Oy. Ok, never mind. It was just wishful thinking.

It's more expensive than I thought. I found an article I wrote in April about weekly shopper shuttles in Lakewood and West Park. Each cost $30,000 for 6.5 hours of weekly service to subsidize what standard RTA fares couldn't cover. So if you wanted a free service, it would cost more than $30,000 for a 6.5 hours of weekly service. If a shuttle ran back and forth between Ohio City and downtown from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. each weekday, that's 15 hours of weekly service.

 

So it's highly possible we're looking at about $100,000 for a free lunchtime circulator -- proof that there are, in fact, no free lunches!

 

Christie's runs their shuttle pretty regularly during weekends and during happy hours (well more than 6.5 hours per week).  The Flat Iron provides shuttles for all Indians and Cavs home games.  Are you suggesting it's costing them and whoever else runs shuttles $30,000 each time they offer up their free service for transportation from downtown to their venue?  You can rent a party bus for 6 hours for like $800.

Good point shs.  That's more of what I was thinking of - a little shuttle sponsored maybe by a group of businesses and restaurants, such as those he mentioned, surely they could afford that if they pooled resources.

I believe KJP's $30,000 figure was yearly.  The $800 party bus times 52 weeks would be $41,600 for a year (and that's assuming they'd split those 6 hours over 5 days, which I guarantee you they wouldn't).

I get that his figure was yearly, but I really doubt Christie's is paying that kind of money to run their shuttle.  Oh well.

I was mainly replying to shs96's $800 party bus comment.

Good point shs. That's more of what I was thinking of - a little shuttle sponsored maybe by a group of businesses and restaurants, such as those he mentioned, surely they could afford that if they pooled resources.

 

Then should I move this discussion out of the RTA thread?

After 1 more question, yes.  Is it possible to simply amend or expand the route of the shorter trolley, the one that goes around WHD? 

What sort of ridership would such a line earn, do you suppose?

What do you mean by "sort?" Numbers? Type of people?  I don't really think I could speculate on numbers.

I don't think that it was matches' point, but a "free" circulator from OC to Downtown probably would draw a lot of the type of riders many on here complain about.

Oh well. forgive me for suggesting a different or innovative idea, let's just find all the things wrong with it we can and explain why there's no way that could happen or ever work.  We'll just keep doing the same thing, without end or change.  Carry on.

It's more expensive than I thought. I found an article I wrote in April about weekly shopper shuttles in Lakewood and West Park. Each cost $30,000 for 6.5 hours of weekly service to subsidize what standard RTA fares couldn't cover. So if you wanted a free service, it would cost more than $30,000 for a 6.5 hours of weekly service. If a shuttle ran back and forth between Ohio City and downtown from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. each weekday, that's 15 hours of weekly service.

 

So it's highly possible we're looking at about $100,000 for a free lunchtime circulator -- proof that there are, in fact, no free lunches!

 

Christie's runs their shuttle pretty regularly during weekends and during happy hours (well more than 6.5 hours per week).  The Flat Iron provides shuttles for all Indians and Cavs home games.  Are you suggesting it's costing them and whoever else runs shuttles $30,000 each time they offer up their free service for transportation from downtown to their venue?  You can rent a party bus for 6 hours for like $800.

 

This is the difference between RTA and their payscale and private sector and private vehicles.  It costs RTA more than $100 per hour of service now, per vehicle operator, not including the purchase of the vehicle itself.  Could you find a private operator that would do this for $50/hour?

 

In theory, you negotiate and rent 2 yellowcab vans for 4 hours/day and negotiate a rate and have the cabbies run the route.  You could put a large magnet sign on the side that had the name of the free shuttle.  Would each cab be willing to do this for $25 or $30/hour or work out a per passnger rate?

On another note, there is an RTA clean up day on the Blue/Green lines schedule for Oct. 23:

 

RTA Clean Up Day

Saturday, October 23rd

 

RTA's Citizen's Advisory Board, along with Park Works and assistance from RTA communications staff, is organizing a Clean Up Day along the Blue and Green Lines on Saturday, Oct. 23, from 9:00 a.m. to noon.

 

Volunteers will meet at a designated location and work to clean up some of the areas where trash accumulates along the tracks. Park Works provides a service through the Rapid Recovery program for 31 weeks during the year, over the entirety of the RTA system, using Court Community Service work crews, but cannot reach all of the dozens of miles of track each week and during inclement weather.

 

If anyone is interested in helping in this volunteer effort to make the scenery for train riders a bit more pleasant, please contact Mary McCahon at [email protected].

 

 

Oh well. forgive me for suggesting a different or innovative idea, let's just find all the things wrong with it we can and explain why there's no way that could happen or ever work.  We'll just keep doing the same thing, without end or change.  Carry on.

 

Or we could just implement every idea every forumer proposes without thinking about the possible obstacles and reasons it hasn't yet been implemented.

I wasn't looking for automatic implemention, but it would be nice if someone said, yeah, I can see your point, there are THOUSANDS of people who work downtown who would love to be spending their money at OC restaurants, it's too bad we can't get something going, maybe we can brainstorm some ideas that would work so both the OC community and the DT workers could benefit from it.

For the record then R&R I can see your point.  There's probably plenty of others reading this thread that do too. However, reading here long enough you do tend to get trained to go right to the nitty gritty realities; otherwise, we're all just "SimCitying."

We did do that.  Then we figured out the costs and discussed possibilities for who would pay for it.

 

And ideas outside of RTA (which seems cost prohibitve for this service unless a major sponsor is found) don't belong in this thread anyway.

Thanks Loretto, it just didn't feel like the idea had any merit at all.  I don't know which things have been implemented that are in place now were "easy" or "cheap," and I just thought it might result in some good ideas, instead of just a slew of reasons why it's impossible to even consider.  I feel a little like EC at the moment, which is kind of scary. :)

I never said don't consider it.  In fact, I think it is a great idea.  The more trolleys, the better.  It is a great service to have, so long as we can afford it.  But you do have to consider that it wouldn't just be downtown workers and a specific segment of the OC community that would use it.  I imagine it would be quite attractive, as a free means of transportation, for those Lakeview Terrace rabble-rousers and others in and around OC to be shuttled into downtown to loiter, cause trouble, scare the suburbanites, etc.  Personally, I would not let that be a deterrent to providing such a service to the community as a whole.

From the back of my envelope:

 

If the annual cost is $100,000 (as KJP guesstimated), that comes out to roughly $400/ workday (approx. 250/year).  If the average diner at an OC lunch joint spends $10.00 for lunch, and the restaurant's food cost is roughly 30% (I'll have to talk to my chef friends to double check, but I think this is a plausible number, maybe too high) then they make $7.00 per meal, (minus fixed costs like rent and utilities which they'd pay anyway, so I wouldn't factor them in here).  I'd assume they probably wouldn't have to add labor, either, unless this thing is wildly successful or they are already stretched thin. $400/$7.00= 57.14 (or 58 riders avg a day) to break even. It seems to me that the economics of this may be plausible, if the ridership is.

 

It could also be offered as a M-W-F/T-Th type service, which may yield most of the ridership with a greater reduction in cost.

Electrify the trolleys --

 

Spanish company is developing rapid charging stations for charging bus batteries at bus stops.  Easier and better looking than running electric wires for the entire route.

http://bit.ly/dnfG9P

 

This would be a great first step toward light rail on Euclid Ave -- twenty years to electric buses, thirty to light rail?

I can dream....

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/10/juveniles_who_jump_rta_rapid_l.html

Juveniles who don't pay RTA fares could face $50 fine

 

" Youthful riders who jump onto RTA's HealthLine and Red line without paying could face a $50 fine, under a policy the RTA board is considering. "

 

 

I have to echo one of the cleveland.com posters.  Wouldn't installing turnstiles at all of the stations, or at least the problem ones, and having security or staff manning the stations fix much of this problem.  Sure they'd cost some money, but in the long term a lot more revenue would be coming in, not to mention the whole process of where and when to pay would be far more simple and less unnerving.

 

Commuter Alerts....something long overdue

 

http://www.newsnet5.com/dpp/news/local_news/cleveland_metro/rta-now-offering-commuter-alert-service-for-rapid-rail-riders

 

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/10/juveniles_who_jump_rta_rapid_l.html

Juveniles who don't pay RTA fares could face $50 fine

 

" Youthful riders who jump onto RTA's HealthLine and Red line without paying could face a $50 fine, under a policy the RTA board is considering. "

 

 

I have to echo one of the cleveland.com posters. Wouldn't installing turnstiles at all of the stations, or at least the problem ones, and having security or staff manning the stations fix much of this problem. Sure they'd cost some money, but in the long term a lot more revenue would be coming in, not to mention the whole process of where and when to pay would be far more simple and less unnerving.

 

 

I thought this comment was particularly upsetting:

 

"I moved here from Boston, where I took the train all the time. When I moved here, I found the transit system here to be seriously confusing. I rode for free many times (not on purpose), after purchasing a one time pass but not sure where to use it. There is no staff at the stations to answer questions, and no signs that indicate what to do.

 

At one point I got off the rapid on West 25th after throwing away my pass once I boarded at Tower City. When I got off, there were three cops and a dog checking passes - something I had never even heard of. When I told them I bought a pass, boarded, and threw it in the trash, they scolded me and threatened me with a $200 fine. Keep in mind I am a grown man, dressed in a suit, obviously a professional coming from work downtown. They did not appreciate my opinion on how vague their riding policy was.

 

Their needs to be a serious overhaul of the rapid here. No wonder it loses money. It is by far the most inefficient transit system I have ever been on. It is hard to believe it is still in operation. Needless to say, I do not take it at all anymore."

 

Welcome to Cleveland, right?  Dang. Seriously, pants-dragging thugs get off with a verbal warning, legit riders new to the "system" get treated like this? 

 

 

^ 100% agree.

 

When we go to the WSM on Saturdays, we board at W117th and get off at W25th, with my gf buying the $5 pass...however in maybe a dozen trips we've never been stopped.  Which makes you seriously question why bother paying the $5.

 

However, in my daily commute from w117 to TowerCity, I am routinely stopped and asked at the 117th platform, once causing me to miss a train.

 

There needs to be a uniform approach taken and a better system enforced.

 

Also, to dovetail on the previous comment, every morning there are 5-6 RTA transit security officers standing at the TC turnstiles greeting commuters.  Isn't this overkill? or at least a gross misallocation of scarce resources?  Couldn't some of these individuals be better put to use manning a turnstile system?

Seriously, pants-dragging thugs get off with a verbal warning, legit riders new to the "system" get treated like this? 

 

It sounds like all he received was a verbal warning as well.  But, thanks for the cleveland.com moment there.  :roll:

 

I do agree with the comment in that it is ridiculously hard to figure out what to do, especially since each rapid line has different rules.

Yeah the rapids can be a bit confusing.

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/10/juveniles_who_jump_rta_rapid_l.html

Juveniles who don't pay RTA fares could face $50 fine

 

" Youthful riders who jump onto RTA's HealthLine and Red line without paying could face a $50 fine, under a policy the RTA board is considering. "

 

 

I have to echo one of the cleveland.com posters.  Wouldn't installing turnstiles at all of the stations, or at least the problem ones, and having security or staff manning the stations fix much of this problem.  Sure they'd cost some money, but in the long term a lot more revenue would be coming in, not to mention the whole process of where and when to pay would be far more simple and less unnerving.

 

 

I thought this comment was particularly upsetting:

 

"I moved here from Boston, where I took the train all the time. When I moved here, I found the transit system here to be seriously confusing. I rode for free many times (not on purpose), after purchasing a one time pass but not sure where to use it. There is no staff at the stations to answer questions, and no signs that indicate what to do.

 

At one point I got off the rapid on West 25th after throwing away my pass once I boarded at Tower City. When I got off, there were three cops and a dog checking passes - something I had never even heard of. When I told them I bought a pass, boarded, and threw it in the trash, they scolded me and threatened me with a $200 fine. Keep in mind I am a grown man, dressed in a suit, obviously a professional coming from work downtown. They did not appreciate my opinion on how vague their riding policy was.

 

Their needs to be a serious overhaul of the rapid here. No wonder it loses money. It is by far the most inefficient transit system I have ever been on. It is hard to believe it is still in operation. Needless to say, I do not take it at all anymore."

 

Welcome to Cleveland, right?  Dang. Seriously, pants-dragging thugs get off with a verbal warning, legit riders new to the "system" get treated like this?  

 

 

 

Yes, this is maddening.  It really leaves a bad impression of the city as well.  What is it gonna take to change this ridiculous system and the people working/running it.  You'd think the fact that so many people are saying the same thing would be enough, as well as the amount of people that just wont bother riding any more.   

the ticket machines on the healthline are beyond ridiculous.  It seriously takes 3-4 minutes to buy a ticket at one of them and half the time people end up with the wrong kind of ticket anyway or forget to validate it (maybe because that isn't really posted anywhere...)

for someone who doesn't know what they are doing it can be confusing because it automatically starts you off with a senior/disability ticket

I once received a verbal dressing down from a mean ole RTA lunch lady at Tower City who wanted to verify the ages of my children riding on their child all day passes (they were aged 5 and 7 at the time).  Apparently I had violated the definition of "child." 

 

When I told the employee that when I sat down on the ground  :wink: to buy the passes at West Blvd, the touch screen did not indicate age groups and perhaps they should do so.  She replied that it was not her problem.  I threatened her to call the police on my 5 year old daughter and she finally let us pass.

 

I thought this comment was particularly upsetting:

 

"I moved here from Boston, where I took the train all the time. When I moved here, I found the transit system here to be seriously confusing. I rode for free many times (not on purpose), after purchasing a one time pass but not sure where to use it. There is no staff at the stations to answer questions, and no signs that indicate what to do.

 

At one point I got off the rapid on West 25th after throwing away my pass once I boarded at Tower City. When I got off, there were three cops and a dog checking passes - something I had never even heard of. When I told them I bought a pass, boarded, and threw it in the trash, they scolded me and threatened me with a $200 fine. Keep in mind I am a grown man, dressed in a suit, obviously a professional coming from work downtown. They did not appreciate my opinion on how vague their riding policy was.

 

Their needs to be a serious overhaul of the rapid here. No wonder it loses money. It is by far the most inefficient transit system I have ever been on. It is hard to believe it is still in operation. Needless to say, I do not take it at all anymore."

 

Welcome to Cleveland, right?  Dang. Seriously, pants-dragging thugs get off with a verbal warning, legit riders new to the "system" get treated like this?  

 

 

How DARE we question or expect better from the best transit system in North America!!!

 

Seriously, yes.....this is a pathetic scenario sure to alienate any respectful and loyal paying rider. (although he wasn't paying...but with the claim of it being a "mistake") This guy, seemingly sincere about not, not paying on purpose.... gets grilled and the daily litterers, loud noise makers, and loiterers are allowed to hang out and use the transit system as a means to conduct the transportation needed for their probable drug business. What a joke.

That reminds me of a scene from one of the Death Wish films, where there is this old couple living in mortal fear of the neighborhood gangmembers and they have a gun for protection. The police then come to harass the elderly couple and confiscate the gun, knowing full well that the weapon is the only thing keeping the couple safe.

 

And in the next scene, we see the couple getting robbed openly by the taunting gangbangers with no police to be found.

 

Cops know it's easier to go after the good guys rather than serious criminals - why do you thiink there are so many cops hanging by Coventry instead of the areas where they are far more needed, say the east Cleveland/Cleveland heights border. It seems like RTA is taking a chapter right out of that book.  Pathetic

Why isn't there advertising displayed at the airport Rapid stop?  Instead of the small model planes (without wheels) that are awkwardly glued to the walls, why can't RTA advertise there?  That's a great space... another missed opportunity for revenue?  This is coming back from a trip to Chicago where their underground transit lines are filled with advertising.

 

And by the way, I saw two ladies almost kneeling down at the airport ticket machines trying to buy tickets... trying to line up their eyes with the ridiculous display screen.  I almost took a picture.  Again, this is coming back from a trip to Chicago where buying a ticket for CTA takes me about 10 seconds (not counting the debit card transaction time) on a system I use very infrequently. 

Some constructive criticisms of RTA here, essentially saying the system is too confusing....

 

Newcomers find Cleveland is a great place to live

Published: Saturday, October 16, 2010, 6:43 AM

Sarah Crump, The Plain Dealer

 

Sometimes it takes a newcomer to show longtime Clevelanders exactly what's right -- and what could be improved -- about the city.

 

We asked seven people, all of whom live or work in the city, their first impressions of Cleveland, and if those opinions have changed.

 

READ MORE AT:

http://www.cleveland.com/living/index.ssf/2010/10/post_4.html

Do they plan on replacing the red lines cars? I would assume the Red Line gets the most use but has the oldest crappiest cars.

Do they plan on replacing the red lines cars? I would assume the Red Line gets the most use but has the oldest crappiest cars.

 

Nope. And the Red Line cars are newer. They were built in 1984-85. The Blue/Green Line cars were built in 1980-81. But the Blue/Green Line cars were rebuilt in the 2000s. The Red Line cars have yet to undergo a rebuilding program.

Am I correct that the red line gets more use? So they renovated the blue/green line cars in 2000. Their interiors definitely looks better than the red line, the red line is just plain ugly. Do you know if they plan on renovating the red line cars since they don't plan on replacing them?

Having them clean would be a nice start. They need a good scrubbing!

Am I correct that the red line gets more use? So they renovated the blue/green line cars in 2000. Their interiors definitely looks better than the red line, the red line is just plain ugly. Do you know if they plan on renovating the red line cars since they don't plan on replacing them?

 

The Red Line gets about 20,000 riders per day. The Blue/Green Lines are about 10,000 per day -- at least that's been the situation for the past decade. I am not aware of any plans to renovate the Red Line cars, however. You may not like them but RTA loves them. The Red Line cars (made by Tokyu) are very reliable, they take a beating and are easy to repair.

I think the blue/green line cars look nice and are comfortable. The redline is what vistors new to the city take from the airport and that is what they see. I would prefer that they got the nicer interiors so that they would have a better experience.

^ honestly, I don't think there is anything wrong with the Red Line Cars.  And I would think the RTA can use those dollars much more productively than on the inside of those cars.  Replacing the Brookpark Station(hell really just the parking lot, fell like I'm going to blow out a tire every morning), or just about any Eastside station would be a good start. 

I would like the mayfield road station

I would like the mayfield road station

 

It's coming, as soon as Norfolk Southern gets off its ass and approves the plans.

Good! Lets hope that happens soon.

The RTA should create a bus route from downtown to steelyard commons

The RTA should create a bus route from downtown to steelyard commons

 

In addition to the 81? Granted, it takes about 30 minutes to get there, but it takes about 18 minutes if you drive directly.

37 min by bus, 8-10 min by car.

81 doesn't come downtown I believe, and not everyone has a car so having a direct route there would improve the ability for people to live in Cleveland without a car.