Bike on train tomorrow: consists?

Planning to get my bike from shop in feasterville tomorrow. Was wondering what kind of consists run on the west trenton line on weekends? I'd ride bike the whole way, but the roads back from the shop are "where they test the missiles" at the moment. Going outbound, probably around 17:00. I know how to get to the station just fine, i'm just worried i'll be stuck with no place to put my fixed frame bike. Has happened to me before and it was not pleasant.


One other question: in the silverliner 5's d i REALLY have to fold a whole seat up to fit my bike, or what? Not a fan of the whole
"open pit in the middle of the railcar" design and i don't (and not allowed to) be an obstacle for other pax to get around per SEPTA rules.

Thankfully the fare is pretty harmless, so but i do need to know what i'm getting myself into, because once i pick the bike up, i need to leave the shop with it and bring it ALL THE WAY home. I had a friend that lived closer and had a nifty bike rack on their car, but alas......

The silverliner V has a belt to secure the bike, the silverliner IVs require you to put the bike in the space where wheelchairs go, it doesn't have any securement and effectively blocks 4 seats. You do have to fold up a seat on the V, but people never sit there unless they have to.

jackintosh11 wrote:the silverliner IVs require you to put the bike in the space where wheelchairs go, it doesn't have any securement and effectively blocks 4 seats.

This is where a center vestibule (like Arrow II/III) would have helped. On Arrows and NJT single level equipment, bikers often ride in the center vestibule.

Yes, i've seen cyclists in the middle door area before on NJT. Sadly I have to use the end doors due to low platforms. I think trevose has a mini-hi but I don't remember. That could help a lot. A family member lives in a building built pre-elevators and getting up those steps was fine. Never used the railcar steps with a bike before, so it should be "interesting". The last time I tried it, the train I wanted was full and the next few were no bikes allowed so I gave up and rode the 15 miles in the rain.

Trevose is a ADA station, with mini-high ramps.

Sweet. I remember it being all wood. As much as I prefer the permanence of steel & concrete at rail stations, the wood brings a homey low-key feel. Did not go today, other stuff came up. Probably tomorrow (I hope). A trip i took today as a passenger took me over part of the direct-to-home route... the roads are bombed out even worse, so definitely taking the train.

Will try to get some photos if i have a free hand. Time i lived up to my username.

So basically the trip went ok. Only things amiss was the fare was 50 cents higher than posted on the trip planner. Going to look into that. Secondly the conductor said the mini-high are for disabled people only. I read no such thing anywhere on the SEPTA website, so I'm a bit put off by that. If I can't use the mini-high, it means no panniers, because then it's too heavy to truck up the near vertical boarding steps. BUT, i'm home with bike & hopefully won't need to use the train like that again. I did manage some photos, which i'll post in another thread.

Was a silverliner 5 consist, maybe 4 cars.

TrainPhotos wrote: Secondly the conductor said the mini-high are for disabled people only. I read no such thing anywhere on the SEPTA website, so I'm a bit put off by that. If I can't use the mini-high, it means no panniers, because then it's too heavy to truck up the near vertical boarding steps.

NJT even encourages bikers to board and detrain at high level and mini-high equipped stations (and briefly was a policy to bikes only at such stations), passengers with bikes could use mini-highs upon request when boarding by standing in position and flagging the train, and detraining upon request to the conductor.

There is absolutely nothing on the website listing restrictions using the mini-high platforms. It states that if you need bridge plate, crew will deploy bridge plate. Definitely going to be calling that one in for clarification. I mean, you can't just tell people they can't use a platform unless they are disabled, that is discrimination "the other direction". "I am sorry Mr. SEPTA Conductor Man for not being disabled enough for your personal preferences of mini-high platform use"?

The bit about the fare.... well it seems they charge 3.50 when purchased in advance, and 4.00 when purchased on-board. It's like they are penalizing people for riding when there is clearly no other option but to purchase on board. The only station past jenkintown with a ticket office is langhorne as far as their website indicates.

Since the bike shop didn't know when the bike would be done, and i didn't figure using the train till after i was home friday, i guess i'm a criminal and need to be fined 50 cents for patronizing the commuter service?!?!

I personally don't really care, but someone else might. So yeah, definitely going to be calling the customer service dept tomorrow.

The trip only took 10 minutes between stations, so it's unfortunate that such a short and straightforward journey ended up with these issues.

TrainPhotos wrote:There is absolutely nothing on the website listing restrictions using the mini-high platforms. It states that if you need bridge plate, crew will deploy bridge plate. Definitely going to be calling that one in for clarification. I mean, you can't just tell people they can't use a platform unless they are disabled, that is discrimination "the other direction". "I am sorry Mr. SEPTA Conductor Man for not being disabled enough for your personal preferences of mini-high platform use"?

The bit about the fare.... well it seems they charge 3.50 when purchased in advance, and 4.00 when purchased on-board. It's like they are penalizing people for riding when there is clearly no other option but to purchase on board. The only station past jenkintown with a ticket office is langhorne as far as their website indicates.

Since the bike shop didn't know when the bike would be done, and i didn't figure using the train till after i was home friday, i guess i'm a criminal and need to be fined 50 cents for patronizing the commuter service?!?!

I personally don't really care, but someone else might. So yeah, definitely going to be calling the customer service dept tomorrow.

The trip only took 10 minutes between stations, so it's unfortunate that such a short and straightforward journey ended up with these issues.

SEPTA has been charging extra for years if you board without a ticket ever since they removed peak hour and non-peak options they used to have (peak tickets would cost more than non-peak tickets)

Anyone can and should be afforded the use of the high level, it will take the train longer to make its station stops which is a non issue, however don't be complaining when the train is late for that reason as that would be hypocritical of the argument that was put forward in the first place.

As for the whole fare thing, that horse has been beaten to death on here, the onboard fare is the base fare, the ticket office fare is advance purchase fare, you can buy tickets in advance and hold on to them for a set amount of time (6 months I believe), septa did away with a penalty system years ago, the way it is now is no different to buying tokens on the buses, you buy the token in advance and the fare becomes cheaper, airlines and Amtrak are the same, buy before you are there (ie in advance) and the fare is cheaper. To say you are being mistreated, criminalized, or somehow penalized is incorrect, you are being given the base fare with no discount

Limited-Clear wrote:Anyone can and should be afforded the use of the high level, it will take the train longer to make its station stops which is a non issue, however don't be complaining when the train is late for that reason as that would be hypocritical of the argument that was put forward in the first place.

As for the whole fare thing, that horse has been beaten to death on here, the onboard fare is the base fare, the ticket office fare is advance purchase fare, you can buy tickets in advance and hold on to them for a set amount of time (6 months I believe), septa did away with a penalty system years ago, the way it is now is no different to buying tokens on the buses, you buy the token in advance and the fare becomes cheaper, airlines and Amtrak are the same, buy before you are there (ie in advance) and the fare is cheaper. To say you are being mistreated, criminalized, or somehow penalized is incorrect, you are being given the base fare with no discount

Interesting... Yea, I don't care if train or bus is a few minutes off the schedule, this isn't japan. Customer service rep said there is absolutely nothing regarding mini-high use restrictions and it was submitted for review and they'd get back to me. The conductor was just doing his job, so I have zero qualms against him. I just feel it is important to have your train crews all working from one rule book consistently. It makes using the system more predictable and less stressful.

I was joking about the criminal thing. Just weird that the trip planner would say 3.50 with no mention of the minor detail of it being advance purchase. 4 bucks to carry me and my bike over 7 miles in 10 minutes (45 mph average speed) is a deal compared to a taxi that can only carry me and cost probably 20 bucks and take far longer. I mentioned this all to the CSR as well, and they put it in the suggestion queue for the trip planner.

Limited-Clear wrote: the onboard fare is the base fare, the ticket office fare is advance purchase fare, you can buy tickets in advance and hold on to them for a set amount of time (6 months I believe), septa did away with a penalty system years ago

Much of this problem should vanish once NPT is in place. The current mess results from SEPTA having a closed system using antiquated payment and ticketing practices. Once we're all in the 21st century fare payment should be a lot more equitable.

However ... and I freely admit I'm one who has attacked the horse more than once ... the definition of "penalty" is IMHO very much like Clinton's parsing of "is". I and other DVARP members followed the whole fare saga for many, many years. When peak and non-peak fares were eliminated, SEPTA also simply redefined its RRD fares to refer to the onboard fare as the base fare. That upended decades of practice dating back to the PRR and RDG where the fare paid at a station or TVM (remember them ) was considered to be the standard fare while the higher on-board fare was the penalty fare. As you remember, the penalty was waived when a ticket office wasn't available which further reinforced the idea that the office/TVM fare was the "real" fare. In addition, the on-board fares were reset so that rather than imposing a fixed surcharge, the price is rounded to the next dollar, or in a few cases two dollars. By SEPTA's own admission the rounding amounts weren't chosen for specific financial reasons but rather to simplify change-making by conductors - yet another example of the agency inconveniencing its riders for the benefit of its employees.

Regardless of nomenclature, it remains a sticking point with many passengers (listen to arguments on the Airport Line sometime) that SEPTA's current policy makes it difficult or even impossible for some riders to avoid paying a higher fare than others.