No Diesel on SEPTA

[seat38a]

The K cars are going strong. Their is talk of replacing them. Which I respond. Don't mess with it. If it ain't broke don't fix it. But Septa is the king of breaking what's not broke.

Here's the best part. These morons can't even get New Payment Technology up and working. How many public transit systems have contact less payment systems. And Septa can't get it right. Idiots. Septa is the only Public Transit System still using Tokens and Transfers. At this rate I'll be dead when Septa gets their new system going.

It makes me wonder how Amtrak got it right with their apps and e ticketing so quickly. Metrolink just fully launched their mobile app for purchasing tickets. It seems one thing that Amtrak gets right (most of the time) is their ticketing system.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

Metra Electric Rider--

When you took SEPTA to the airport, were you on one of the old ones that looks like it has 100-year-old coffee stains ingrained in the floor? They have been introducing new trains for a while now, and they are much nicer.

I like SEPTA's new trains, and I have almost always had friendly and professional conductors when on SEPTA. In fact, I love SEPTA. But that may be because my daily commute is on NJ Transit, and the grass is always greener on the other side of the river!

It was a few years ago now, maybe like 4-5 right after my cousin moved there. It was the whole design that felt old (and this from someone who at the time spent most of his train time in a 40 year old rustbucket highliner, but very comfortably spending that time) not that the cars themselves were that old or dirty.

Next time I'm there I'll try to ride the subway and streetcars.

Metra's Vulture app has been a resounding, smashing success from what I can tell.

 

[John Bredin]

Metra's Vulture app has been a resounding, smashing success from what I can tell.

Wow, autocorrect strikes again! For those unfamiliar with Chicago, the transit app is Ventra. :giggle: And yes, it's a great success. (Ventra had some teething problems when it was new and a CTA/Pace-only show. Metra didn't get onboard until all that was long-since ironed out.)

For years, most Metra conductors have announced before the train leaves Chicago that there's a surcharge for tickets bought on the train when boarding at a station with an on-duty ticket agent (which is all the time for the Chicago termini). Now most conductors also announce that one can download the Ventra app and buy a ticket online. The surcharge is higher now, but there's also more ways than ever to avoid it.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

Metra's Vulture app has been a resounding, smashing success from what I can tell.

Wow, autocorrect strikes again! For those unfamiliar with Chicago, the transit app is Ventra. :giggle: And yes, it's a great success. (Ventra had some teething problems when it was new and a CTA/Pace-only show. Metra didn't get onboard until all that was long-since ironed out.)

For years, most Metra conductors have announced before the train leaves Chicago that there's a surcharge for tickets bought on the train when boarding at a station with an on-duty ticket agent (which is all the time for the Chicago termini). Now most conductors also announce that one can download the Ventra app and buy a ticket online. The surcharge is higher now, but there's also more ways than ever to avoid it.

Haha, no, it wasn't autocorrect, that's what people called it when it was introduced to the CTA (primarily on the CTA Tattler site - started by a journalist). Ventra is a farecard for CTA/Pace, but an app on smartphones for Metra. I don't know where the interchangeability is/lies/rests since I don't have a smartphone, use a paper monthly ticket and have an unregistered vulture card for the CTA when I need to take the el or a bus.

They still make the announcement about the $5 surcharge (at a station with ticket machine, unless said machines are out of order*) and there is now an auto announcement "lauch smartphone application now."

*Do the other metra lines have ticket machines in the stations? MED does, but I don't think the others do.

 

[John Bredin]

Haha, no, it wasn't autocorrect, that's what people called it when it was introduced to the CTA (primarily on the CTA Tattler site - started by a journalist). Ventra is a farecard for CTA/Pace, but an app on smartphones for Metra. I don't know where the interchangeability is/lies/rests since I don't have a smartphone, use a paper monthly ticket and have an unregistered vulture card for the CTA when I need to take the el or a bus.

They still make the announcement about the $5 surcharge (at a station with ticket machine, unless said machines are out of order*) and there is now an auto announcement "lauch smartphone application now."

*Do the other metra lines have ticket machines in the stations? MED does, but I don't think the others do.

Well, I'm not surprised about "Vulture" for Ventra considering (1) it did have initial rollout problems, though IME Ventra works fine now (card and app), and (2) CTA Tattler has a faction among the comment-posters (not the blogger himself) for whom the CTA can do absolutely no right. Some of these posters have an unnatural hatred for the seating on the 5000-series L cars; despite Boston and New York having similar seating on their subways for years, and despite most riders at the height of rush-hour being standees no matter how the seats are arranged, the posters insist that this was obviously the stupidest seating arrangement ever devised and proof that the CTA hates and seeks to discomfit its riders.
I'm not sure either what the interoperability of Ventra between Metra and CTA/Pace is supposed to be. As you say, the app actually holds Metra tickets while CTA/Pace fares are still paid by fare card. The Ventra app *does* have all CTA (L and bus), Metra, and Pace schedules and real-time trackers in one very convenient place (head and shoulders better than GoRoo, the RTA trip planner) and allows one to use the same account to buy and hold Metra tickets and to refill one's Ventra card.

As to Metra ticket machines, I don't know about outlying stations but the non-Electric Chicago termini (Union Station, Ogilvie, and LaSalle St.) have ticket machines now.

 

[RSG]

I'm not sure either what the interoperability of Ventra between Metra and CTA/Pace is supposed to be. As you say, the app actually holds Metra tickets while CTA/Pace fares are still paid by fare card. The Ventra app *does* have all CTA (L and bus), Metra, and Pace schedules and real-time trackers in one very convenient place (head and shoulders better than GoRoo, the RTA trip planner) and allows one to use the same account to buy and hold Metra tickets and to refill one's Ventra card.

I think the CTA non-ticketing capability for the Ventra app has more to do with the complete implementation of a contactless payment system. Presumably once NFC becomes universal in smartphones, they will allow/integrate that with their system.

There may also be an issue with concerns about universal acceptance among their riders. I only use CTA when passing through Chicago as a visitor/passenger, but many of the times I’ve gone into a station, there’s often an agent assisting someone with issues concerning a vending machine. I imagine they don’t want to throw another wrench into the system. (You also don’t want someone slapping their phone on the card reader pad multiple times because the phone isn’t set up to make transactions with the system in the first place.)

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

They are removing the ticket machines from some of the MED stations gradually (obviously the downtown stations have them, plus ticket agents and Randolph and Van Buren) - I think the app has been a bigger success than expected/anticipated.

I've met Kevin of the Tattler at a party - nice guy - was a colleague of a good friend of mine. Yeah, the obsession with the new cars on the el borders on insanity (though the stupid poles do reduce capacity more than just a suspended rail would have.

I don't think they'll ever fully go to the smartphones for fare medium since they are far from universal.