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Shame that all those buses have movie screens, but no movies
By adamg on Mon, 08/22/2022 - 12:04pm
What, no movie? Photo by Madelyne.
OK, we'll get to the question of what movie Orange Line shuttle buses should be showing in a moment, but first, a brief report on how the morning commute went:
At a City Hall press conference after taking a 34 to Forest Hills, a shuttle bus from there to Back Bay and then the Green Line to Government Center, Mayor Wu said the commute was basically fine: Didn't take too long, there were five buses all waiting at Forest Hills, EVERYBODY GOT A SEAT and those seats were the exact opposite of the ones on new Orange Line cars: Comfortable.
Wu said all the traffic planning and new bus lanes worked, too. She said some areas need better signs, or signs in languages other than in English, but that was the extent of her complaints. On Twitter, other riders said rides from the north did take longer, there were the odd reports of buses sideswiping trucks, but in general, not bad - and, hey, the rain held off until a couple hours after the morning rush.
Wu added she expects the real challenge will come after Labor Day, when the 5,000 BPS students who normally ride the T go back to school. She said BPS is looking at a possible yellow-bus shuttle for kids who live particularly far from their schools.
Now back to screens. Madelyne wants movies to play on the shuttle buses. What would be on your Orange Line playlist? An obvious first choice:
Other options:
Could run old Cheers episodes …
— Lisa Johnson (@LisaJohnson) August 22, 2022
A local news station would be nice too
— Jay Madden (@JayMadden75) August 22, 2022
“And now, traffic”
Maybe not.— Patrick Cooleybeck (@pcooleybeck) August 22, 2022
Monty Python all day every day
— j0hn4devils (@j0hn4devils) August 22, 2022
Morbius 24/7
— billy butchers crowbar (@BroItsOtis5) August 22, 2022
The Perfect Storm on repeat
— Kyle (@The_Walking) August 22, 2022
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Comments
The Boston Globe could help
I don't know where else to put this, but the Globe should make their Orange Line section free for the next month. The Washington Post has done something similar for certain weather situations. But I think the Globe is too cheap to perform a community service for free.
That would imply some feeling
That would imply some feeling of "responsibility" to "the community" that "your news organization is based in", and last I checked that's not profitable behavior.
My commute was ok this
My commute was ok this morning. I took the commuter rail from Readville. (I usually took the 32 bus to Forest Hills and the Orange Line) but this morning, I took the Fairmont Train to South Station and took another train to Back Bay. It was ok. The longest wait was for the train from South Station to Back Bay.
I take the train from Readville too
You should have taken the Walpole/Franklin. It’s faster and stops at Back Bay.
But the Fairmont train was
But the Fairmont train was leaving a lot quicker than the Franklin train. That was the only deciding factor.
Here's a semi-serious
Here's a semi-serious proposal: let's run a video on these screens in which Charlie Baker and Steve Poftak explain, in detail, their future plans for the T, with special emphasis on changes to maintenance standards and procedures.
Let me repeat the key words, "in detail", I don't want to hear a lot of fluffy speeches about how the future will be awesome with clean stations, no fires, and free beer for all. It's time for these two to get out of their comfort zone and commit to times, places, and figures in public. If they don't know everything, that's fine, in a project the size of rehabilitating the T it's simply not possible to know everything important up front, but they have to be open about it if they know that they don't know something, and be able to articulate a plan to find out.
I estimate that this is 0% (rounded) likely to happen, but wouldn't it be a breath of fresh air?
How much detail do you want?
They're replacing a bunch of track in the subway portion and up north. They are replacing track at switches at 3 points along the line. They are redoing the signals between Oak Grove and Wellington. In addition (mentioned, glossed over, though perhaps a key element of all of this) they are taking down the Government Center Garage, a project that has had impacts on the Orange and Green Lines.
Do you want to know exactly how switches, track, and signals get replaced?
Why not?
Why not give the public perhaps more detail than they strictly need, so the whole region isn't in the dark, such as being suddenly caught flat-footed by the announcement that they have to shut down a whole line two weeks before it happens even though they totally 100% needed to do it and knew they needed to do it, and it was all planned and expected and had nothing to do with the arrival of the feds at all?
If I were in charge of an organization that had lost the trust of the entire city, I like to think I'd go above and beyond to win it back.
To dream the impossible dream
Ah, the boundless imagination! I would not have thought it possible to devise a way to make being stuck in traffic on a MBTA shuttle even more tedious, but you have managed it.
I mean,
Charlie Baker's lifelong plan has been for the MBTA to not exist. Not sure I want to have to listen to his detailed plans for that while I'm already on a replacement bus for a subway train.
If you don't like my other
If you don't like my other idea, let me suggest "Primer". Trying to figure out what the hell is going on in that movie will make the commute fly right by.
Knowing Boston
Even if they played a PG Disney movie someone should get offended.
You seem to have confused Boston with Florida
...
It Happened One Night
There are many classic films involving trains, but this is the only one that immediately comes to mind with a bus. (Other than Speed, of course.)
There's always this bus movie
Oh, wait, you said "classic." Never mind.
Ditto:
Cyclops One
We are all foamed up. Repeat, we are all foamed up. Reduce your speed, reduce your speed.
Why, yes, there's a Wikipedia page
Films about buses.
What?
No one's made a movie of C.S. Lewis's _The Great Divorce_?
so many disaster movies. so
so many disaster movies. so little time.
Customary display notice
"The next movie will begin in 20 minutes."
15 minutes later...
"The next movie will begin in 30 minutes."
There is another movie
immediately after this one.
And here's one for the youngs
And here's one for the youngs: how about we stream someone playing Desert Bus. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penn_%26_Teller's_Smoke_and_Mirrors#Desert_Bus
Nooooo!
Worst game. EVAR.
a good film
“The Taking of Pelham One Two Three” 1974 would be a good choice.
Particularly the line, “What do they expect for their fifty cents, to live forever!”
With respect, I believe Frank Correll's line
"What do you mean you haven't got any buses? Go hijack some." is more appropriate for this specific situation.
A public service
The closing scene reminding riders why they should avoid the third rail.
https://www.youtube.com
Fun fact about the 1974 Taking Of Pelham One Two Three
When initially approached, the City of New York officials didn't want the film made there because of the subject matter. At one point, the producers were looking at Boston as an alternate shooting location, with the Red Line playing "stand in" for the IRT. After very careful negotiations, and concessions made by the production company - including outright purchase of the subway car used in the movie and taking out an insurance policy that would pay the City of New York in the unlikely event someone actually tried to hijack a subway train after the movie was released, the officials relented and allowed filming to commence.
Those buses are going to be destroyed after this is all
Done.
The few times I’ve taken the T it smelled like only half of the people riding actually showered in the last month.
$35m will pay for a lot of cleaning
I think the poor struggling bus owners will be ok once they climb out of their Scrooge McDuck piles of money after the month is up.
Meh
I take (or took) the Orange Line daily. Compared to what one encounters on coach buses, my fellow riders are (or were) the very hygienic.
You haven't lived
You haven't lived until you've taken an overnight bus from NYC to Florida and you spent most of that time sitting next to someone who looks like they would benefit from a flea dip who enjoys drinking out of a paper bag...
and then wake up to his greasy hair on your shoulder smelling like stale beer at 3am only to get off the bus into an empty bus station in Charlotte, NC with no food or bathrooms for an hour while the bus refuels.
Edit: clarity, adding bus station city
Part of me wants to go cross country by bus
But I try to suppress that part.
I've done it by train, and the last trip from Chicago to Boston turned so bad that the crew was allowing the coach passengers to use the toilet in the vacant bedroom. Bus would be a hoot, though.
ew
I wanna do train but I want the roomette from the Chicago --> West coast (cant decide which route yet). Not so sure about BOS->CHI . Its only overnight and the rooms are already so over priced. (they really are.. )
Last year,,,,
...we took business class to Chicago -- then got a roomette to the west coast (Berkeley). Using business class got us access to the deluxe waiting room in Chicago (where one could even take a shower). Same method coming back (albeit from Seattle instead). Only sleeping car folks get access to anything more than the cafe car (with its microwaved hot dogs and breakfast muffins).
Sleeping car folks
get access to what amounts to *fancy* TV dinners. I'm sure some of it is actually cooked on the train, but it's not like they've got a full kitchen and cook from scratch.
(This was true of the Silver Service. The dining car on some lines might still use real silverware and good food? Amtrak is weirdly heterogeneous.)
The long-haul traIns going west from Chicago and back....
...had very different meal service from trains going from Boston to Chicago (or to points south). Not certain if things were fully cooked "on train" -- but the food was pretty good. I think the "real dining car" experience is supposed to expand a bit.
Realistically...
...if you go to nearly any "casual dining" "restaurant", the food is prepared elsewhere and either microwaved or dropped in a fryolator. Applebee's, TGI Friday's, etc. So it's what most Americans think of as "restaurant dining".
The obvious choice would seem
The obvious choice would seem to be "Next Stop, Wonderland"
The screens
I suggest that the screens be used to play a constant loop of meaningless droning announcements about watching your personal belongings, reporting unusual or suspicious activity, etc.
I was thinking "A Clockwork Orange Line"
Is the man who chooses the T perhaps in some way better than a man who has the T imposed upon him?
We'll see how much ultraviolence starts happening after a couple of weeks.
How about whatever propaganda
How about whatever propaganda movies or newspresentations that the governor of Texas is providing for immigrant refugees to watch on the slightly deceitful 30 hour non-stop bus rides to New York City?
...
If not, I would go with a choice that has been burned in my memory since a forced watching (and listening) on a NY-Boston trip many years ago - Sylvester Stallone in Copland!
OT, but
The governor of Texas is probably doing a favor to the immigrants by putting them on buses to NYC. There's a much more robust social safety net in New York when compared to Texas, especially considering that New York is a right-to-shelter state. Plus you are going to find a community of virtually any national origin you can think of in NYC. I mean, NYC is going to do a better job of caring for these folks than Laredo, Del Rio, or Brownsville.
Plus a 30-hour bus ride from Texas to NYC is probably by far the least arduous part of the entire trip for these immigrants.
As long as we're talking bus hijacking
Start playing "Dirty Harry" when the kids start going back to school.