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I don't recall you ever discussing anything about septa in a positive way and, of course, what you experience here always sucks compared to what your life was like in Minneapolis.
You did it again above: Septa doesn't suck BUT....
That's because I feel like "SEPTA gets me where I need to go everyday" is a really obvious thing and not a great contribution to the board, or use of my time (which I have less and less of to spend on online forums).
This is interesting because I'm the reverse. There are three bus routes within easy walking distance from where I live. I rarely use them since the BSL is the about the same distance. I'm a train person.
It’s funny too, because I actually love trains. Amtrak, metro north, lirr, etc. It’s subways I’ve strayed from starting with a “series of unfortunate incidents” in New York many years ago and then when I went back to visit I would take the bus so I could see everything. Same when I moved here. Can’t see anything traveling through a hole in the ground . I still take the train in ny if I’m in a hurry but since I don’t work any more, that’s pretty rare.
I've been reading this thread thinking this. It's old technology but it's been working for PATCO since February 1969
You are comparing tangerines to gold dollars.
PATCO is one line. Financed by bridge tolls. (which I honestly would not be against raising the toll to $10 to enter Pennsylvania from New Jersey).
In terms of commuter rail. SEPTA beats PATCO in all regards.
In terms of suburban infrastructure, the PATCO agency is severely lacking. And there should be no comparison. This is due to the auto-oriented development of about 90% of S. Jersey.
SEPTA does come with problems but it is due to its legacy status.
Act 89. Quite possibly one of the most progressive transit bipartisan bills passed in the past 25 years in the U.S is breathing new life into SEPTA that is quite transformational.
Try out the river line. That shuts down at 9 pm.
Last edited by rowhomecity; 07-30-2018 at 06:32 PM..
Location: The place where the road & the sky collide
23,813 posts, read 34,657,307 times
Reputation: 10256
Quote:
Originally Posted by rowhomecity
You are comparing tangerines to gold dollars.
PATCO is one line. Financed by bridge tolls. (which I honestly would not be against raising the toll to $10 to enter Pennsylvania from New Jersey).
In terms of commuter rail. SEPTA beats PATCO in all regards.
In terms of suburban infrastructure, the PATCO agency is severely lacking. And there should be no comparison. This is due to the auto-oriented development of about 90% of S. Jersey.
SEPTA does come with problems but it is due to its legacy status.
Act 89. Quite possibly one of the most progressive transit bipartisan bills passed in the past 25 years in the U.S is breathing new life into SEPTA that is quite transformational.
Try out the river line. That shuts down at 9 pm.
You obviously don't have much of a clue. Does it make you feel important to post such drivel? I responded to a post about the commuter rail ticketing situation, not the whole system.
Do you understand that PATCO is run by the Delaware River Port Authority (DRPA)?
Location: The place where the road & the sky collide
23,813 posts, read 34,657,307 times
Reputation: 10256
Quote:
Originally Posted by rowhomecity
You are comparing tangerines to gold dollars.
PATCO is one line. Financed by bridge tolls. (which I honestly would not be against raising the toll to $10 to enter Pennsylvania from New Jersey).
In terms of commuter rail. SEPTA beats PATCO in all regards.
In terms of suburban infrastructure, the PATCO agency is severely lacking. And there should be no comparison. This is due to the auto-oriented development of about 90% of S. Jersey.
SEPTA does come with problems but it is due to its legacy status.
Act 89. Quite possibly one of the most progressive transit bipartisan bills passed in the past 25 years in the U.S is breathing new life into SEPTA that is quite transformational.
Try out the river line. That shuts down at 9 pm.
You obviously don't have much of a clue. Does it make you feel important to post such drivel? I responded to a post about the commuter rail ticketing situation, not the whole system.
Do you understand that PATCO is run by the Delaware River Port Authority (DRPA)? It runs 24/7.
Yeah, 15th Street needed to remain open, but do you know if they'll completely close CH during the renovation? I would think they will for at least part of the work. The architecture and engineering is going to be incredible I would think.
I doubt City Hall will be completely shut down. It's the primary interchange point between the Broad Street and Market-Frankford lines, and 8th and Market simply couldn't handle the traffic (besides, there's no free transfer between lines there.)
But the four-track configuration is a saving grace here. What I could see happening is that two of the tracks are taken out of service on weekends much as one track of the MFL through 15th Street is. Since regular main line expresses do not run on weekends (Sports Expresses run if there's a game, but they are limited in hours and run in only one direction), all trains could use the local tracks between Girard and Lombard-South while work proceeded on the express side of the platform, then shift to the express tracks (skipping Fairmount) between Girard and Walnut-Locust while work took place on the local-side platforms.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rowhomecity
You are comparing tangerines to gold dollars.
PATCO is one line. Financed by bridge tolls. (which I honestly would not be against raising the toll to $10 to enter Pennsylvania from New Jersey).
In terms of commuter rail. SEPTA beats PATCO in all regards.
In terms of suburban infrastructure, the PATCO agency is severely lacking. And there should be no comparison. This is due to the auto-oriented development of about 90% of S. Jersey.
SEPTA does come with problems but it is due to its legacy status.
Act 89. Quite possibly one of the most progressive transit bipartisan bills passed in the past 25 years in the U.S is breathing new life into SEPTA that is quite transformational.
Try out the river line. That shuts down at 9 pm.
The Lindenwold Line was one of three South Jersey rapid transit corridors Parsons Brinckerhoff identified as capable of supporting rapid transit in a 1955 study it conducted for the then-new Delaware River Port Authority. The other two corridors ran to Woodbury and Moorestown. As with the Lindenwold line, much of the route to Woodbury could use existing railroad rights-of-way; I think there is a rail line roughly paralleling NJ 38 between Camden and Moorestown, but it's not ideally sited to serve the communities along this route.
Talk of building the Woodbury line ran rampant in the 1980s and 1990s, the main question being: Were the DRPA and the State of New Jersey willing to spend the money to make it full-blown rapid transit? Much was made of a "modified PATCO" arrangement that would have resembled a light metro. But no money was forthcoming from anyone to build even that, so it died a quiet and ignominious death.
The proposed Glassboro-Camden Line LRT will run in this corridor and even use the ROW as far as Woodbury before continuing on to Glassboro. However, no one has yet stepped up to say it will run the trains if the line is built.
The River Line is a joke. It was built as a sop to South Jersey pols in exchange for their supporting all the serious stuff the state was building in North Jersey. The FTA laughed the proposal out of the room when the state went looking for funding assistance. I'm sure it has had some impact on revitalization in some of the towns along it (Roebling, Burlington, Palmyra, but not really Bordentown, which is in okay shape already), but as a carrier of travelers, it's an underperformer, and that's even after NJ Transit priced it so that an end-to-end trip was the same as a one-zone bus ride.
Location: The place where the road & the sky collide
23,813 posts, read 34,657,307 times
Reputation: 10256
Quote:
Originally Posted by MarketStEl
The Lindenwold Line was one of three South Jersey rapid transit corridors Parsons Brinckerhoff identified as capable of supporting rapid transit in a 1955 study it conducted for the then-new Delaware River Port Authority. The other two corridors ran to Woodbury and Moorestown. As with the Lindenwold line, much of the route to Woodbury could use existing railroad rights-of-way; I think there is a rail line roughly paralleling NJ 38 between Camden and Moorestown, but it's not ideally sited to serve the communities along this route.
Talk of building the Woodbury line ran rampant in the 1980s and 1990s, the main question being: Were the DRPA and the State of New Jersey willing to spend the money to make it full-blown rapid transit? Much was made of a "modified PATCO" arrangement that would have resembled a light metro. But no money was forthcoming from anyone to build even that, so it died a quiet and ignominious death.
The proposed Glassboro-Camden Line LRT will run in this corridor and even use the ROW as far as Woodbury before continuing on to Glassboro. However, no one has yet stepped up to say it will run the trains if the line is built.
The River Line is a joke. It was built as a sop to South Jersey pols in exchange for their supporting all the serious stuff the state was building in North Jersey. The FTA laughed the proposal out of the room when the state went looking for funding assistance. I'm sure it has had some impact on revitalization in some of the towns along it (Roebling, Burlington, Palmyra, but not really Bordentown, which is in okay shape already), but as a carrier of travelers, it's an underperformer, and that's even after NJ Transit priced it so that an end-to-end trip was the same as a one-zone bus ride.
Thank you! My entire point was that SEPTA seems to have misplaced the KISS principle. The old magnetic tickets lasted for decades. In 1969, most people had no technical awareness. It was simple & easy to maneuver. Most people were able to figure out how to use the SEPTA transfer vending machines that were beyond the gates by themselves. I've seen post after post made by people who are technically aware pondering the unnecessary complexity.
I couldn't agree more with you about the River Line. Most people in South Jersey have considered it to be a bad joke from Day 1.
I'm a Philly area native -- grew up in Delaware County, Temple grad, lived in University City and Center City as a young adult. During that time I was constantly frustrated by SEPTA, its unreliability and its skeletal subway system and eventually bought a bicycle for travel in the city.
And whenever I go back, I see it has barely changed.
In the 80s, I moved to NYC, and whenever I get frustrated with the MTA and its problems, I just tell myself, "At least, thank God, it's not SEPTA." I can usually get to most places in the city via subway, and if I have to travel to the suburbs, the commuter rail -- Metro North, Long Island Rail Road and NJ Transit -- is extensive and runs frequently. Also, many of the busiest bus routes have been converted into Select Bus systems, with limited stops, proof-of-payment, and reserved lanes, which immensely speeds up service.
Today, for example, I had to travel to Stamford CT. Before leaving, I bought my round trip ticket on the MTA app, then walked a few blocks to the Select Bus stop for a quick trip to the Fordham Metro North stop. Before boarding, I activated my ticket on my phone, then showed it to the conductor. This was an express train, so it was only a half-hour ride from the Bronx to Stamford.
On my way back, I activated the return ticket before boarding the local train, which took 50 minutes to get to Fordham. On my arrival there, I checked the MTA Bus Time app for real time info and saw that the Select Bus was only a minute away. I bought my fare receipt from the machine at the stop and was home in about 15 minutes.
Based on my past experience, SEPTA will get innovations like apps that give real time bus info and sell rail tickets sometime around the 24th century.
Oh, and there has been cellular service and wifi in every subway station for several years now. However, there's no signal in the tunnels between the stations...yet.
I'm a Philly area native -- grew up in Delaware County, Temple grad, lived in University City and Center City as a young adult. During that time I was constantly frustrated by SEPTA, its unreliability and its skeletal subway system and eventually bought a bicycle for travel in the city.
And whenever I go back, I see it has barely changed.
In the 80s, I moved to NYC, and whenever I get frustrated with the MTA and its problems, I just tell myself, "At least, thank God, it's not SEPTA." I can usually get to most places in the city via subway, and if I have to travel to the suburbs, the commuter rail -- Metro North, Long Island Rail Road and NJ Transit -- is extensive and runs frequently. Also, many of the busiest bus routes have been converted into Select Bus systems, with limited stops, proof-of-payment, and reserved lanes, which immensely speeds up service.
Today, for example, I had to travel to Stamford CT. Before leaving, I bought my round trip ticket on the MTA app, then walked a few blocks to the Select Bus stop for a quick trip to the Fordham Metro North stop. Before boarding, I activated my ticket on my phone, then showed it to the conductor. This was an express train, so it was only a half-hour ride from the Bronx to Stamford.
On my way back, I activated the return ticket before boarding the local train, which took 50 minutes to get to Fordham. On my arrival there, I checked the MTA Bus Time app for real time info and saw that the Select Bus was only a minute away. I bought my fare receipt from the machine at the stop and was home in about 15 minutes.
Based on my past experience, SEPTA will get innovations like apps that give real time bus info and sell rail tickets sometime around the 24th century.
Oh, and there has been cellular service and wifi in every subway station for several years now. However, there's no signal in the tunnels between the stations...yet.
There are already apps that offer real-time bus arrival information, including SEPTA's own now. (I use a third-party app from a British company that works in multiple cities worldwide.) The agency is working on upgrading its Wi-Fi infrastructure to improve the consistency and reliability of the info the buses send to the apps. (It's also slowly, tentatively rolling out public WiFi on the buses.)
Paying via an app, however, does look like it's going to be a little ways off. They have experimented with this on the Airport Regional Rail line, but the experiment hasn't spread yet.
If you're upset with the city's skeletal subway system, direct your ire at City Hall, not SEPTA. The city approved a multi-line rapid transit network, with branches into several outlying neighborhoods and a downtown loop subway a la Chicago, back in 1913. Only two of the lines ever got built: the elevated line to Frankford and the trunk line under Broad Street. Repeated attempts to build the spur from the Broad Street trunk into the central and far Northeast via Roosevelt Boulevard have all foundered, and now we have BRT-lite instead. But we do have the only regional rail network in North America whose trains run through rather than to the center city thanks to one of the few new additions to the rail transit system the city did build after the 1950s. SEPTA could run trains more often, though - but actually, "commuter rail" in most other cities doesn't operate as frequently in the off-peak hours or the non-peak direction as SEPTA Regional Rail does.
Heavens you would have found Septa unbearable to ride on 10-15 years ago. Before that would have the been the nightmare you mentioned.
Maybe because I see it through the lens of being a rider for decades I see it all very differently. You didn't live through the massive graffiti era, for example.
Quote:
Originally Posted by kyb01
As I said I haven't experienced that.
Folks think about this: AC was not common on parts of septa vehicles until the 80s. So imagine being in a hot station( no fans either) and then getting on a equally hot vehicle.... Ugh.
I recognize that things have improved, and I empathize with your perspective. Having used transit systems around the world, SEPTA is pretty far behind. Now, it's one of the best in the US, and the funding situation is still only mediocre vs. what it should be. All in all, I'm thankful for SEPTA if I'm in the US. There are still some areas that they really need to work on, which are mentioned up-thread.
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. I still take the train in ny if I’m in a hurry but since I don’t work any more, that’s pretty rare.
Will SEPTA Ever Change?
