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  • Discussion related to DC area passenger rail services from Northern Virginia to Baltimore, MD. Includes Light Rail and Baltimore Subway.
Discussion related to DC area passenger rail services from Northern Virginia to Baltimore, MD. Includes Light Rail and Baltimore Subway.

Moderators: mtuandrew, therock, Robert Paniagua

 #1463275  by MCL1981
 
smallfire85 wrote:Saw 7500-7503 testing on the former rush-plus yellow route this morning. Realistically, 7499 is car #500, but the number threshold is passed!

An aside to running shorter consists: WMATA's current berthing policy is to have all revenue trains stop at the end of the platform (8 car marker) to service the platform. Running shorter trains would require a rehash of the policy (including training all the operators brought on after the enactment of the current policy) to have shorter consists stop at the appropriate car marker - which is missing at some stations, or give customers longer platform walks to/from the exits at stations like Addison Road.
Remember the reason they started doing this in the first place. Because the train operators were too inept to remember where on the platform they should be stopping their train. Current performance (lack thereof) suggests that situation is not likely improved. So people should get used to walking....
 #1463311  by Head-end View
 
Hold on! The Long Island Railroad which is a somewhat rapid-transit like operation in its extensive electric territory runs trains of 6, 8, 10, and 12 car lengths. Every station platform has clearly visible orange/blue car markers showing the engineers exactly where to stop their trains based on the size of the consist. If LIRR can routinely operate this way, then why can't WMATA do the same? It's not friggin' rocket science!
 #1463342  by STrRedWolf
 
Head-end View wrote:Hold on! The Long Island Railroad which is a somewhat rapid-transit like operation in its extensive electric territory runs trains of 6, 8, 10, and 12 car lengths. Every station platform has clearly visible orange/blue car markers showing the engineers exactly where to stop their trains based on the size of the consist. If LIRR can routinely operate this way, then why can't WMATA do the same? It's not friggin' rocket science!
This is WMATA we're talking about. The LIRR to WMATA *IS* rocket science!

That said, if you had the money to put those markers there, yeah, sure... but you still had the human element in and humans make mistakes. It was simpler (and well advocated by Greater Greater Washington) to have them all pull up. Yeah, you're walking, but you got those signs saying you got a short consist. Get up front. Didn't they slap signs on the floors saying "6 car consist ends here." and such?

The simpler approach would be to get ATO working again (ha!) and have the computers stop in the middle. If it's a human driving, it's going all the way up.
 #1463377  by MCL1981
 
Head-end View wrote:If LIRR can routinely operate this way, then why can't WMATA do the same? It's not friggin' rocket science!
Probably because the LIRR is a railroad and WMATA is a jobs program.
 #1463446  by Head-end View
 
Oh! I didn't know that. Well Maybe WMATA needs to hire a better class of train operators, even if it means paying a higher salary to attract better caliber people.
 #1463503  by MCL1981
 
Oh, it's not the salary. They're well paid, as they should be. It's the hiring practices, nepotism, favoritism, and racism that prevent any progress. It's so flagrant, their union president says so on national television and nobody cares to change it. So don't expect any change in that anytime in this decade.
 #1463629  by Chris Brown
 
MCL1981 wrote:Oh, it's not the salary. They're well paid, as they should be. It's the hiring practices, nepotism, favoritism, and racism that prevent any progress. It's so flagrant, their union president says so on national television and nobody cares to change it. So don't expect any change in that anytime in this decade.
That's what's sad about the world. Whenever you put things like Unions in place to protect people, you always end up with a segment of people who exploit the system and take advantage. Overtime, it becomes corrupt and loses its effectiveness for its intended purpose. Ultimately it gets ruined for everyone.

And hear we are. We have incompetent morons keeping their jobs because no one can fire them. Absurd.
 #1465037  by JDC
 
Maybe it's just a lucky coincidence, but this morning I saw four 7k trains operating on the Yellow line. If only this was commonplace.
 #1465097  by JDC
 
So according to metrohero website, 6 of 8 trains this evening rush hour are 8 car trains and every one I've seen has been 7k. Also just saw a test train on Green line with car 7507.
 #1465331  by Sand Box John
 
"daybeers"
That's awesome! Hope it stays that way.


Which do you prefer, higher percentage of 8 car trains or shorter waiting times between trains. Under WMATA's present operating schema you can only have the one, not both.
 #1465343  by daybeers
 
Sand Box John wrote:Which do you prefer, higher percentage of 8 car trains or shorter waiting times between trains. Under WMATA's present operating schema you can only have the one, not both.
Definitely shorter waiting times, but I guess I'm a little biased, as I don't ride Metro as often as I used to, and when I do, it's rarely during rush hour. I just wish night and weekend service would improve, really.
 #1465420  by Sand Box John
 
"daybeers"
Definitely shorter waiting times, but I guess I'm a little biased, as I don't ride Metro as often as I used to, and when I do, it's rarely during rush hour. I just wish night and weekend service would improve, really.


The only way you will get shorter waiting times is for WMATA to dump the 7k cars in 8 car only consist policy.
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