Escalator Headline

[mattlistener]

"MBTA To Discontinue All Escalator Service"

Just kidding. But it certainly seems that's the direction we're headed, doesn't it?

The T is in a steady state in which escalators break down with a certain frequency, and are put back into service by a certain average # of labor hours per escalator. These two forces converge toward a saddle point. If there were millions of escalators in operation, even a 1% per week per escalator chance of breaking down would put them out of service way faster than MBTA's crew of repairfolk could get them back up and running. If there were only dozens in operation, at 1% breakdown per week the same crew could easily keep all of them running and be sitting around ready to fix more.

So, a certain size crew can keep a certain size fleet of escalators running. The number of escalators in operation will go up or down until it reaches a balance point where escalators are breaking at exactly the rate that the current crew of repairfolk fixes them. This level could be 50% of all MBTA escalators or 99% -- it all depends on the number of labor hours the MBTA is willing to pay for.

Lately we've been seeing more escalators broken at a time, some of them seemingly indefinitely. So either the base rate of escalator outage has gone up, or the average time-to-fix has gone up, or the number of labor hours the MBTA is paying for has gone down, or some combination. The result is that the MBTA is currently settling for something like 70-80% operational status in its fleet of escalators, as opposed to the high 90's.

Effectively this means that 20-30% of the deployed escalators have been demoted to permanent stairs. Which part of the system these stairs reside in may change as the steady state of breakdown/repair shuffles them around, but the social cost is similar wherever they are.

The City of Boston should require the MBTA to have a policy that 100% of its escalators should be *escalators* rather than stairs, and pay for enough labor to keep operational the number of escalators that we have in the system.

Comments

[queue.livejournal.com]

The City of Boston should require the MBTA to have a policy that 100% of its escalators should be *escalators* rather than stairs, and pay for enough labor to keep operational the number of escalators that we have in the system.

If that ever happened, then we would have the escalators in the Boston stations running and none of the escalators outside of Boston running.

[koshmom.livejournal.com]

Here i have to sympathize somewhat with the escalator repair folk. Think about it: most escalators (department stores, malls, for instance) are designed to be 1. indoors and 2. move a trickle of people. THe MBTA escalators move huge amounts of people. And the escalators are either close to actually being outside (maybe just a cover over the actual escalators) or so close to being outside that they get wet and mud, etc from people's just-outside footwear. And they get all sorts of people on them, compared to malls or airports, where people generally have to have some sort of money to be where they are. Thus the escalators are old, rusted, as are the machinery.

Perhaps you can think up a better alternative? Perhaps a non-decaying escalator, or a different people-moving apparatus?

[bedfull-o-books.livejournal.com]

I agree that out side elevators are a dumb idea outside of southern California or other places with climate rather than weather.

That being said, the stations whose elevators I deal with most (Porter, Davis, Arlington) are all inside. Davis' elevators have been out for months on a rotating basis. Arlington's escalator is out for days at a time, works for a couple days, and then is out again for days.

There have to be escalators out there that are designed to haul lots of people. Picture the malls during the holidays.

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

I don't buy that escalators are only meant to move a trickle of people. They're designed to move a lot of people all day, every day. That's what they're used for, that's what they do. Most of the MBTA escalators are well indoors, too.

[mattlistener.livejournal.com]

I'm not saying the repair folk should work harder, I'm saying the MBTA should contract for enough of them working at once to keep up with the need.

Of course, engineering may well be the root of the problem for them -- the MBTA may not be able to justify the required repair expense in its budget if that'd put it out of line with comparable public transit in other cities. That would probably mean that our escalators are just wearing out and need replacing.

[magid.livejournal.com]

From what I read, a lot of them are older (>20), and there are a number of different kinds used in the system, which can't help, either.

[bitty.livejournal.com]

I remember the escalators on the DC Metro broke down all the time - but they also (generally) had redundant service, so that if one was being worked on (and they were good with repairwork), there was still another one available.

(Generally 3 escalators - 2 in the direction of rush hour flow, and one the opposite direction. Granted, one was usually broken at any given point.)

Occasionally all three (or two of three) would be down at the same time, which leads to problems when the elevator is at the other exit, which means entering and leaving the platform again ($1.10) - and so some people just walk up the broken escalator instead, which has led to at least two heart attacks. (The red line is incredibly deep.)

[mud-puppy.livejournal.com]

hehe.. silly Matt :)

[bedfull-o-books.livejournal.com]

One of my friends actually considered calling the T the day when when all the escalators at Porter were running. He figured it had to be a fluke....

The problem is that the T has contracted out the escalator maintenance job to Kone, who doesn't seem to be doing a good job at all. But they are cheap.... Recently the T renewed their contract.

It's like the lunch counter near your office where you eat every day because it is the cheapest place, never mind that it constantly gives you food poisoning.... Stupid, stupid, stupid.

When I sprained my ankle a couple years ago I learned how unaccessable the T really is.

[golux-org.livejournal.com]

I was at a MBTA Board of Directors meeting, and Kone's abysmal performance was one item on the agenda. The T's top officials were REALLY MAD at Kone, and basically told the T's contact people to warn them that the T would never, ever, ever, ever do any business with them again, if they didn't start fixing everything yesterday. If I recall, Grabauskas (normally very polite) made a point of telling the T's contact people to pass along some specific undiplomatic language. I've never seen MBTA management so upset about anything else. They are really trying to make the escalators and elevators work, but this is out of their hands right now.