She writes to the top, gets a fix for busted doors on the Orange Line

The stickers are on doors that do not have a sensor to detect something in there.

Safety? I guess. NYC subway doors as a rule do not "recycle" no matter what... at least on the lines I know the best. Seems to work ok there. I don't like the idea of doors that don't pop open when something is in the way, but that's the way these cars were built for a really long time, it seems, and there aren't too many lost limbs apart from those on TV shows, so I guess people are more or less careful.

So, again, practice this: The door is not busted. The note is a safety warning to call out a possible issue for people who abuse the doors/subway/other passengers in the first place.

The door jockey is re-closing the doors because some door that DOES "recycle" (crappy term) has detected a jackass with a backpack, baby carriage, foot, or fat ass hanging out somewhere else on the train that you can't see.

checklist? Maybe. But you know when you see one train pull up with, oh, 6 cars with 6 doors each on each side. That's 72 doors. But there isn't just one train. There are lots and lots of them. And no, not only is every train not gone over with a fine tooth comb every night, but it would be impossible to do so with a checklist having as many details as you'd ultimately want.

I HATE the freaking T. Hate it. The way it's run. The grammatically-challenged and self-aggrandizing announcements. The way they shut down a very cool project i wanted to do a few years ago because they are such control freaks. The lack of information.

BUT in this case, they're doing it right and you just sound like a screaming hothead. The way to fix problems is to notice problems, record problems, assign someone to repair them, and then do it, finally having things checked to make sure the repair happened. This way you get a fix, but you also get stats, and know where your costs are coming from, know what parts you need, and how many, and how often. Knowing things like that means the subway can be better run now and in the future, and could perhaps start saving some expenses immediately, that occur when everything is just done on an ad hoc basis with no information captured and nothing learned along the way.

Japan: Bet you didn't know that the trains stop between midnight and 1 am. Also there are three companies servicing Tokyo and no transfers between them on the often redundant lines that cross at a great many stations. How about the severe crowding that's nothing like you have ever seen? How loudly would you complain about train-stuffers if we had those here? (I don't want them here).

Basically in Japan there are tons of people crammed into a small space, and no other transportation options. The trains cost more to ride than they do here, run a slightly shorter day, and are just about always full of people. More money coming in means more money for operations.

The T by contrast has slowly and thoroughly worked itself into a real crappy position by the non-virtue of a slovenly work force, and lazy, uncreative, unthinking, entitled management. Digging out of that hole is going to take quite a while.

Japanese subways are also heavily subsidized. The T was asked to cover its own costs for far too long, and now there is decayed infrastructure, atop needed expansions, atop a failed economy, all piled on the accumulated stupid moves of past management.

"Late for work" issues would seem to largely involve the commuter rail, which seems to be a nightmare of amazing scale, and has been for as long as I've even known of it. You should be asking in that case why the T's board keeps re-awarding that damned contract to the MBCR after years and years of absolutely incompetent operations... start there. Why commuters have not torn those board members to shreds after all this time is just beyond my understanding. The commuter rail is a disgusting failure. They're also subject to the whims of the operators of the tracks on which they run, I'm told... as is Amtrak, whose trains in some places post 60% on-time rates because 70% of the delays are caused by CSX (who own the tracks) issues.

To take it to an even more appropriate level: Why does Japan have the Shinkansen, which is faster than a plane (and much nicer) even for long trips, and we have choo choo break-down charley? Talk to Congress and local and state government officials. They still think that cars and planes are important means of transportation, trains and buses are for poor people, and bicycles are for hippies. Some of this thinking seems to be changing, but even good old Cambridge had a wink and a nod for the "cute" complaints of cyclists a few years ago.

Seeing that a higher-level manager not only recognizes that a problem is a problem, but then knows how to slot it into an existing process where it won't be lost or forgotten is, under the circumstances, encouraging.