Fare gates coming for commuter-rail riders

free rides when the ticket gates are broken so they have to leave them open. How much are we paying for these systems vs how much they take in again?

... to pull out your ticket or pass before boarding. It slows down boarding and makes passengers vulnerable to theft and loss when they have to fumble through stuff with full hands or small children. People who accompany others down the quays to help elderly or disabled folks board and find a seat will no longer be able to do so.
Worst of all with be the added roadblocks for seniors and the mobility impaired who often have to pass through special gates located out of the way because they have a wheelchair or use a special pass that is rejected at regular stiles, as is often the case already in T stations.

for boarding enough in advance of departure, which normally doesn't happen now. Otherwise, the faregates are only going to worsen the current boarding congestion.

Equally important is the impact these faregates will have in delaying people getting off inbound trains, especially during the AM rush hour.

But Keolis's response to such legitimate concerns is "Oh, passengers will adapt."

is that on some of my rush hour trains that I take, even when it is not crowded, and the aisles are clear, my pass does not get checked. This usually happens when the train is short staff conductors. But not always.

Perhaps Keolis also has en employee morale issue?

These gates solve absolutely nothing. You still need to pay conductors to check all the tickets on the train. If you have a Zone 1A rail pass, you get past the fare gates even if the train doesn't stop at any zone 1A stations.

These gates make it look like the MBTA is "doing sometime" to catch the very small number of people who don't buy tickets. But in reality all it will do is make boarding the train even more inconvenient when traveling at peak times.

This policy makes about as much sense as setting your couch on fire instead of turning up the heat if you're cold.

Iarnród Éireann, Ireland's national railroad, gates most, if not all of its station platforms (even very rural stations), and uses the same exact model gates as used on the MBTA. You have to have a valid ticket to enter and use the same valid ticket to exit (so that, for example, if you are going from Dublin to Cork, but only buy a ticket to Portlaoise, you won't be able to exit without paying the difference in fare). There was also periodic ticket inspection by the conductors on board the train.This seems to work most of the time, though last year when I was waiting for a Cork to Dublin train that was running a little late, the gate attendants at Cork Kent opened all of the gates, allowing everyone waiting to board more quickly. Despite a slight slowdown, there were no real issues exiting at Dublin Heuston, since there were plenty enough gates to handle trainloads of people exiting there.

.... in cities that already have the infrastructure.
This will require far more rebuilding of stations to work in Boston than this plan reveals. It’s the Big Dig all over again.

I presume the gates will be roughly where you leave the station and go onto the platform. Unless you are in the habit of kissing your paramour farewell as they board the train, this won't affect you.

... be sure to extend their stays once they get in on the lowest fare ticket.

at a train station. (Well, at South, North, and Back Bay that I know of.)

You can get the weekend fare on the mTicket app.

Gates will be across the concourse, not at the platform doors, at least at North Station, largely because of the constraints you cite.