Railroad Forums 

Discussion related to commuter rail and rapid transit operations in the Chicago area including the South Shore Line, Metra Rail, and Chicago Transit Authority.

Moderators: metraRI, JamesT4

 #1233750  by lstone19
 
Pacific 2-3-1 wrote:Turnstyles for all Metra stations too costly, Metra says:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi- ... 6631.story" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Of course turnstiles are a problem. The platform on my station (Roselle) is part of a signed bike route. Other platforms are split by roads. You might as well grade separate every Metra line while you're at it. But that's not really what I came here to talk about.
From the article: "Metra, which outlined plans to work with the CTA to integrate the two agencies' systems, hopes to have a "mobile ticketing' pilot program running next year that will let customers use their smartphones as "virtual tickets," rather than fumbling with the traditional paper passes, officials said."
Amazing what a few choice words can do to the way things get interpreted. Using a paper ticket is "fumbling" with it yet going through all the steps to display a ticket on a smart phone is implied to be easier. Let's see - pull out ticket and show or hand it to trainman or pull out phone, unlock it, scroll to the correct page, open app, display ticket, and show it to trainman. Think the trainmen will get to everybody before reaching the end of the line?
Just because it's new technology doesn't make it automatically better. Unfortunately, politicians seem to think otherwise. :-(
 #1234088  by Tadman
 
Well said, Larry. I work for a company that markets an app, so I live in the cloud. But when I get on a plane and have the option of printing a ticket or using my phone, there's no question I'll print a ticket. It can live in my shirt pocket and if I lose it or drop it, I go print another one.