Jenn Martinelli Blogging in Boston

I know you will be very shocked to learn this, considering all my other thoughts about the T (to prove my even-handedness, there is a post in there where I give them credit for running on time in a snow storm).

Saturday we made the (apparently) horrible mistake of deciding that rather than walking to Cambridgeside Mall from our apartment on Beacon Hill, like we typically do for numerous reasons, since it was about 19 degrees out, we would opt to take the T.

We also opted to take the T to and from the closest stops on either end, which meant getting on the redline at Charles/MGH, switching to the green at Park, and then taking that to Lechmere.

The green line sucks big time. The trains are too small, always breaking, run with nonsensical frequency (or lack thereof), and since they are basically driven by a guy with a gas pedal, they have the smoothness of most bus rides in Boston.

So the red line to Park Street was fine except that they just built this crazy new station at Charles/MGH, and do you think they could figure out a way to enclose the platform at all? Oh, no, why would you want an enclosed platform on which to wait for the train in Boston, right on the Charles, where you get a good stiff breeze of frigid air all winter? That wouldn't make any sense at all. Let's leave it nice and open so everyone can freeze their asses off.

Next, we get to Park and we of course, predictably, have to wait forever for a green line train going all the way to Lechmere, because of course most of them stop at Government Center or North Station. Of course, if people are only interested in going to Government Center or North Station, since those stops are both on the way to Lechmere, they could just get off at those stops, so there's no reason to have Lechmere trains run so infrequently that they are always packed because by the time they come so many freaking people are waiting!

So we finally got on a Lechmere train and what do you suppose happened? They decided to take it out of service at North Station and kick everyone off. As Rob said, I'm sure it was still going to Lechmere since that's the last stop on the line and the train graveyard on that arm. Why we couldn't ride it there is beyond me.

On our way back from the mall later, our train paused randomly halfway between Science Park and North Station so the driver could "reset the circuit breaker" because according to his angry call to "dispatch" there was "no heat" on the train. Only there was heat on the train, as evidenced by the following:

1. it was nice and toasty warm on the train
2. there was hot air blowing out of heating vents on my legs

He made no less than 3 or 4 angry calls to "dispatch" and someplace else about how this train was supposed to be taken out of service 2 hours ago and there was no heat on it and how when he gets it back there he's taking it out of service himself. Only there was heat! On the train! Also included in his diatribe was how he didn't appreciate "dispatch" "playing games" with him because he was not some "rookie" and he had been working there for 14 years. Oh, yes, and by the way, he was especially enraged because this was a "brand new train". You know, the brand new always broken trains? Did he not catch on yet that these trains break more than the old ones? Because I figured that out about the second time I rode one, several years ago.

I just do not understand what on earth is going on with the MBTA. They are building lots of pretty new stations, but they have all the same problems as the old stations. Why can we not heat or cool train stations exactly? Is everyone working at the MBTA aware that we live in a temperate zone which has changing seasons and therefore changing temperatures? I'm not sure they are. Why do we have a terrible new access gate system that is usually broken from my observations, and which has an awesome system where the reduced fare gate charges everyone who walks through it less, so they have to have a T employee standing around to yell at non-reduced-fare people who accidentally walk through it? Hey, how about a special reduced fare pass geniuses?

I hate to say the government would do a better job but I almost think the T needs to be run by the state. Just take all the crappy overages out of my taxes and don't charge me $4 for an hour and a half of torture when I just wanted to avoid a 15 minute walk in the freezing cold.

I guess for now I learned my lesson. Buy some gloves and back to walking, even in the bitterest of winter days.

Thanks for nothing, MBTA. Status quo for you I guess.