Yellow Line to Fort Totten…
6 minute read
October 21, 2010, 9:49 PM
On Tuesday, when I was perusing the Twitter while riding the Red Line home from work, I noticed a tweet that read, “Can’t for life of me figure out why @WMATA stops Yellow trains at Mt Vernon Sq during rush hr. I hear Ft Totten is lovely this time of year.” I gave as good of an explanation as 140 characters would allow, and got a thank you for my efforts along with expression of hope for the addition of a pocket track at Fort Totten. I then explained that it would be far more economical just to send trains to Greenbelt than to reconstruct things north of Fort Totten.
I felt my explanation was a little weak, mainly due to the 140 character limit that the Twitter imposes. So to @jeremycluchey, here’s a better explanation of the Fort Totten situation.
The short of it is that Fort Totten was never designed for turning trains in regular service with the full Green Line. While there is a switch at Fort Totten allowing trains to change tracks, its main purpose for existence there was to allow trains to cross over while the Green Line did not exist south of Fort Totten – thus Fort Totten’s lower level was being used as a stub-end terminal. From 1993 to 1999, one may recall, there was a gap in the Green Line. The segment of the line north of Gallery Place to U Street opened in 1991, and then the segment from Fort Totten to Greenbelt opened in 1993. The mid-city segment linking the two sections (including Columbia Heights and Georgia Ave-Petworth) didn’t open until 1999. That’s why the Green Line Commuter Shortcut existed in the 1990s.
Continue reading…Categories: WMATA
So the question remains… could William Shatner run Metro better than the current Metro management?
2 minute read
September 22, 2010, 8:56 PM
Right around 5:00, I got an Email titled, “Dude! You made Slate!!!!” I followed the link in the message, and found an article on the online magazine Slate by Justin Peters called “$#*! @SenJeffMerkley Says“.
The gist of the article was to take tweets that people posted on the Twitter and use them as the basis for primetime television show concepts. Creative writing at its finest. The second one used my Twitter feed, of all things, and here’s what they said:
The @SchuminWeb Files
Office manager. Transit enthusiast. World-class detective. Ben Schumin is the man to call when something’s amiss with your D.C.-area morning commute. In this fall’s hottest new suspense drama, the plodding, methodical Schumin will tackle unsolved mysteries (“No underground cell service from Glenmont station to halfway to Wheaton. What’s wrong? #wmata”), investigate horrible crimes (“@FixWMATA Who do you think the thieves are? #wmata”), maintain the peace (“A kid is screaming on the train. Get this little noisemaker OFF MY TRAIN! #wmata”), and generally remain alert (“Note to self: Get off at Metro Center this morning. #wmata”). Co-starring William Shatner as X, the villainous head of the mysterious “#wmata” organization.
Categories: Netculture, Social media, WMATA
At last, we got one more 51 in the evening…
< 1 minute read
September 6, 2010, 1:27 AM
I just received the most wonderful news. Turns out we’re going to see a little more of this:
Categories: Ride On
The following is completely secret, and absolutely serious…
5 minute read
August 6, 2010, 11:20 PM
So today was interesting. It was a very quiet day at work today, with a lot of people either traveling on business or on vacation. We had so few people, we didn’t even do our regular “lunch buddies” today. However, that’s not to say I didn’t have a few amusing moments…
First of all, I would like to point out that the people that design digital projectors should be required to mount their own projectors and then change the bulbs in them. The bulb in the digital projector in one of our conference rooms recently burned out, and it ended up becoming a much more involved process than I had wanted. See, the manufacturer, InFocus in this case, put the access door for changing the bulb on the same side as the mounting apparatus. Thus in order to change the bulb, one must:
Categories: Project Chanology, WMATA, Work
Welcome to Club Acela…
2 minute read
July 18, 2010, 3:05 PM
Welcome to Club Acela in Union Station. This is where the people with sleeper accommodations stay before boarding their train. But first you have to get there, and we got Alstom 6083 from Glenmont. I was disappointed to find that Mom had not read my Distinguishing Metro Rail Cars page, and thus was not able to identify our train as an Alstom. Of course, Mom was a little anxious about the whole thing. I ride Metro every day. I know what to look for, and I know the drill. She was hurrying, and I wasn’t. The destination sign wasn’t lit. The train won’t leave until the destination sign is lit. I quoted Jerry Seinfeld when he spoke about riding horses: “All right, hopalong, I know the trail.”
Then at Union Station, we went to the Swatch store. Mom ended up getting three watches (can never have enough of those), and then we went down to Gourmet Station in the food court. I love that place – it has some really good food. I first discovered it on a DC trip back in 2005 or so, and have always enjoyed it. Then after that, off to the club…
Meanwhile, I’m going to be hitting the Twitter pretty hard on this trip, and so if you’re not already following me, you should. And I’ve already been uploading to Twitpic, like this one where the sign talks about “safety and security”. Don’t you love it when people will throw around “security” for anything? I would dare say that the requirement to be on board two minutes before departure is more about maintaining the schedule than it is about safety or security. After all, they have a train system to run. You can’t run a train system effectively when people are late. Let’s just be honest about it. People have become accustomed to hearing people justifying everything by saying “security” for everything. Honesty is the best policy. You need to do this to maintain the schedule? SAY SO!
So we’ll be on the train in no time… see you in Chicago!
So I decided to talk and drive again…
2 minute read
July 8, 2010, 2:19 PM
So on Wednesday evening, I decided to talk and drive again. I set the cell phone in the GPS holder once again, and started talking. I started at approximately 16th and T Streets NW, heading north on 16th Street:
Categories: Anti-war, Driving, Movies, Power Rangers, Ride On, Television, Today's Special, Video games, Video Journal, WMATA
My favorite phrase in the evening…
4 minute read
July 2, 2010, 7:12 PM
My favorite phrase in the evening is definitely “51 NORBECK P&R“. That’s my bus, and it means I’m going home. And it looks like this:
You know, driving is starting to look really attractive…
3 minute read
June 7, 2010, 2:37 PM
Well, Metro announced its fare increase, and it’s now going to cost me $11.00 round trip for work. Multiply that by 22 workdays per month on average, and you’ve got $242 in commuting costs per month. By comparison, the cost of a monthly parking pass at my building is $230. Transit still edges out driving when you factor in the cost of gas and increased car maintenance, plus that early-evening nap that I like to take on the Metro going home. Plus I’ve made friendships on the bus, and I would miss those folks if I started driving to work every day. It’s those little intangibles that are keeping me on transit, even as the costs are coming close to being a wash.
But with this new fare increase, one really has to start wondering if Metro isn’t starting to price itself out of the market. For folks like me who commute from the suburbs and have a choice between driving and commuting, if driving becomes cheaper than public transportation, I’m driving. I don’t care that I’m a public transportation buff. If it’s more expensive than driving and parking, then the hell with it. I’ll add one more car to the road, spewing noxious fumes out its tailpipe.
Categories: WMATA
Crunch…
3 minute read
May 7, 2010, 8:24 PM
So I was going to lunch at Lawson’s with a bunch of my coworkers today, and we saw this when we got to Dupont Circle:
Categories: WMATA
Orange Line to New Carrollton…
8 minute read
May 2, 2010, 11:06 PM
That about sums things up for Saturday, along with “Orange Line to Vienna”. See, I went railfanning with Matthew Tilley on Saturday, and our goal was to railfan the heck out of the Orange Line, with the goal of getting good photos of a lot of the stations for Transit Center and Wikipedia.
In doing this, we planned to cross the Orange Line twice. Once out to New Carrollton, and once back in to Vienna. On the run out to New Carrollton, we concentrated on the outdoor stations. The idea was that since we needed daylight to get good shots of the outdoor stations, we would do those first. Then we would do the underground stations after that, since they would look the same regardless of what time of day it was.
So starting with Vienna (I drove out to Vienna to start), we did Dunn Loring, West Falls Church, and East Falls Church, and then jumped over to Minnesota Avenue, Deanwood, Cheverly, Landover, and finally New Carrollton. We took a break at New Carrollton, and then turned around and did Potomac Avenue, Eastern Market, Capitol South, and Federal Center SW. Then we skipped over to Court House, Clarendon, and Virginia Sq-GMU. Then we went over to Ballston for dinner, and then back to Vienna.
Now you KNEW that those service cuts were just grandstanding on Metro’s part…
3 minute read
April 30, 2010, 10:49 PM
I was saying it all along, that the proposed Metro service cuts were just grandstanding in order for the public to support a big fare increase. And the public took the bait – hook, line, and sinker. And now it looks like the riders will be forced to eat most of Metro’s budget shortfall. I cringe when I think about what my commute will cost once this fare increase goes into effect. I already pay $9.90 for a day’s commuting with Metro’s “temporary” ten-cent increase in effect. And with this increase being “the largest fare increase in its history” according to The Washington Post, it’s going to cost a lot to get from my house to the office and back.
Now one thing that I find interesting is that one of the options on the table is a $4.00 flat fee for late night service on weekends. I’ve been saying for a while that Metro needs to implement a flat fare for the rail system. Most other rail systems are like that, including the New York Subway. Ride anywhere, and it costs the same amount. It would make figuring out your fare so much easier, and eliminate all the large signage about fares that have to be individualized for each station. All you have to say is “Peak fare is $3.50” and “Off-peak fare is $2.50” (pulling these numbers out of the air here for purposes of illustration) and you’re done. Load $7 or $5 for a round trip, and you’ve got it, regardless of where you’re going. Of course, if Metro Board member and DC councilman Jim Graham has his way, there won’t even be a late-night flat fare.
Categories: WMATA
I have conquered the 4000-Series…
3 minute read
April 12, 2010, 12:19 AM
Yes, I have conquered the 4000-Series. And by that, I mean these:
(By the way, the truly dedicated Metro enthusiast ought to be able to tell me what day I took this photo)
Categories: WMATA
It’s raining, and wouldn’t you know it…
4 minute read
February 22, 2010, 8:08 PM
It’s raining, and wouldn’t you know it, I left my umbrella on the Metro coming home. I find this kind of ironic for two reasons.
First of all, while I was still at work, one of my coworkers wanted to take the umbrella, thinking I had pinched this one that had been sitting abandoned in a corner for about six months or so. I told him that this one was my “work” umbrella, and that the other one was still there.
Then secondly, when I got into my seat, I noticed that someone else had already forgotten an umbrella in that same seat. Then on the long ride back to Glenmont, I took one of my famous Metro naps. I woke up as we were pulling into Glenmont (going over the switch south of Glenmont tends to wake me up), and got off the train. The train went out of service at Glenmont, and headed for the yard. Then as I was riding the escalator up to the street, I realized it – no umbrella. Crap. Well, there goes ten bucks. So I saw that some poor schmuck had left their umbrella in the seat, and then left a second one to go with it.
Another gutter bites the dust…
4 minute read
February 7, 2010, 1:36 PM
Categories: Snowmageddon, WMATA
I am ready to be snowed in…
3 minute read
February 5, 2010, 12:22 AM
I am ready to be snowed in this weekend. The Sable is safely parked, and the cabinets are full. I am set. My castle is stocked up. Bring it on, nature.
Otherwise, today I discovered that adults can be just as bad as children when it comes to getting revved up about a potential snow day. All I heard today was, “Do you think we’re going to get tomorrow off?” I was all, noooooooo, since I think that the Feds have already decided on their course of action. They’re operating under an unscheduled leave policy for Friday, which for us basically means show up. Now whether they close early once the snow starts coming down is another story.
Meanwhile, speaking of snow days, when I was in school, I always just wanted to strangle those teachers that acted like it was our fault for missing school due to bad winter weather when we grumbled about having to go to school on Memorial Day for make-up days. These teachers that would say, “You had your Memorial Day back in January!” Big help. Like it’s my fault that it snowed. I remember my seventh grade year was hell for that kind of thing. We had something like 16 snow days that year. Thus we had no days off of any kind except for weekends from the last snow day in March through to like June 16 plus one Saturday (yes, we had one make-up day on a Saturday). And when you couple that with the fact that my homeroom teacher was a real d—–bag, it made for a very rough year. This particular teacher even made fun of me (in a mean way) in front of the whole class when he presented me my perfect attendance certificate at the end of the year. I had better attendance than he did that year, and he made fun of me…
Categories: Snowmageddon, Walmart, WMATA