newtonmarunner.bsky.social
Life Insurance Actuary, 8x NYC Marathon Finisher, Pasta Aficionado
1,504 posts
196 followers
195 following
Regular Contributor
Active Commenter
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I just remember once James talked about how my commonwealth’s Senior Senator was right wing and Bernie Sanders was a moderate.
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I’ve been in conversations with James, an avid leftist, before.
Too often he shows a frightening inability to read the room.
[Fwiw, I’m personally not a fan at all of free transit fares in major cities, and hate the free buses program here in Boston.]
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Always appreciate your political insight, Tiff!
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We’ve tried stop consolidation in Boston on the trams and 28 bus. It aways butts into serious political opposition b/c nobody wants *their* stop to be taken away, particularly the elderly and disabled.
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At least the 72R now has even headways with the 72 and 72M branches.
[As a Bostonian, where there are no rapid or SBS buses, I’m not a fan of rapid (or express) buses. If there’s that much demand, build grade separated rail, and have people take local buses. KISS.]
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I feel bad breaking my promise to dump on someone’s crayon — particularly someone who has a lot of good ideas.
I think the West Side Lines uptown need a stronger two-seat ride to the hospitals on the east side, so I do still strongly prefer SAS-125th to Triboro-125th.
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While I’m not a fan of the vanshnook Triboro/LGA solution, I think I’m like the only person who soured on extension of the Astoria Line to LGA.
I’m more of an “extend the Astoria Line one stop to Con Ed, get a rail yard for deinterlining, and call it a day” type of guy.
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We should make chocolate milk free, too.
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But in fact, the highest ridership is the most diverse ridership. Transit's greatest ridership success arises from (almost) everyone going down the same street feeling motivated to use the same vehicle, rather than demanding to be separated by class. 7/
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The main reasons people don't use public transit are that it isn't useful: It isn't frequent enough, reliable enough, or fast enough. (Yes, feelings of security also matter, and [not but] right-wing media likes to inflame this factor out of proportion.) 9/
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Thank you so much, Steph!
I know you like cooking a lot more than I do, so I trust your judgement.
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I don’t want to spend too much on the oven/range as I likely will only use the range.
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I live in Newton. I was at the Boston Common yesterday. We did not get 1M people or remotely close to that. More like 100K. I question the reporter’s orthogonal veracity on 1M people.
Now there were several hundred at Newton Center town center.
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Am I missing something?
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Not worth it. My co-workers belong, and get a good amount of groceries at Costco.
I think I'd end up buying the store if I went to Costco. The lines are so long that you have to buy a lot of things for buying there to be worth your time (as time = $$$$).
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Completed 8 NYC Marathons
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Thx.
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I have had a New Yorker use colors to describe lines.
I thought New Yorkers always use the letter/number of the route or the street it goes under. So much easier that way.
Honestly. I’d prefer Boston to back to that rather than colors.
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Buses are rarely time competitive with driving in Newton, the vast number of Green Line and commuter rail stations relative to Newton’s population density notwithstanding.
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People take cars because they are more time competitive to their destination than buses or trains.
That doesn’t change the equation if buses are free. If anything, by having less revenue to run buses and trains, free buses makes transit *less* time competitive with cars, and decreases access.
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Free buses also often gets disruptive passengers (e.g., teenagers) who make the ridership experience worse for others.
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At any rate, the additional people who ride when buses are free are disproportionately people on the busiest corridors who would otherwise have walked or biked the distance. So you’re not increasing mode share with free buses.
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Encouraging people to ride more labor intensive buses (far fewer passengers per employee than rail) under a finite operating budget is bad for efficiency, bad for equity, and bad for access.
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I think a government subsidy or a broad-based refundable tax credit for incomes below a certain threshold makes a lot more sense than free or means-tested transit.
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You’re certainly entitled to all the minority opinions you want.
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Even in DC and Boston, where bus fares cost less than rail, low-income folks still ride the much, much slower buses instead of trains.
Now imagine if buses were free.
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Where did Brent say anything about banning cars?
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I agree that applying doctrines to the letter is overkill, and more important, leaves no margin for error.
Best practices applied to local realities is what we want.
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Ugh!
I have yet to experience the Northeast Regional being on time going from BOS to NYP.
Anyhow, enjoy time with your old man!