"This could have permanently shut down the rail system, but it did not."

 

This seems a bit crazy. Did he mean to say "completely" in place of "permanently"?

^ The train in was "much less crowded" because it was a 3-car train. I boarded on the 7:23 a.m. train at Brookpark, and all seats were pretty much taken immediately. By the time we reached Tower City at 7:55 a.m., there were many riders standing, but it was not "packed." Some of the East Side Red Line stations cannot handle 3-cars, so at Tower City, the operator asked all persons left in Car #3 to come into Car #2.

 

I actually boarded the train after you, 7:35 or so.  Not entirely sure if it was a 3 car train or not (it's still before I have ingested the needed amount of coffee to function) but the station was much less crowded than previously.  Maybe due to a 3 car train arriving before hand.  Either way good to hear that RTA has responded appropriatly with more capacity.

Weeks? Damn..... That must've been a lot of damage!

I am a little surprised those track signals aren't grounded to protect against lighting strikes

Things were much better today. RTA found a way to operate trains more frequently and still maintain safety. One train left Brookpark at 7:14 a.m.. The next one left at 7:23 a.m., and I was on it. Two cars. The Brookpark crowd was a much more normal size. The train reached Tower City at about 7:50 a.m., and everyone had a seat (as far as I could tell).

^ I was on the 7:26(ish) from Puritas so I was probably on with you.  The crowd was much more normal in size, maybe even slightly lighter.  The increased frequency has to be helping a lot.  Good to see the adjustments having a notably positive effect.

Good news. Glad to hear it.

Good to see the letter from Mr Calabrese posted all over thee TC rapid station. Hope all others on the west side got similar treatment.

^ They did. We also sent it out to everyone who subscribes to e-news. I hope that all people on this Forum are subscibers.

Just posted on rideRTA.com

 

Preview of Aug. 2 Board meeting

* http://www.riderta.com/nu_newsroom_releases.asp?listingid=1618

 

Aug. 21 service changes

* http://www.riderta.com/nu_newsroom_releases.asp?listingid=1616

 

Two changes to RTA canine team

* http://www.riderta.com/nu_newsroom_releases.asp?listingid=1617

 

RTA and the Browns, a winning combination

* http://www.riderta.com/nu_newsroom_releases.asp?listingid=1615

 

I know you want to "Marvel" over Cleveland, but Avengers filming causes many detours

* http://www.riderta.com/nu_newsroom_releases.asp?listingid=1613

 

Have a great weekend.

If you're having a good experience despite the Red Line's recent troubles, be sure to e-mail the Plain Dealer's Tom Breckenridge. At noon today he tweeted:

 

RTA's West side trains running slower. http://t.co/nzbpfhH Let me know your Red Line experience these days, email [email protected]

 

People usually only speak up when they have something to complain about. I'm hoping he gets a balanced response....

Random thoughts/questions...

 

Since moving downtown, I've made a point of using RTA more - mostly because I hate driving and I left my car in another neighborhood. That said, I had already ridden the Rapid plenty. It seems unless you're getting off at Tower City, you can ride for free and won't get caught.

 

I've been taking the trolly, making my already short commute laughable. That's free.

 

I took the Healthline for the first time yesterday. Some cops at the station in front of Star Plaza halfheartedly glanced to see if people had tickets, but nobody had to swipe. It seemed that at almost any other station, you could get on and ride for free. Once more, I bought a 1-ride pass. It didn't get swiped and it says I have until January of 2012 to use it. So if I never have to swipe, I could theoretically continue riding the Healthline at the price of one ticket.

 

My only experience riding one of the regular city buses was on the 81 from Ohio City to Public Square. There I had to enter in the front and swipe my ticket, which is typical of Chicago during my almost 2 years there.

 

So my question is... how the heck does RTA make make money? Do they purposely overlook these loopholes, because they know many can't afford it or what?

 

Cheers!

Joe

FWIW, money from fares is a VERY small part of how RTA makes money. Not saying that they shouldn't be enforcing and collecting all fares, as I completely agree with you, but that's like 20% of where they get their income as I understand it.

Interesting... did not know that. But then again, think about how long this has presumably been going on. 20% over a long period of time is a lot of money. Maybe they wouldn't be as worried about the federal government cutting 30% of public transit funds.

It just doesn't play out when you look at the numbers. I mean, MOST people are honest and pay when they are supposed to. The small percentage of people who are stealing fares by riding for free out of the 20%, what would that be, maybe 1%? I'm no math major but it's a pretty small drop in the bucket of their revenue there. The problem with it is perception really. If people see others not paying, it feels really unfair when you do pay. And it makes a lot of people think like you do - that they're just being lax and stupid and not collecting these HUGE amounts of money and that if they did, they'd have no problems and be profitable, when that isn't actually true at all. It's a big PR problem. They don't have the proper equipment in place to collect all fares, all the time, and they don't have the police force to enforce it in person.

To draw a parallel, a lot of people speed, but only a few get caught. The city/county/state assumes that the possible threat of getting caught (or interpretation of it beign a "safe" speed to drive) will keep most people to driving under the limit. There aren't enough cops to ticket every single person that's speeding, you can't enforce it. You can just put up signs saying this is what speed your'e supposed to go and hope most people do that.

Good point on perception. That's why when I was a suburbanite I assumed RTA was a deathtrap. Poor people get on and they just go all stabby, right!?

 

I didn't necessarily think I was being cheated or something. More an observation. But I did go ahead and assume they were losing more than they probably are.

 

For the Healthline, I don't think they need anything more advance to collect fares. Just make people load up on the front, like on the regular city buses!

 

For the Rapid, I'm guessing they don't have the funds to create turnstiles with a transit officer watching - like Chicago.

 

In other news, do we have smart cards? I've chatted with the GCRTA twitter account about it and they said it's in the making, but will be a while. Yet when I was getting on the Healthline, I saw a "Smart Card" machine...

Good point on perception. That's why when I was a suburbanite I assumed RTA was a deathtrap. Poor people get on and they just go all stabby, right!?

 

I didn't necessarily think I was being cheated or something. More an observation. But I did go ahead and assume they were losing more than they probably are.

 

For the Healthline, I don't think they need anything more advance to collect fares. Just make people load up on the front, like on the regular city buses!

 

For the Rapid, I'm guessing they don't have the funds to create turnstiles with a transit officer watching - like Chicago.

 

In other news, do we have smart cards? I've chatted with the GCRTA twitter account about it and they said it's in the making, but will be a while. Yet when I was getting on the Healthline, I saw a "Smart Card" machine...

Actually in the past many of the Red Line stations had turnstyles, like the old chicago and NYC sytems.

 

However, Chicago and NYC went to fare card and electronic turnstyles, in the late 90s/early 00's, something that is needed here in Cleveland.

The sheer volume of Healthline riders eliminates the possibility for the "pay at the front" approach.

 

The fare machines on the Healthline and Rapid are programmed to utilize smartcards.  But RTA has yet to implement that.

I rode during rush hour yesterday and it didn't seem any busier than buses I've ridden in other cities that have a pay up front approach. Ultimately it doesn't bother me... just something I noticed!

 

I could've sworn I saw someone use the smart card machine and it beeped. Maybe they were just looking at it, though... Can't wait for a smart card! Will definitely ride more then.

 

Cheers,

Joe

CLEJoe, someday when you have about 15 hours on your hands and are really bored, you can read the history of recent RTA fare collection policy in this thread.  But to catch you up:

 

The "proof of payment" system RTA uses on the Red Line and HealthLine was a purposeful move away from turnstiles and pay-as-you-enter operation.  Ridership at several Red Line stations is not high enough to really justify an [expensive] station agent to man a turnstiled entry, but is high enough that having passengers pay as they enter the rail car slows down boarding and slows Rapid travel time (you'll find many complaints waaaay upthread about holding up an entire rapid train to allow boarding passengers to pay at the front entrance).  For the HealthLine, it's the same story: not requiring passengers to all board at the front entry and pay or show proof payment to the driver = faster service, which was one of the main elements of the conversion of the #6 route to BRT.

 

As for not seeing many people swipe on the HealthLine: RTA's web site does a lousy job explaining fair policies, IMHO (they still list a $1.50 fare for the free trolleys), but many riders do not have to swipe or validate, including riders with monthly passes, or riders with an all day pass that was activated earlier in the day, which I suspect covers a lot of riders.  Also, if you buy your one ride farecard from a machine at a station, I don't think you need to validate or swipe or anything further.  And all the validating/swiping is supposed to occur at the station, I believe, not on the bus itself.

 

I rode during rush hour yesterday and it didn't seem any busier than buses I've ridden in other cities that have a pay up front approach.

 

Probably not busier, but it is meant to be faster than traditional operation with the same passenger load.  And in my experience, it does board much, much, much faster than other high-load lines in other cities (than in pre-select bus service NYC, anyway).

 

RTA ought to route of their downtown trolleys via the bike station.

RTA ought to move their trolleys off euclid anyways and stop replicated service.

RTA ought to move their trolleys off euclid anyways and stop replicated service.

 

I agree. The trolley on Euclid could be rerouted in favor of a free Health Line between Public Square and CSU. Since the trolleys only run 7am-7pm M-F, you could get easily get more ridership between Playhouse Square and East 4th for weekends and evening events, especially during the colder months.

RTA ought to move their trolleys off euclid anyways and stop replicated service.

 

I agree. The trolley on Euclid could be rerouted in favor of a free Health Line between Public Square and CSU. Since the trolleys only run 7am-7pm M-F, you could get easily get more ridership between Playhouse Square and East 4th for weekends and evening events, especially during the colder months.

 

The Healthline is too busy between those points. I think the trolley helps relieve the traffic a bit.

The trolley actually helps back up traffic. It just puts a bus in the traffic lane when we already have a bus only lane. It would be so easy to reroute this thing on Prospect where it could serve essentially the exact same stops (and better connect the wolsten center to central downtown), give a boost to prospect, and minimize congestion on Euclid. No one is going to pay to ride the healthline between PS and E.22nd. Simply stop checking POP on this stretch and give people some options.

Nobody is going to pay to ride the Healthline between those stops as is. Nobody is checking for RTA passes :/. That said, I'm cool with the trolly servicing another road! Prospect makes sense.

^It's about time for Cleveland to have a "fare free" zone anyway.  Where it's practical atleast (Healthline).

I love its convenience during the winter time. As somebody who rides it a lot, prospect would be out of the way for me and serve way less people. Maybe it would be better if they moved the trolley to use the bus only lane and middle platforms instead. The healthline is very hard to get on downtown going west because of there large ridership.

Nobody is going to pay to ride the Healthline between those stops as is. Nobody is checking for RTA passes :/. That said, I'm cool with the trolly servicing another road! Prospect makes sense.

 

Gotta disagree.  When I was riding over the winter, at least 1 in 5 trips in the morning I would have to flash my CSU card to a pair of RTA police.  Only in the mornings though (and often during the worst weather).  Of course they often stupidly both entered through the front door and there would be a mass exodus of freeloaders screaming "back door" at the bus driver and then stampeding out.

 

Though, why is it out of the question that the free trolley use the bus lane?  The regular non-healthline buses do it all the time.

 

And to be on topic, why not have a policy where you can show your PHS ticket or E. 4th dinner receipt to the bus driver to get a free ride from one place to the other?

 

 

^The trolley's have no doors on the left do they?  That's what precludes them from using the center Healthline stations.

^The trolley's have no doors on the left do they?  That's what precludes them from using the center Healthline stations.

 

Correct

RTA ought to route of their downtown trolleys via the bike station.

 

Because of their vintage design, trolleys have no bike racks in the front.

RTA ought to route of their downtown trolleys via the bike station.

 

Because of their vintage design, trolleys have no bike racks in the front.

 

I don't want them to carry bikes. I want them to distribute around downtown bike commuters who arrive downtown's bike station.

I love its convenience during the winter time. As somebody who rides it a lot, Prospect would be out of the way for me and serve way less people. Maybe it would be better if they moved the trolley to use the bus-only lane and middle platforms instead. The HealthLine is very hard to get on downtown going west because of there large ridership.

 

The trolleys now carry about 4,000 people a day, and are one of RTA's most popular services. Looking ahead to when both the casino and the medical mart are in place, RTA will be looking at its downtown trolleys to see how to expand the services to better connect the travel/tourism sites with the hotel sites...and of course, better serve downtown workers.

A friend of mine just shared this story with me.....

___________

 

Nearly missed my connection to Megabus on Friday.

 

Rapid train arrived at U Circle stop at like 4:55…and promptly sat for about 20 minutes…then started…and stopped again. 

 

Eventually an RTA staffer stormed through the car, announcing signal problems and assuring that the train would be back underway shortly.

 

Got to Tower City in time to run up the escalator and burst outside about 5:37.  A kindly cab driver directed a couple of us to walk a block north to Prospect (we were on the south side of the Tower…which I thought was Prospect) and look for the long line of folks waiting for Megabus.

 

Fortunately, the bus was late (scheduled to depart at 5:30)…and all worked out well.

 

Was disappointed with the Rapid not being so rapid…

The trolley actually helps back up traffic. It just puts a bus in the traffic lane when we already have a bus only lane. It would be so easy to reroute this thing on Prospect where it could serve essentially the exact same stops (and better connect the wolsten center to central downtown), give a boost to prospect, and minimize congestion on Euclid. No one is going to pay to ride the healthline between PS and E.22nd. Simply stop checking POP on this stretch and give people some options.

 

I like this idea a lot. 

Riders To Bring Back The Daily Lakewood Circulator to host public forum

Published: Monday, August 08, 2011, 12:58 PM    Updated: Monday, August 08, 2011, 1:02 PM

  By Cody Peck, Sun News

 

Riders To Bring Back The Daily Lakewood Circulator will host a public forum with Lakewood mayoral and City Council candidates at 7 p.m. on Aug. 30 in the Lakewood Public Library’s multi-purpose room, 15425 Detroit Ave.

 

Discussion will focus on how Lakewood can have its own daily circulator bus service without the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority.

 

RTA cut the Lakewood circulator route, along with 11 others, in 2009 to help close a $5.2 million deficit in its operating budget.

 

READ MORE AT:

http://www.cleveland.com/sunpostherald/index.ssf/2011/08/riders_to_bring_back_the_daily_1.html

This is probably a tough time to be asking for expansion unless Lakewood businesses create a Transportation Improvement District (http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/5540) to support restoring and sustaining the circulator.........

 

For all the imbedded links, see: http://allaboardohio.org/2011/08/03/ohio-public-transit-services-in-serious-jeopardy/

 

Ohio public transit is in serious jeopardy

 

If Congress fails to extend the current federal surface transportation spending authorization by Sept. 30, 2011, numerous public transportation services will cease. If the recent ideological fight in Congress over the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization, which will terminate 4,000 FAA workers and 80,000 construction jobs, is any indication, a similar and much more serious debacle is coming to surface transportation this fall.

 

Without public transportation, thousands of Ohioans will lose their only way to reach their jobs, which is the same as a layoff. Indeed, the Ohio Department of Transportation says more Ohioans (500,000) use public transportation each day than fly in and out of Ohio’s airports (fewer than 130,000). According to the Ohio Public Transit Association, six out of 10 public transit riders use transit to get to work. Others use transit to visit the doctor, go to school, get groceries and make other trips.

 

Federal surface transportation taxes due to expire Sept. 30 include the following:

 

+ 14.1 cents of the total 18.4-cent per gallon of the gasoline, diesel, kerosene, and alternative fuels taxes.

+ Reduced rate of tax on partially exempt methanol or ethanol fuel.

+ Tax on retail sale of heavy highway vehicles.

+ Tax on heavy truck tires.

+ Annual use tax on heavy highway vehicles.

 

(As a reminder, the U.S. Federal Highway Administration presents the following summary of federal highway user taxes.)

 

Although renewing the Highway Trust Fund excise taxes has typically been a routine affair, observers at Politico, DC.StreetsBlog, and the Council of State Governments question whether this case will be different.  Given the continuing debate over the federal debt ceiling and surface transportation reauthorization bill, compromise may be harder to reach in time, as evidenced by the current Federal Aviation Administration partial shutdown.

 

Some in Congress see this as an opportunity to sharply reduce or eliminate a federal role in funding transportation programs. While this may seem tempting considering that gas tax-donor states like Ohio send more money to Washington than they get back in funding, turning over transportation funding control to states could devastate public transportation that hundreds of thousands of Ohio families depend on for their livelihoods.

 

The reason is Ohio’s Constitution (Article XII, Sec. 5a) which prohibits the spending of state-levied taxes on road users for anything other than building and maintaining roads. There is no such restriction on federal transportation funds. So some federal gas taxes are used to fund public transit capital and operating costs. If some or all federal funding of transportation stops and/or is turned over to the states, the quality and quantity of public transportation in Ohio will be seriously affected.

 

Gone will be the federal funding share (up to 80 percent of project costs) for new bus purchases, rail improvement projects in Cleveland, new ore rebuilt bus garages, new bus rapid transit projects, and more. Big-city transit providers may have to cannibalize some transit operations to fund capital costs to keep other services functioning safely. Gone will be operating assistance to small-city and rural transit agencies, most of which will likely cease some or all operations.

 

How many Ohioans are affected?

 

The Census shows 8.5 percent of Ohio households have no car — that’s 1 million people! And there are 1.2 million one-car households where 3 million Ohioans live and are forced to share cars to reach work, health care, shopping, school or to vote. Lastly, 2 million Ohioans are 65 years or older, many of whom may have cars but can no longer drive them safely, the Census shows. Rising gas prices, reduced interest by young people in driving everywhere and an aging populace means we need more funding for transit, not less!

 

You don’t have to accept this…

 

Contact your Congressperson

Contact your Senator

 

Please don’t forget to support All Aboard Ohio! Help us in reaching our $5,000 goal for the $250 NOW Campaign — we are only $1,000 away. Even if you don’t have $250 to help All Aboard Ohio, please donate whatever you can afford. Please visit our Pay Online feature. Or kindly send checks payable to “All Aboard Ohio” to 309 South 4th Street, Suite 304, Columbus,  OH 43215-5428.

 

Together we can win this fight for more and better transportation choices in Ohio!

Fare Evation: Simple idea. Return turnstiles to the Red line. Should never have been removed.  Maybe have a station manager incharge of keeping each station working. Have servailence cameras. Electronic smart cards. Health Line: At heavy, used, stations: Put in mini turnstiles with a paid waiting area. I saw this done in a couple of busways in South America. Smart cards.

It is very unlikely RTA will hire/re-hire employees to staff rail stations. That's a lot of expense, considering there are more than a dozen Red Line stations with usable station agent booths. Considering the Red Line runs 20 hours a day, that's 2.5 shifts x 13 stations x $75,000 (assumes pay and benefits is in the $50,000 to $100,000 range) per employee, you're talking nearly $2.5 million to add managers at each station. You can run a lot more trains and/or buses for that amount.

 

Turnstiles? Who knows, but they would certainly be more affordable.....

 

BTW, speaking of red lines, when you typed "evation" didn't a little red line appear under the word to encourage you to check its spelling?

$50-100K for a job manning a turnstile? I want that job!

That was quoted including benefits.  Health insurance isn't cheap.

I know that, but I would assume a job like that would pay like $12 or $15K a year. Surely health insurance doesn't cost a company $35K a year, or double that.

Oh heck no. Those are union jobs. While I don't know the exact pay of RTA station agents (when RTA had them), station agents at other transit authorities have  minimum salaries of $15 - $20 per hour, with increments that rise with seniority to $20 - $25 per hour. In annual pay, that's about $30,000 to $50,000 per year. Then there's health insurance, retirement, paid sick leave, payroll taxes, and other benefits. So, with benefits, a station agent can cost a transit agency $50,000 to $100,000 per year very easily.

 

In fact, while researching this, I found the average GCRTA employee, in fact, costs the agency $75,000 per year (lucky guess on my part). This paragraph is about 2/3 the way down:

 

As a rule of thumb, the cost for each position at RTA is approximately $75,000, which includes salary, fringe benefits, retirement costs and payroll taxes.

SOURCE: http://www.riderta.com/budgetchallenges/index.asp?print=1

 

Of course, that doesn't mean that this cost applies to station agent positions. But it's the best number I could find.

Dang.

To put it into perspective, a friend of mine is a locomotive engineer for one of the large freight railroads. He makes $100,000 per year in direct salary. And he doesn't even work a lot overtime like some of his colleagues who earn more than he does. But he is responsible for a lot more than an RTA station agent, including moving a 12,500-ton train at speeds of up to 60 mph carrying thousands of pounds or millions of gallons of hazardous materials that, if released into the air or water, could wipe out a small city. Or think of the value of the cargo he is hauling. A 100-car train can carry 750 to 1,500 newly built autos making their way to car dealerships. That could be $20 million to $50 million worth of new cars he's hauling.

 

But, then again, the driver of an RTA train could be hauling 200 to 300 priceless lives in a single Rapid transit train, that is meeting and passing other equally full trains just inches apart at closing speeds of more than 100 mph. Understandably, they are paid more than station agents because their responsibility and skill level is greater. But I don't know how much more. Their pay certainly pushes the average RTA employee compensation up to $75,000.

Question: I do not know if RTA or the city, or both have some sort of interest/responsibility in this matter, but along the Healthline, (like some other parts of downtown with much older pavement) there are at least a couple dozen manhole covers on sewers between downtown and UC that are totally out of alignment. The constant "CA-CLUNK" sound, continually is really annoying and seems to evoke shoddy work. FFSakes... Is there anyone noticing this? It seems way too new for this sort of thing to be happening already. Its almost as though a slight earthquake hit and knocked these holes out of alignment with their covers all along the H.L. RTA? City? Is there any attention to this and any plan to correct this problem? Its bad enough this is a problem on streets like 9th and Superior where the surface is much older and worn, but on a much newer surface... Woah!

Now that you mention it, I have heard them. And I never give them another thought until now.

Well, that's just the problem... Rhetorically speaking...a lot of Cleveland has an attitude that does not give much of anything a second thought....like things that seem small, but add up to be a lot collectively. Its like a defect in some of the thinking around here that most seem to not be able to admit...and when someone does point out issues or areas for needed improvement, they're often mistaken and labeled "anti-Cleveland" just for holding things to a higher standard that should be expected. Ask some people who have to work in offices on streets with this constant Ca-Clunk... who have hear this and how disruptive it can be like a dripping faucet all day long. In fact, I did not take much note to it either until I had at least 4 people tell me about it who work downtown---and after riding down Euclid. Its tolerable if a couple do this on and off... but it is increasing all over downtown.  So, the question still remains unanswered: Who is responsible or alert to the fact that this problem should be corrected?