WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 26 Rider #1: I've moaned and whined about Muni long enough. It's time to get serious and do something about it. This week (the distastrous changes on the N Judah line with proof of payment and the extension to Cal Train, etc.) have been, as you know, disastrous and completely unacceptable. We cannot just sit back and let this happen. comments = Next month, September, to reward all of us loyal Muni sufferers, service should be free. It should. How can we start this? Can you imagine? Free Muni for a month? We could at least stop complaining for a month because we'd be getting what we paid for. Muni needs to exert some good will here, and free service for a month (November would be acceptable if September is too soon) would go a long way toward making people slightly less grumpy. Rider #2: Tonight I got fed up....I boarded the N-Judah that is supposed to go to Caltrain at the Montgomery station. When we got to the Embarcadero Station we were told to get off because there was a *power outage* on the outside of the tunnel, they said it wasn't going to Caltrain. They had said before the N-Judah train that was coming behind this one would to to Caltrain. We got off at Embarcadero only to see the head of Muni, Mr Cruz, standing there with a ton of patrons standing around him complaining...with SFPD standing nearby him. The N-Judah arrived & we boarded only to be told to get off AGAIN because of the *power outage*; it was going to go down & turn around, come back & pickup passengers on the outbound side. I refused, along with another woman who was sitting next to me, to get off at the Embarcadero Station. I yelled "No, I am not getting off. Arrest me" The driver kept announcing to get off , we just kept yelling "no, arrest us". Mr. Cruz then came aboard & told the driver to go & let us stay on. I really didn't think there was a power outage at all. They were just saying this so they can get the N's back out quickly so the people would stop yelling & complaining about the service. When I got home I called a friend who works for PG&E (Electric Power Division) to see if there really was a power outage in that area (towards 4th & Townsend). PG&E had NO outage but he told me that Muni runs their own electric power. I want proof that there was really a power outage on Muni's end!!!! I think all passengers should refuse to get off at Embarcadero!!! What are they going to do....arrest us all, 100's of people ???? Joan Downey: 9:25AM: A double Breda arrived as soon as I arrived at Carl & Hillway and I got a seat! My lucky day? No. We waited at Church & Duboce and at the entrance to the tunnel for a total of 35 minutes! So the commute to Montgomery station took 55 minutes! It was interesting that there was a driver on the second car. He got off during the long wait. During that time another car dumped all there passengers off. They could not get on the second car--the white buttons didn't work, so every crowded on to the 1st car where there was standing room only and the 2nd car only had a few people. 5:50PM Caught an N 2 minutes after arriving at Montgomery St., got a seat, and arrived at Carl & Hillway about 20 minutes later!!! At Montgomery the train consisted of 2 Ns and 2 Js. Have they listened to us and realized that they need to couple the cars? Two members: In the Tuesday Examiner, P. Johnston of Muni stated the ATCS was running on Monday "without any glitches and was not causing delays". Fact or fiction? Lie. Richard Mlynarik: Ah, no. The point of technology is to serve people. Operators and passengers are the _first_ people who should be consulted, and whose observations and suggestions should be considered. The job of engineers is to make systems work for and with people. A thoughtful observation I've received from a couple of different operators is along the lines of "when I can cut out and just work on visual things work far better than they do either with the new or the old control syetem." What this fails to account for is the powerful inertia of a $79 million (and counting) slush fund: not thoughtful enough! Re: ATCS. The three big _design_ (rather than implementation) shockers for me are: (a) The Embarcadero scissors crossover is never used and never to be used for turning back trains. This is insane. I had thought, I had been told, and I had reasoned that the point of the MMT was to _add_ reversing locations to the existing facility. By requiring that _all_ vehicles proceed through Embarcadero, reverse in the MMT, and reappear at the outbound Embarcadero platform, Muni is wasting at least four minutes PER TRIP, on every trip of every run of every non-N service in the system. This is reducing the number of revenue hours of each vehicle, and yet further reducing the terminally poor levels of metro service city-wide. A competent and "advanced" train control system would dispatch trains bidirectionally from either Embarcadero platform according to path availability (ie whether there are potentially conflicting arrivals from either direction) in order to maximize service levels. (b) Train doors may only open at a fixed platform location. Although the downtown metro subway platforms are long enough to accomodate several cars or trains of cars, and although the "advanced" control system allows following trains to follow into the platform area behind a loading train (just like human operators have done under "visual" for nearly 100 years!), operators are unable to cut out and unlock the doors to enable their passengers to exit a car which is, to any reasonable observer, already "in" the station. If you think people are steamed about being stranded in a tunnel between Civic Center and Montgomery, wait until you see how steamed they are when they're stranded in Montgomery station. Yes, there are problems with needing to close doors and restage the train to load at the officially designated location; no, these aren't insuperable. (c) wheel diameter sensitivity. Come on! This is well-known and well-modelled and well-understood in the field. Modern train control systems use a combination of fixed passive or active balises for absolute positioning combined with _calibrated_ rotation counters and/or doppler radar for sub-block positioning. Differing diameters are a given in rail operations, and the idea maintaining extremely closely matched sets of wheels in an urban transit environment is just insane. Make the technology serve the purpose! Other things: (c) Operators are given far too little authority. Cutting out of ATCS appears to involve jumping through hoops with radio calls to central ... which are generally unanswered. (I was in a train on Saturday in which a call put in at Balboa on the J line wasn't answered until reaching Montgomery, on a trip which included a 13 minute freeze-up at Duboce portal and constant stuttering emergency brake application all the way to the junction. Over 45 minute wait for response!) (d) Operators are given too little information about the train control state. A mimic panel which merely states "AUTO" to me seems insulting to workers whose job it is to supervise equipment and ensure the safety of their passengers. How much could it have cost to include some basic system information, at least about planned speed profiles? As it is, the system is either "working" (in the loosest sense of the word) or is is off. There seems to be not even minimal diagnostic information for the choice of either mode. As usual, operators are left nearly as much in the dark as Muni passengers. It's all about as bad as one would expect, based on a miserable track record... Eric Carlson: Inbound today (Wednesday): Train stood @ Castro sta.: 10 minutes. Those aboard reported a 10 min wait for that train, so what, exactly, was ahead of us? 10 minute wait in tunnel near Dolores Street. Stopped at Van Ness- a train could be seen at Civic center- it wasn't moving. Our 1 car just sat there. Outrageously, cars were backed up outside Van Ness; As we were a 1 car, why could they not pull in and unload? So I enjoyed a trip on the #9 and BART. (BART was delayed too. Their version of late is 6 minutes ) Operator #1: Hi, gang! Today was a watershed day in the annals of Muni. Management actually did something to help the beleaguered passengers and operators! No, they didn't do a quick fix to the ATCS system or the worn-out Boeings or the clunky Bredas. They did, however, reassign PCC-qualified operators to pull out SIX additional PCCs for service on the F-Market during the afternoon rush hour! That meant that there were 15 PCCs on the F, running every 5 minutes apart, instead of the usual nine on 8-10 minute headways. And all of the cars carried standees. Muni kept four of the extra runs out until 800pm; normally, there are only four cars after 630pm. This was much-needed relief to all of us! Best of all, the plan for extra F-Line service will continue at least another 2 weeks. And there will be five extra cars tomorrow morning, to augment the normal seven PCCs. This is an idea that I, and many other operators, the Van Ness Avenue morning supervisor, certain individuals in Metro Operations Group, and the streetcar booster organization Market Street Railway have advocated for months. I am glad to see it bear fruit. (Now, if we could get 1 or 2 conductors, we could bring the "Iron Monster" and "Boat" 2-man cars out.) and: Wednesday morning started normally enough, but starting about 800pm, subway service bogged down. It must be all those single cars in the subway, all needing to disgorge passengers at Montgomery and Embarcadero, then move to the pocket tracks or out to Caltrain. Anyway, there were two delays which forced droves of passengers onto the F-Line PCCs. On my 930am trip out of Castro on the F-Line, I was completely full at Church Street, so I announced to my passengers that I would be "running express to Van Ness unless someone signaled a stop request--so nobody pull the cord, please!" No one did, and there were loud cheers. I managed to squeeze four more patrons in at the Dolores stop, and then it was off to Van Ness. I made it from Church to Van Ness in three minutes, making all the lights, not having to stop once. On the surface. In my PCC. So I asked the crowd, "Ever make it from Church to Van Ness that fast in your life?" Everyone said "No", and there was considerable applause. I got to Montgomery some 7-8 minutes later, and a lot of people thanked me for making a miserable commute tolerable, etc. While working my way downtown, I heard a Central Control person harangue an operator for not being able to get a door--which had been popped open by passengers--closed. For a while, he was on the verge of accusing the operator of popping the door on purpose. This is why we don't like Central Control. At least today there were no reverse runs in the subway. But the major disaster today was the 2-hour power failure on the MMX, allegedly caused by attempts to make two many 2-car trains become 4-car trains. Shuttle buses were called. Since what happens on MMX affects N-Judah service now, I can only imagine that the normal N-Line evening commute was another nightmare. If anyone has any corroboration of this, feel free to e-mail me. The best news was management arranging for six additional PCCs to work the F-Market line in the evening rush hour (see my previous post). I am finding that more and more passengers are joining the "Underground Resistance Movement" and riding the F-Line to work. Rider #3: Mr. Mayor The automated train control system is not the key problem with MUNI. Older trains breaking down are not the problem either. By focusing on these simplistic solutions in your reporting of MUNIs woes, you are doing the community a disservice and at the same time harming your reputation. In fact, MUNI woes may prove to be your political undoing, if the riding public I have witnessed on my commutes is any indication. You have a major PR problem on your hands here sir and telling the public that a new ATC and newer trains will fix the problem is going to come back to haunt you in the election. Riders of MUNI know the problems run much deeper than this. Riders know this is only a portion of the problem. First, you have made a public commitment to fix MUNI by May 1999. See: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/1998/0 5/06/MN58153.DTL Ouch! This is a huge risk considering that the problems MUNI faces are SO far reaching. In order to fix MUNI you need to address the inefficiencies, ineffectiveness, unresponsiveness and unaccountability that is at the core of the management and employees of MUNI. We've all heard stories of drivers off schedule, drivers missing stops, stopping at street corners for unauthorized coffee breaks, screaming at riders and ignoring/not removing those passengers who break rider rules while on-board. And its not just the driver/operators. MUNI management is a complete disaster. Riders who complain are promised a written response within two weeks - these never come. Posted schedules are never altered to reflect a more accurate timetable for trains. Scheduled trains never come, forcing the next train to become overloaded. Complaints have no avenue for redress and management has no responsibility to the general public to address their concerns. Further, management seems unable to manage their own ranks, budgets and facilities. Second, you have begun to build a baseball park whose success is keyed upon MUNIs ability to transport passengers to and from the field because not enough parking spaces are part of the design. In fact, there has not been even a single attempt to plan for adding "park and ride" lots near MUNI stops to handle this kind of traffic. You can't seriously expect that MUNI will be able to handle the upsurge in short term riders and expect the city streets where MUNI loads and unloads passengers not to be a complete mess! Another huge problem in the making! You NEED to reorganize MUNI from the ground up. With the worst reputation in the nation for a mass transit system, you as an elected official can afford no less than that if you seriously expect to be re-elected. The riders and their supporters are furious and each one of them has horror stories that go far beyond what the hopes for new trains and an updated control system can hope to mend. The problem is the people of MUNI. It's the people of MUNI who have neglected the maintenance on cars in the past (leading to the breakdowns now), its the people of MUNI who are rude and unresponsive to the public, its the people of MUNI who exceeded the overtime budget last year by 1000%, its the people of MUNI who cannot get their own house in order and it's the people of MUNI who must be held accountable. Without them, the only one left to hold accountable is the major who promised to fix it. I fear unless you cut to the core of the problem and change MUNI from the inside out, your tenure as Mayor is limited. I urge you to act decisively. Rider #4: I try to boycott the N judah as much as possible after having to give the same lame excuse for being late to work at least twice a week. I usually take the 16BX, which is USUALLY on time and fairly quick (but crowded). Unfortunately, today it hadn't come for about 25 minutes, so I decided to bite the bullet and take the N. It looked the N had also not come for a while, because there were about 5 trains bundled together (about 9 cars total) coming down the tracks. I should've known, I should've taken the 71 instead, but I made the mistake to descend into the N Judah hell. It about 50 minutes to get to Powell Street, but then we got stuck about 10 feet before Montgomery (my stop, of course)! First it was L holding us up, then the driver said the car wouldn't move. About 20 minutes into this, one of the passengers says "let's pull the red lever and get out of hear", and voila, the car starts moving. It only took me 1 hour and 20 minutes to get to my stop on the N (it takes 30 minutes by bike, 35 minutes on the 16BX, and about 20 minutes by car). By this time, I'm in such a bad mood that my day is basically shot, and all I can do is rant and rave about how bad Muni is. I think the only way to fix it is to privatize it and break the union. You don't how far this is going for me, as a liberal who usually supports unions and public transportation, but MUNI sucks! Thanks for listening. Let's make sure Wille Brown doesn't get re-elected if MUNI isn't better by election time, and let him know why! Rider #5: All I can say about Muni Metro is that at least they are trying. One thing that irks me now is that the signs on the stations for the upcoming train don't always match the front of the train. The public announcements over the intercom system don't seem to match what's coming to each station either. Muni is barely decent, but when it's bad it's really, really, really bad.