Dry Run for NPT at 30th Street?

Honestly, besides added theoretical benefit by allowing chaining of railroad and city transit trips, what benefit is this system over what every other system does with simply having (gasp) TVMs with paper tickets? The NPT units will have traditional strip readers anyway, just put one on the ticket like a PATCO ticket and allow a transit transfer. I was told a big factor was to eliminate lost revenue when conductors can't get through cars in SRO conditions but what is the cost/benefit of the expense of putting the system in place and maintaining it compared to fare recovery? Plus, the provision will still be in place anyway for conductors to sell tickets to the ill-informed infrequent riders who just mosey onto the train. And above all else, it would make more sense if only for the sake of improved service to simply sink that money into providing more seats/trains to make it a moot point.

NPT makes a lot of sense for city transit by nature of the status-quo turnstile and farebox infrastructure and operation, but unifying it with the railroad in the way proposed just makes it seem like a dog and pony show.

loufah wrote:

bikentransit wrote:If a rider taps in and gets upstairs and misses his train, and decides waiting an hour for another, or service is suspended, or whatever the scenario, how do they get their account credited if they decide to "choose an alternate means of transportation"?

You pays your money and you takes your chances. Connections aren't guaranteed. Some buses out of 69th Street weren't running yesterday because of a shortage of drivers. I couldn't wait another hour to get to an appointment - and there might not have been room for everyone on the next bus - so after 45 minutes I took alternate transportation and tossed my transfer.

Realistically, the fare gates can't tell if you were waiting on the platform for an hour, or if you instead took a quick round trip to/from a non-gated station. I suppose they could impose time limits on what constitutes a refundable stay inside the paid area.

You, sir, are talking about something you know nothing about. SEPTA took pains during the NPT hearings last year to say that the software would be configured to recognize when a rider entered and left the same station's faregates in a short period of time, and would accordingly not deduct a fare. Remember that the gates require a tap in both directions, and that those taps are electronically timestamped. The nearest non-gated stations are North Philadelphia, North Broad, and 49th Street, and none of those are particularly close or frequently served enough to allow for much in the way of "quick round trip[s]", even from Temple or UCity. There are plenty of reasons why SEPTA is paying close attention to this use case, not least the fact that there will be no public restrooms in any of the paid zones, on top of the lack of restrooms on board trains.

loufah wrote:Things are different with services, especially services from a monopoly. If your phone or cable service is out for a few days, you're not going to get a refund.

My provider, one of the Big Two (sorry, no commercials/promotion) has provided a credit whenever we've had an outage traceable to their network.

... which has been only twice during the entire 5 years we've been subscribers. Of course moving electrons is a lot less problematic than moving trains

I'm still wondering what happens if someone who's not a passenger wants or needs to be on the platform. The RRD is more likely than, say, the MFL, to be used by someone with luggage, a family, or handicapped access issues. The same is true at an airport - you can't simply go to the boarding area to wave goodbye to Aunt Thelma - but if someone has lots of luggage or mobility issues airports have facilities to deal with it. I can't see how the same would be even vaguely practical for SEPTA.

Especially since virtually all of our trains have electric traction motors, so railroads need to move electrons AND move trains.

I wasn't in Center City on the 22nd; did SEPTA cancel the gating trials because of the weather, or did they press on regardless? And if so, how did things work out?

ExCon90 wrote:I wasn't in Center City on the 22nd; did SEPTA cancel the gating trials because of the weather, or did they press on regardless? And if so, how did things work out?

Rescheduled for this Wednesday:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jacorbett70/12109305736/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

CComMack wrote:SEPTA took pains during the NPT hearings last year to say that the software would be configured to recognize when a rider entered and left the same station's faregates in a short period of time, and would accordingly not deduct a fare. Remember that the gates require a tap in both directions, and that those taps are electronically timestamped.

Thanks. Looking forward to seeing the time threshold written in SEPTA's tariffs. Would be adding insult to injury if someone waiting almost an hour on the platform for a delayed train was notified that the train would be arriving on a different platform and the tapout/tapin resulted in an extra charge.

Can the faregates detect when someone has actually walked through them? WMATA's evidently can't, and if you dawdle too long after putting in your ticket the gate will close before you've entered and your ticket won't open it again because of frequent-use limitations. The danger to SEPTA, if their tickets or cards will operate as you've described, is that someone can tap in on the entry side, enter, then tap out on the exit side but not actually pass through the gate and remain in the paid zone for free.

Was at 30th st today. The damn lil test was dum. All it was , two people at the stairs on floor level asking did you have a ticket SEPTA, OR AMTRAK. I showed the ticket and that's it. They had no scanner. Waste of time. Hopefully they had luck during rush hour. I doubt it.

It would be a different story if they actually had turnstiles there, 2 people at each stairwell can't substitute as a turnstile gates @30th street... (there were 2 people at each stairs that leads up to the platforms)
I was at 30th street station too and they only checked if you had a ticket or not and asked about if the ticket's for SEPTA or Amtrak

I want to state something for the record...

NOBODY said for certain that this was related to NPT.

SEPTA's only documentation was: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jacorbett70/12109305736/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The only mention of NPT was the OP, who made an assumption:

ExCon90 wrote:I asked someone at the information desk (the one at the foot of the stairways between tracks 2 and 5) whether this was a practice run for NPT, and she said she thought that's what it is, possibly to find out whether any significant congestion results. Could be a learning experience for SEPTA.

zebrasepta wrote:It would be a different story if they actually had turnstiles there, 2 people at each stairwell can't substitute as a turnstile gates @30th street... (there were 2 people at each stairs that leads up to the platforms)
I was at 30th street station too and they only checked if you had a ticket or not and asked about if the ticket's for SEPTA or Amtrak

This sounds very much like the cross-honoring of Amtrak tickets into Suburban and Market East is being re-evaluated. Does anyone have a good estimate on how many riders SEPTA should have been expecting today? I'd settle for a bad estimate, too...

We've been wondering how NPT was going to handle that little wrinkle in the tariff. Well, I guess we know where SEPTA's head is at.

zebrasepta wrote:2 people at each stairwell can't substitute as a turnstile gates @30th street...

Too bad they didn't do this test last Wednesday as originally planned. They could've brought their kids along (no school) and they would've had a blast pretending they were faregates.

Scotty, in Excon's defense, he never said it was for NPT. His title's a question, and what you label as assumption was his QUESTION to Ms. Septa Information Person, who as Excon phrased it rendered an opinion. As Septa Information Person shouldn't that be an expert opinion?

Patrick Boylan wrote:Scotty, in Excon's defense, he never said it was for NPT. His title's a question, and what you label as assumption was his QUESTION to Ms. Septa Information Person, who as Excon phrased it rendered an opinion. As Septa Information Person shouldn't that be an expert opinion?

ExCon90 wrote:I asked someone at the information desk (the one at the foot of the stairways between tracks 2 and 5) whether this was a practice run for NPT, and she said she thought that's what it is, possibly to find out whether any significant congestion results. Could be a learning experience for SEPTA.

Patrick, the answer is no. A SEPTA station information person should not be an expert opinion. They don't know much other than scheduling related information. She never claimed to know for certainty, as per his post. She said she "thought" but most likely had no clue whatsoever.

It still seems to me the most likely assumption, given the timing. We know SEPTA is obsessed with freeloaders burdening the system by riding ticketless from 30th St. to Suburban (and even to Market East!), but they surely must be thinking about determining how much of an obstruction would be caused by interrupting the flow of passengers right at the foot of a stairway. (BTW, it does seem possible that someone in that position would hear of things being planned.)