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(L) OPTO Program Cancellation - Why?


Lawrence St

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Saw this on twitter so wanted to create a new thread over CBTC, OPTO and Union rules.

I understand that the (L) ran OPTO for a few weeks until the union sued the (MTA) and made them return C/R's to the line. But why was this program criticized? The Franklin Av (S), Rockaway (S), late night (5), and weekend (M) are all OPTO with no issue. Why was the (L) a whole other story?

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3 hours ago, Lawrence St said:

Saw this on twitter so wanted to create a new thread over CBTC, OPTO and Union rules.

I understand that the (L) ran OPTO for a few weeks until the union sued the (MTA) and made them return C/R's to the line. But why was this program criticized? The Franklin Av (S), Rockaway (S), late night (5), and weekend (M) are all OPTO with no issue. Why was the (L) a whole other story?

 

Because the (L) is a full-length interborough route and the others are short intra-borough shuttles. 

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26 minutes ago, Lawrence St said:

Wrong, the weekend (M) is a reduced length interborough route. 

Doesn't change the fact that the (L) is an entire line, the (M) is like 13 stops back and forth it'll take you maybe 20 minutes to get to the other end of the route. The (L) is about double that. 

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If I'm not mistaken, the ruling was based on safety issues (either the union or the courts made this call). Any train that was longer than 300 feet had to have both a motorman (operator) and the conductor (person who opens/closes the doors). This is why the (G) train WEEKENDS runs OPTO (train length is 300 feet, making it NOT longer than 300 feet), but WEEKDAYS has to have both because of crowding conditions (safety concerns). 

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I believe the issue was train lengths as mentioned above. Primarily union contracts prohibit OPTO if the train was greater than a certain length.

That is the reason the (L) has TV screens at the T/O position.

How long a train line is does not matter. It all comes down to the contract, the train physical length and how busy the train is

Edited by Mtatransit
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3 hours ago, darkstar8983 said:

If I'm not mistaken, the ruling was based on safety issues (either the union or the courts made this call). Any train that was longer than 300 feet had to have both a motorman (operator) and the conductor (person who opens/closes the doors). This is why the (G) train WEEKENDS runs OPTO (train length is 300 feet, making it NOT longer than 300 feet), but WEEKDAYS has to have both because of crowding conditions (safety concerns). 

You pretty much nailed it. Key words are “safety” concerns.  

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10 hours ago, darkstar8983 said:

If I'm not mistaken, the ruling was based on safety issues (either the union or the courts made this call). Any train that was longer than 300 feet had to have both a motorman (operator) and the conductor (person who opens/closes the doors). This is why the (G) train WEEKENDS runs OPTO (train length is 300 feet, making it NOT longer than 300 feet), but WEEKDAYS has to have both because of crowding conditions (safety concerns). 

 Correct....

It was also in the Contract in writing, TA was just being petty as usual trying to see what they could get away with...

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20 hours ago, Lawrence St said:

Saw this on twitter so wanted to create a new thread over CBTC, OPTO and Union rules.

I understand that the (L) ran OPTO for a few weeks until the union sued the (MTA) and made them return C/R's to the line. But why was this program criticized? The Franklin Av (S), Rockaway (S), late night (5), and weekend (M) are all OPTO with no issue. Why was the (L) a whole other story?

What happens on Tweet Twott doesn’t count for the entire story. That’s just hearsay. The L has 5 stops in Manhattan and 20 in Brooklyn. Even though the (L) is CBTC, which has them run frequently with good communication from the lights, 25 stop One Person Train Operation on that line is not supportive. The (L) has more volume at all times of the night. Then there is safety: 

1) what happens if the passenger gets robbed on the last car of an 8 car train? The operator has to walk all the way to the last car to see the incident, delaying service. Especially in a dangerous sections of Brooklyn. 
2) something happens or a fire breaks out? And there is only one personal there. Cameras won’t solve issues on the (L) line unless there is an uniformed NYPD officer in it. 

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Anybody mentioned the (G) from Church to Court Square? Is that still running on OPTÓ during the weekdays or did they returned it to 2 person. 
 

the 42nd Street Shuttle (S) was a three man operation until 1996, it’s a 2 motorman operation until after one track is eliminated and both sides become 5 cars long. 

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On 6/28/2021 at 12:06 PM, FLX9304 said:

What happens on Tweet Twott doesn’t count for the entire story. That’s just hearsay. The L has 5 stops in Manhattan and 20 in Brooklyn. Even though the (L) is CBTC, which has them run frequently with good communication from the lights, 25 stop One Person Train Operation on that line is not supportive. The (L) has more volume at all times of the night. Then there is safety: 

1) what happens if the passenger gets robbed on the last car of an 8 car train? The operator has to walk all the way to the last car to see the incident, delaying service. Especially in a dangerous sections of Brooklyn. 
2) something happens or a fire breaks out? And there is only one personal there. Cameras won’t solve issues on the (L) line unless there is an uniformed NYPD officer in it. 

WMATA has 600 ft trains with one operator at the front (and those operators manually operate the train AND manually close the doors...two MTA jobs in one), BART has 700ft trains with one operator at the front (basically doing OPTO with a full length train. 

 

Those issues are clearly addressed in those cities, why not NY? These damn unions and politicians are the reason why the MTA is so far behind. All in the name of "safety". Safety = Control. They don't want technology taking over human manpower. We all know that and that's why they didn't like Byford. Byford was ready to turn this city around and make it efficient AND safe as possible with the current resources. Then he was planning on future implementations to make all projects consider efficiency AND safety to allow the MTA to modernize and maximize capacity. 

 

The MTA is now going backwards again. And this massive employee shortage is a prime example of what happens when you rely on people to make every single aspect of the system work. 

 

Had years of prior modernization and less political neglect not happen, and transportation in this city was equally modernizing as fast as the business, real estate and gentrification was/is taking place. The subway would be 10x modern and more reliable. 

Its 2021...and even before COVID...below is what should have been already implemented. 

Full Second Ave subway with (Q)(T) from Hanover - 125st by 1980. 

Rogers Ave Junction on (2)(3)(4)(5) restructured by 2000. 

CBTC first implemented in 2004 on (L). OPTO during non rush hour starting in 2009. 

Restructuring of all platforms to account for platform doors 2005-present. 

CBTC/ATO on entire (A)(C)(E) an under Queens Boulevard on (E)(F)(M)(R) and all of the (4)(5)(6)(7) by 2009-2015. 

CBTC/OPTO on the SIR with R160s to railroad specs in 2010. 

OPTO on all CBTC lines during non rush hour times by 2017-2018.  

R179 order with a few open gangway sets. 

 

R211 with ALL 5-car fully-open gangway sets. 

Full Driverless Automation on the (L) by 2014 (with platform doors designed for R160 2012-2014).

Full Driverless Automation on the (7) by 2020 (with platform doors designed for R188 2018-2020). 

 

You improve service, you improve the quality of life, and you improve the behaviors of riders. Frequent, on-time, clean, accurate, fast service will lead to much less animosity between riders & MTA. Obviously politicians need to do their part in enforcing/maintaining homelessness, crime, and vandalism. But none of this is happening because of greed from these dirty far left/far right politicians, and a artificial intelligence complacent MTA agency. 

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45 minutes ago, XcelsiorBoii4888 said:

WMATA has 600 ft trains with one operator at the front (and those operators manually operate the train AND manually close the doors...two MTA jobs in one), BART has 700ft trains with one operator at the front (basically doing OPTO with a full length train. 


Those issues are clearly addressed in those cities, why not NY? These damn unions and politicians are the reason why the MTA is so far behind. All in the name of "safety". Safety = Control.


 

 

It was clearly addressed in those cities because they were built 70 years later. Here's the line-of sight in an average WMATA station USA-Metro_Farragut_West0.jpg

And here's the LOS in New York:

163_St-Amsterdam_Av_(43142722230).jpg

Crowded visual areas dont translate well to CCTV (especially since people have a habit of vandalizing the cameras). But you know, union bad, just making things up.





This massive employee shortage is what happens when you make political decisions with people's safety, also this 'massive' shortage is occurring in every industry that kept going at a high pace during the pandemic, American Airlines, My old company, ferry boats...so its not endemic to the MTA by any stretch, its a natural consequence to stalling training for months and having a few hundred people die. Rosters aren't generally designed to handle double/triple digit casualty rates. Even had the NYCT been OPTO before the pandemic then the TOs would've been the people dying/sick (since conductors are overrepresented in the people absence column) as people would just interact with the only employee on the train per force. With out the TOs you can't even move the trains to avoid terminal hold outs blowing up the road. 

P.S I don't think service will improve passenger behavior, this isn't South America where people are damaging trains in protest. New Yorkers had better service during the pandemic than all but about 3 cities in the world, they still set trains on fire, derailed them and spit on the crews every day...

45 minutes ago, XcelsiorBoii4888 said:

The MTA is now going backwards again. And this massive employee shortage is a prime example of what happens when you rely on people to make every single aspect of the system work. 

 

You improve service, you improve the quality of life, and you improve the behaviors of riders.

Edited by Jsunflyguy
typo
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39 minutes ago, XcelsiorBoii4888 said:

WMATA has 600 ft trains with one operator at the front (and those operators manually operate the train AND manually close the doors...two MTA jobs in one), BART has 700ft trains with one operator at the front (basically doing OPTO with a full length train. 

 

Those issues are clearly addressed in those cities, why not NY? These damn unions and politicians are the reason why the MTA is so far behind. All in the name of "safety". Safety = Control. They don't want technology taking over human manpower. We all know that and that's why they didn't like Byford. Byford was ready to turn this city around and make it efficient AND safe as possible with the current resources. Then he was planning on future implementations to make all projects consider efficiency AND safety to allow the MTA to modernize and maximize capacity. 

 

The MTA is now going backwards again. And this massive employee shortage is a prime example of what happens when you rely on people to make every single aspect of the system work. 

 

Had years of prior modernization and less political neglect not happen, and transportation in this city was equally modernizing as fast as the business, real estate and gentrification was/is taking place. The subway would be 10x modern and more reliable. 

Its 2021...and even before COVID...below is what should have been already implemented. 

Full Second Ave subway with (Q)(T) from Hanover - 125st by 1980. 

Rogers Ave Junction on (2)(3)(4)(5) restructured by 2000. 

CBTC first implemented in 2004 on (L). OPTO during non rush hour starting in 2009. 

Restructuring of all platforms to account for platform doors 2005-present. 

CBTC/ATO on entire (A)(C)(E) an under Queens Boulevard on (E)(F)(M)(R) and all of the (4)(5)(6)(7) by 2009-2015. 

CBTC/OPTO on the SIR with R160s to railroad specs in 2010. 

OPTO on all CBTC lines during non rush hour times by 2017-2018.  

R179 order with a few open gangway sets. 

 

R211 with ALL 5-car fully-open gangway sets. 

Full Driverless Automation on the (L) by 2014 (with platform doors designed for R160 2012-2014).

Full Driverless Automation on the (7) by 2020 (with platform doors designed for R188 2018-2020). 

 

You improve service, you improve the quality of life, and you improve the behaviors of riders. Frequent, on-time, clean, accurate, fast service will lead to much less animosity between riders & MTA. Obviously politicians need to do their part in enforcing/maintaining homelessness, crime, and vandalism. But none of this is happening because of greed from these dirty far left/far right politicians, and a artificial intelligence complacent MTA agency. 

Yes, you’re right and not to mention SEPTA operates 2 lines with OPTO. The MFL also has ATO, and the operator does not even have to get out of his or her 💺 to open doors from the opposite side. The BSL carries 5 cars while the BRS only has 2. They’re similar to the NYCTA’s R62/68s with full width cabs. 
 

Yes, by last year, NYCTA should’ve been automated and all lines with new techs, but we all know how that story went. Even though I have not been back to NYC since last September, I still miss my blue transit bus and subways 

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11 hours ago, FLX9304 said:

Yes, you’re right and not to mention SEPTA operates 2 lines with OPTO. The MFL also has ATO, and the operator does not even have to get out of his or her 💺 to open doors from the opposite side. The BSL carries 5 cars while the BRS only has 2. They’re similar to the NYCTA’s R62/68s with full width cabs. 
 

Yes, by last year, NYCTA should’ve been automated and all lines with new techs, but we all know how that story went. Even though I have not been back to NYC since last September, I still miss my blue transit bus and subways 

BSL, BRS and MFL trains on SEPTA are much shorter than trains on every NYC subway line except the shuttles. Yes, BART runs longer trains and WMATA runs trains that are the same length as NYC subway trains, but the stations in those two systems are designed to give the operators a clear view down the platforms. None are built on curves, like some that we have here.

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23 minutes ago, T to Dyre Avenue said:

BSL, BRS and MFL trains on SEPTA are much shorter than trains on every NYC subway line except the shuttles. Yes, BART runs longer trains and WMATA runs trains that are the same length as NYC subway trains, but the stations in those two systems are designed to give the operators a clear view down the platforms. None are built on curves, like some that we have here.

But most (L) line stations aren't built on curves, so the field of view is still able to be seen clearly.

But he is right, the (L) should have gotten a lot of upgrades, platform doors, complete CBTC and OPTO, etc etc.

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