Dear Gov. Patrick (via Fax), Rep. Honan, Rep. Brownsberger, Mayor Menino, and members of the Boston City Council,

I am writing to you all in incensed opposition to the abhorrent plan currently under discussion to close the MBTA’s budget gap by decimating Massachusetts public transportation.

The T’s budget gap is structural, resulting from the Big Dig debt thrust upon it several years ago, coupled with sales tax revenue that was supposed to increase but flattened instead. Drastic cuts in service won’t actually solve the structural issue, they’ll merely postpone it. They are not the answer.

The idea some people seem to have that public transportation should pay for itself is simply absurd. Public transportation is an essential public service, like roads, bridges, police, fire departments, and schools. Do the Commonwealth’s roads and bridges pay for their own maintenance?

I ride the 501 express bus from my neighborhood in Brighton to and from my job downtown nearly every day. No matter what time of day I commute, the bus is full or nearly full. Eliminating this particular route will cause many T riders to start driving to work instead of taking the bus, increasing pollution, traffic, and road maintenance costs. It will also make Brighton a far less attractive and stable neighborhood and damage property values, since easy access is to downtown is a huge plus for professionals looking for a place to live.

Every one of the more than 100 other routes whose elimination is under discussion serves many people whose lives and communities would be similarly impacted by the elimination of their route. This proposal isn’t an answer; it’s a disaster.

The right way to solve the T’s budget woes is actually quite obvious:

• The Legislature should compare how much the T was projected to receive from the 20% cut of sales tax revenue vs. how much it actually received, and pay off that much of the T’s debt, including any debt servicing interest paid on it over the years, from the state’s general fund or rainy day fund.

• The T should raise its fares to make them comparable to fares charged in other cities and should raise them regularly moving forward to keep up with inflation. Some of the fares charged by the T are absurdly low. For example, I pay $89 per month to ride the 501 bus every day, whereas if I drove to work I’d pay a minimum of $265 for parking, not to mention possibly needing to buy and insure a car, as well as paying for gas and increased maintenance. I suspect the T could easily charge 50% more than it’s charging now for the 501 and other express buses and keep most of their riders. I know I’d pay it.

• Other sources of revenue, such as income or sales taxes or even state highway and bridge tolls, should be used to offset any remaining budget gap on a year-by-year basis. To make this politically feasible, the Legislature needs to change the conversation by first educating itself, and then educating the public through a massive public opinion campaign, about the fact that a good public transportation system actually saves the Commonwealth and its citizens money, creates jobs, reduces traffic, protects the environment, and reduces our country’s dependence on foreign oil.

I love living in Boston. However, the parochial mentality which so often seems to dominate how things are done around here frequently prompts me to wonder if I live in a minor town with pretensions of being a major city. Destroying our public transportation system would reinforce that image in many people’s minds. Please don’t let this happen.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens

CC: fareproposal@mbta.com

Needless to say, the merchants are livid.  According to the Boston Herald, here’s what Richard Davey, the General Manager of the T, had to say to justify the removal of parking spaces:

“… he said a survey of 500 Route 28 bus passengers found that 91 percent approved of it rolling out the state-of-the-art 60-foot articulated buses, even if it means losing between 60 to 92 parking spaces along its five-mile route…”

Yes, that’s right, the T asked people who don’t use the parking spaces whether it’s OK to get rid of them.

What’s next?  Are they going to ask people who don’t ride the buses whether it’s OK run fewer of them?

The T is holding a public hearing at 6:00pm tomorrow at the Mattapan Public Library.  They’ve publicized this hearing where?  On the buses, of course.  This calls to mind Arthur Dent’s experience in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy when his house is slated for demolition to make room for a bypass road:

“But Mr. Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months.”

“Oh, yes, well, as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday afternoon.  You hadn’t exactly gone out of your way to call attention to them, had you?  I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything.”

“But the plans were on display…”

“On display?  I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.”

“That’s the display department.”

“With a flashlight.”

“Ah, well, the lights had probably gone.”

“So had the stairs.”

“But look, you found the notice, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” said Arthur.  “yes, I did.  It was on display in the bottom of a locked file cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.’”

Also, wouldn’t want normally want to hold one’s public hearings before buying the new buses?  What exactly is the T going to do with $900,000 worth of buses if it turns out they can’t use them because the public outcry is too loud for them to enlarge the bus stops?

Unless, of course, the public hearing is a sham and the removal of the parking spaces is a foregone conclusion…

Alas, it’s still wrong in the MBTA’s own Trip Planner.

Go figure.

I was quickly confronted by Daniel Dombak, a Marketing Director for Equity Office (which manages South Station), and informed that I was on private property and couldn’t distribute flyers without a permit.

“Are you going to arrest me and drag me out of the station for handing out flyers to reporters?” I asked him.

“No, of course we’re not going to drag you out of the building,” he responded, but in fact that’s exactly what he intended to do.

A few minutes later, a Transit Police officer approached me and informed me that I was not allowed to distribute written materials on MBTA property without a permit.  We went back and forth for several rounds with me trying to get her to explain in plain English what would happen if I continued to distribute flyers.  She finally claimed that yes, if I continued to distribute the flyers after being asked to stop, I would be arrested.  The police officer, against whom I have no complaint because she was just doing her job, informed me that of course I could talk to reporters as much as I wanted; I just couldn’t hand them pieces of paper.

This entire exchange was witnessed by Wade Roush, Chief Correspondent for Xconomy Boston.  He subsequently interviewed me about this incident and about the problem I was attempting to bring to light. [UPDATE: Roush's Xconomy article which discusses what happened to me: MBTA Data Helps [sic] Google Users Get Around Boston]

I would have enjoyed getting arrested, because that would definitely have given some much needed publicity to the issue I’m trying to get fixed, but I don’t think my boss or my family would have appreciated it all that much, so I decided not to push the issue.

Nevertheless, the trip was not a complete waste.  I managed to get flyers into the hands of a few reporters, and I was interviewed by one of them.  Furthermore, something even better happened.  Boston Transportation Commissioner Thomas Tinlin was there representing Mayor Menino, and I was able to talk with him briefly after the press conference.  He and I have corresponded in the past, so I used that to break the ice before asking what he recommended I do to get someone to fix the incorrect route information I’d been complaining about for over six years.  He told me to send my concerns to him by email and he would make sure they made it directly to Dan Grabauskas.  So I’ll give that a try and see what happens.

One final thing I’ll mention is that I was terribly amused by the number of people who praised Dan Grabauskas for so quickly taking advantage of new technology by getting the MBTA onto Google Transit.  “Quickly” indeed.  Apparently none of these people are aware that there are 70 transit agencies in 10 countries managed to find their way into Google Transit before Grabauskas figured it out.

I checked, and the data that the MBTA gave to Google has the same errors I’ve been complaining to the T about for over six years.

Since South Station is a short walk from where I work, I’ll be paying a visit and handing out this flyer to any reporters I find there:

(click for PDF)

If I’m lucky maybe I’ll even get to shout out a question to Dan Graubaskas and ask what he’s planning on doing about the fact that the routes given out by Google Maps are wrong because of incorrect data provided by the T.

On July 10, I emailed Monahan at the address McGuire gave me to complain about the fact that John Houghton, the superintendent of the Cabot Bus Garage, had not responded to complaints I’d sent on July 6, 7, and 9.

My email message to Monahan bounced with “User unknown”.  I can’t say I was surprised.

I called the phone number McGuire gave me for Monahan and left a message.  About a week later, on July 16, Houghton finally responded to my email.  He responded to my complaint about passengers not being notified about the delays on July 6, but ignored my complaint about the trip planner having given me an incorrect route.

I wrote back to Houghton on July 17 and asked him to address that complaint.  Almost two weeks later, he has not responded.

Around that time Monahan finally called me back.  I told him I was still trying to get someone to fix the broken trip planner, and he said he would refer the problem to someone who would be able to do something about it, and I would be hearing from her soon.  I haven’t heard from her (no surprise there!).  He also said that McGuire had given me an incorrect email address for him, but he did give me his correct address (no surprise there either!).

Here, incidentally, is the email message I tried to send Monahan on July 10, which reveals a critical piece of new information about this fiasco: I actually first notified the T about the problem with their trip planner over six years ago.  They admitted at the time that there wa a problem, but almost 6½ years later, it still isn’t fixed.

Subject: Non-responsive garage superintendent; failure to notify passengers about delays; wrong information on MBTA Web site

Jim Monahan
Deputy Divison Chief — Transportation
MBTA

Dear Mr. Monahan,

I am writing with the following complaints:

1. The superintendent of the Cabot garage has failed to respond to three separate emails from me, and I was told by Kevin McGuire in a letter last November that I should contact you if that happens.
2. The MBTA continues to fail to notify passengers of delays using the mechanisms it has established for that purpose.
3. The Trip Planner on the MBTA Web site contains incorrect route information which causes passengers who rely on it to miss their buses, a problem about which I first wrote to the MBTA over six years ago.

Please read on for details.

On Monday, July 6, my daughter and I attempted to travel by bus from Brighton Center to Newtonville. I asked the MBTA Trip Planner for the correct timing and route to use, and it told us to take the 501 from Washington St and Foster St to Park St & Tremont St, then walk to 400 Centre St and take the 554 from there to Washington St & Walnut St.

My daughter and I followed the Trip Planner’s directions exactly, but although we waited for well over a half hour, the 554 never showed up. Afterwards, I heard that there were many significant bus delays that morning due to a stuck railroad crossing gate in Waltham. None of these delays were posted to the MBTA Web site or broadcast to passengers through the T-Alerts system. I have complained to the T before about your failure to post and broadcast delays, and I shall continue to do so until you are reliably doing so. I sent the attached complaint about this to the Cabot superintendent on July 6 and received no response.

The next day, we attempted the same trip. Once again, the bus never showed up. This time, we were told afterwards by another passenger that she had seen that bus driving down Washington Street, and I surmised that either the driver had not stopped at 400 Centre St (I was correct, but for the wrong reason; see below), or the driver had run the route early. I sent another complaint to the Cabot superintendent, attached, and again received no reply.

Yesterday, we attempted the trip a third time. This time, we arrived at 400 Centre St more than twenty minutes before the Trip Planner said the 554 would stop there, to ensure we would not miss it. When a 554 bus whose route sign said “downtown” stopped at approximately the correct time, I ran over and asked the driver whether he was going to Newton. The driver responded, “No, I’m going downtown. You need to be on the other side of Newton Corner to catch the bus to Newton.” When I informed him that the Trip Planner had told us to wait at 400 Centre St, he replied, “I’ve been driving buses for 22 years, and that bus has never stopped here.” In other words, your Trip Planner tells people to wait for buses in the wrong place. I sent the attached complaint to about this to the Cabot superintendent and again received no response.

This morning, it occurred to me that the Trip Planner problem sounded familiar, so I went digging through my email archives to find out why. I found an email message (attached) I sent to the MBTA in April 2003 reporting almost exactly the same problem, along with an acknowledgment (attached) from the MBTA. It’s astoundingly unacceptable that over six years later, your trip planner is still giving passengers the same incorrect information.

I’m very much used to complaining to the MBTA, and I’m very much used to being either ignored or fed rationalizations, excuses, prevarications, and buck-passing rather than seeing problems actually solved. It would be a pleasant surprise to receive a prompt, honest, straightforward response to this message, and to see concrete steps taken and concrete improvements made to address my complaints.

So, what’s it going to be, Mr. Monahan? Real improvements or more of the bad service which typifies the MBTA?

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens

To the editor:

Councilor Michael Flaherty’s idea to slash the city’s motor pool by having workers ride the T is a brilliant strategy for doubling the number of employees on the payroll.  How else does he expect to maintain the same level of productivity when workers are forced to spend half the day waiting for trains and buses that run infrequently and arrive late, if at all?

Is Flaherty trying to save the city money or earn points with the unions by creating jobs for their members?

Jonathan Kamens
Brighton

Mr. Houghton,

Thanks to a helpful bus driver this morning (the driver of the inbound 554 bus that passed through Newton Corner at around 8:20), my daughter and I finally found out the real explanation for why we missed the 554 bus from Newton Corner to Newtonville on Monday and Tuesday of this week. It wasn’t because of delays caused by the broken railroad crossing gate in Waltham on Monday, and it wasn’t because the bus went through Newton Corner early on Tuesday.

No, it was because the outbound 554 bus doesn’t actually stop at 400 Centre Street, which is where the Trip Planner on the MBTA Web site told us to wait for it.

The aforementioned helpful driver stopped at 400 Centre Street to let off passengers. After two days of missed buses I was all through making assumptions, so my daughter and I hustled over to the bus, despite the fact that its route sign said “downtown” and it had stopped at the point where passengers are typically let off but not picked up. The driver saw us hurrying over to the bus and was kind enough to wait for us.

When we got there, I asked if he was going to Newton, and he said no, he was going downtown. He then informed me that if I wanted the 554 to Newton, I had to be on the other side of Newton Corner. I told him the MBTA Web site had told me to wait at 400 Centre Street and asked if he was sure the outbound 554 didn’t stop there. He said he’d been driving MBTA buses for 22 years, and as far as he knew, the outbound 554 had never stopped at 400 Centre Street.

Your Trip Planner told my daughter and me to wait at 400 Centre Street (and, by the way, 554 isn’t the only route with this problem — I believe 556 has it, and I bet there are others as well). There’s a route sign posted at 400 Centre Street claiming that the 554 to Waverly stops there. These are real problems. Are you going to fix them?

I’ve written to you twice about this problem, and you haven’t given me courtesy of any reply at all, let alone letting me know that we were waiting in the wrong place. Why is that?

Jonathan Kamens

Being a glutton for punishment, and having no better option, my daughter and I set out this morning once again to take the T from Brighton Center to Walnut Street in Newton, changing buses in Newton Corner.

We were stationed at 400 Centre Street by 8:17, waiting for a 554 bus scheduled to stop there at 8:25.  Our arrival time at 400 Centre Street was consistent with the route suggested by the Trip Planner on your Web site.

Well, 8:25 came and went.  No bus.  Then 8:30 came and went, then 8:35, then 8:40.  At that point, we finally gave up and reverted to the plan B we’d created after yesterday’s fiasco — walking to the cab stand in front of the Crowne Plaza and taking a cab from there.

Alas, when we got there this morning, there were no cabs, even though there had been a long line of them at the same time yesterday.  I called the cab company, and they said we’d have to wait a half hour.  That was useless, so my daughter and I were forced to fall back on plan C — walking in the rain from Newton Corner to Walnut Street.

When we were about two thirds of the way there, a woman standing at the bus stop we had just passed yelled after us that there was a bus coming, and we were able to rush back and catch it.  If not for that kind woman’s help, my daughter would have been twenty minutes late to her ballet program rather than only ten.

We mentioned to the woman that we had been waiting for a 554, and she said she saw it go past her stop about a half hour earlier.  How odd!  I watched every single  bus go past 400 Centre Street from the time we arrived there until 8:40, and I don’t recall seeing a single 554.  Certainly, no 554 ever stopped to pick up passengers.  Perhaps she was mistaken?  If so, then the 554 we were supposed to take was at least a half hour late.

On the other hand, perhaps the driver didn’t bother to stop at 400 Centre Street?  Or perhaps he was in a hurry to end his shift and decided to blow through the route ten minutes ahead of schedule, without regard to all the passengers whom he would leave stranded?

When a bus runs every ten minutes, there’s no harm in letting one run a little ahead of schedule.  However, I hope you will agree that on a route with gaps of a half hour or more, not leaving the major stops significantly early is just as important as not leaving them late.  If not, then what good, exactly, are your schedules and your lovely interactive Trip Planner?  If it is, in fact, the T’s policy that buses on infrequent routes can leave transfer points that early, then don’t you think the Trip Planner should take that into account?

Or perhaps you guys think it’s just more fun to screw over your passengers?  The more I ride the T, the more it seems that way.

Looking forward to your newest excuses and rationalizations, I am,

Sincerely yours,

Jonathan Kamens