb.edu> 
>I dunno where "The Paradise" is, but last trains leave Park St at
>12:45am. (red and green lines). Any MBTA person can tell you this (call
>722-3200 if you don't believe me). They leave at 12:45 *on the nose*.

I'm not sure that's true.  I recently started green-line commuting, and was
suprised to find out that the last D train left Park Street at 12:05 or
some such nonsense.  I think the last one from the *other end* (riverside)
started heading inbound at around 12:30 or so.  It depends on the line.
Which means, of course, that if I'm working late I have to leave by
11:30-11:40ish to make a connection.

>In my last-bus trips from Lechmere (1am) I've talked to many a driver
>about this. They all say the same thing. If they had to work past 1am
>they'd want double wages. There's a certain "threshold" where they still
>consider it reasonable to work for "normal" pay and 1am is just pushing
>the limits.

Maybe this is just because of the unions, but why should they get double
wages?  Obviously, I'm not making the decision, but there are plenty of
other three-shift jobs, and I can't think of too many where the graveyard
people get double.  For many of them they only get a shift differential,
assuming that that's the person's normal working shift (in other words,
40hrs a week, with those 40 hours just happening to be at night).

> Plus, if you kept the T running, you'd have to have 
>(1) token sellers in each and every station, two in ones that don't
>connect over (like Kendall).
>(2) inspectors on the platform. more people who have been drinking makes
>it more likely that people will be "misbehaving".
>(3) dispatchers to direct the trains (they don't go by themselves)
>
>etc, etc, etc. This, for Boston, who has the lowest subway fare of any
>major city in the country. How much does the NYC Subway cost nowadays?

Maybe that's part of the problem.  Perhaps if the subway cost was more in
line with reality, the service would be too.  Does the T operate at a loss?
I think so (can't remember).

At any rate, they could run a very slow schedule.  The T's slowest time is
late night, and the trains run every 12 min or so.  They could have fewer
drivers if they ran every 20 min, or half hour.  I believe that's what NYC
does.

>The problem, of course, is where to run the shuttle bus *to*. It costs a
>fair amount of gas money to run to all over Boston and Cambridge.

Just run them between the various bars/clubs/entertainment sites.  Since
many of the Boston nightclubs are owned by the same group, I'm surprised
they havn't done this already (well, most of these are on Landsdowne, which
makes transport easy, but...).  You'd think it'd be an incredible
investment!

Of course, the same people who are against condoms in schools are usually
against shuttle busses like these.  When I was in school (University of
Rochester, NY) the student government ran a shuttle to many of the
Rochester eateries/pubs/night spots.  It cost something like $3, ran in
circuits, and you could get off at one spot and get back on later to go to
the next spot or home.  Ostensibly this was to reduce drunken driving, as
the campus wasn't close to many of these spots.  As I remember, it was shot
down because it "promoted drinking".

>Helen Trillian Rose             	<hrose@eff.org, hrose@kei.com>
>Electronic Frontier Foundation   	email eff@eff.org for EFF Info
>Kapor Enterprises, Inc.                 Flames to: 
>Systems and Networks Administration	women-not-to-be-messed-with@eff.org

-- 
Sean Colbath
sean@think.com					...harvard!think!sean
"...and now for something completely different..."
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