Andrew
Subject: LA Times article on Metro Meltdown
Sent: 9/11/98 19:43
Received: 9/11/98 19:48
From: Andrew Sullivan, celebes@well.com
To: Andrew Sullivan, andrew@sulli.org
http://www.latimes.com/archives/doc/rArchive/temp/temp.19405
>
> [submitarchives] [submitsite]
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> [Los Angeles Times] [Archives]
>
> Tuesday, September 8, 1998
> Home Edition
> Section: PART A
> Page: A-3
>
> California and the West;
>
> Bay Area's Light Rail 'Meltdown' Raises Havoc;
> Transit: San Francisco Muni's new computerized system designed to
> streamline train operations collapses, leaving commuters in the
> lurch.;
>
> By: MARY CURTIUS
> TIMES STAFF WRITER
>
> What people here are calling the Muni Meltdown began Aug. 22, when
> the city's transit service put into operation a $70-million
> computerized relay system meant to revolutionize its light-rail
> train operations.
> Instead, the system shuddered, staggered and then suddenly
> collapsed in what panicked politicians and outraged commuters are
> calling the worst breakdown of the city's public transit system in
> memory.
> San Francisco's 100-year-old system--which includes cable cars,
> streetcars, trolleys, trains and buses--has never been perfect. In
> fact, it has long been the subject of complaints among riders who
> say rude drivers and late and overcrowded buses are all too
> common.
> But never before has so much gone so wrong at the same time. And
> in a city where public transportation is the preferred mode of
> travel for many, Muni's failure has been considered a disaster.
>
> "We have more boardings on public transport here, per capita, than
> does any other city in the country," said Michael Yaki, a county
> supervisor and head of the transportation committee.
>
> The computerization was supposed to cut morning commute time by
> increasing the number of trains that could shoot through the
> tunnel under Market Street, the backbone of downtown, from 24 an
> hour to 48 an hour. It also was supposed to virtually eliminate
> the possibility of collisions on the tracks.
>
> Instead, traffic through the tunnel slowed to a crawl. Two days
> after the new computer went into operation, one driver panicked
> and locked himself in his cab, backing up the network for more
> than an hour and forcing Muni administrators to call the police to
> coax him out. Other trains simply broke down, or their doors--now
> operated by computer--refused to open or shut.
>
> Muni and city officials issued assurances that the problems would
> be quickly worked out. But the situation continued to deteriorate.
> Commuters began to lose patience.
>
> And then, during the Aug. 28 morning commute, the wounded system
> essentially lay down and died.
>
> More than half of the trains that haul at least 100,000 commuters
> in and out of downtown every workday stopped running. Commuters
> were stranded in tunnels and on platforms for up to an hour.
>
> Computer glitches, driver errors, breakdowns and at least one
> derailment made Muni just about the only topic of conversation in
> the city that day.
>
> Ugly confrontations erupted between drivers and riders. The mayor
> and county supervisors were inundated with complaints. "Muni Hell
> on Wheels," screamed the front page of that afternoon's San
> Francisco Examiner.
>
> Frantic efforts by Muni technicians resurrected the system by the
> next day, putting more trains into service and switching to manual
> control of their movements. As the week wore on, the computer
> system seemed to function more smoothly. But delays and
> overcrowding are still widespread.
>
> Both Mayor Willie Brown and Muni director Emilio Cruz say no quick
> fix is possible. At least one county supervisor has raised the
> possibility that the new computer system may simply have to be
> scrapped, although no one knows how the city would pay for another
> one.
>
> Riders are furious.
>
> "I'm thoroughly disgusted," said Noel Dedora, an investment
> manager who took his frustrations out on a Muni driver on the
> Embarcadero station's crowded platform during the Thursday evening
> rush hour.
>
> "It's not my fault!" the visibly agitated driver shouted back when
> Dedora screamed at him about the delays.
>
> A Muni rider since 1990, Dedora said he could never recall a worse
> time for public transit in the city.
>
> "They should indeed fire all the people responsible for this," he
> said.
>
> Every day, commuters switch on all-news radio stations early in
> the morning to calculate their chances of getting to work on time.
> Talk radio programs are filled with angry exchanges between city
> officials, Muni representatives and riders.
>
> Columnists have been merciless, skewering the transit system's
> union and its administration. They have assailed Brown, never
> failing to remind readers that he promised, as a candidate, to fix
> Muni in 100 days. And they have pitied commuters, referring to
> them as "Muni moles" trapped on stalled trains in pitch-dark
> tunnels.
>
> "We're all going to be held accountable, and rightfully so," said
> Yaki, the supervisor. "The heat is on."
>
> If another collapse on the scale of the Aug. 28 disaster occurs,
> Yaki said, "I think that the public's trust in this system will be
> irrevocably broken and we'll have no choice but to start from
> scratch." Failure Blamed on Many Factors
>
> Yaki blames the system breakdown on a combination of factors.
> Chief among them, says the Brown appointee, are years of neglect
> by previous administrations that forced Muni to continue operating
> aging trains long past their useful life and kept it from
> modernizing operations.
>
> But Yaki says the transit system also suffers from poor planning
> and poorly trained drivers who don't know how to deal with the new
> computer system.
>
> Although the city is fining Alcatel Transport Automation of France
> and Canada, designer of the new computer system, $20,000 a day for
> the breakdowns, backups and delays, Yaki said it appears that Muni
> demanded a system that Alcatel warned would not work, one that
> would combine computerized operation with manual operation of
> trains.
>
> Since the meltdown began, Alcatel representatives have insisted
> that their system is working fine, and that Muni is just failing
> to use it properly. Yaki said he'll hold transportation committee
> hearings this month on who is to blame and how to fix the
> problems.
>
> Commuters who have no alternative are getting up earlier to get to
> work and getting home later. But some have switched to buses or to
> the regional BART subway that crosses the San Francisco Bay.
>
> Others say they are hitching rides with friends, hailing taxis or
> driving their cars. That has produced a ripple effect across the
> city, clogging streets with lumbering, packed Muni buses, more
> cars and more taxis.
>
> Brown, who normally rides in a chauffeured limousine, is now
> clambering aboard buses and trains and working sullen crowds at
> stations across the city, trying to demonstrate that he is taking
> a hands-on approach to the problem. On Thursday morning, he walked
> down Market Street to the Embarcadero station to prove that Muni
> was, in fact, faster than humans after a local newspaper said it
> was quicker to commute up Market on foot.
>
> "San Francisco is a city that loves public transit," said
> political consultant Robert Barnes. "People use it to go to work
> every day, and it is a part of people's everyday routine. If Muni
> isn't working, it hurts people's lives and people get angry. And
> that hurts all politicians."
>
> Barnes, who said Brown still has time to fix the problems before
> he faces reelection in November 1999, predicted that the mayor
> will weather the Muni storm.
>
> "No one has emerged as a challenger. You can't beat someone with
> no one," Barnes said. But some of the five members of the
> 11-member board who are up for reelection this November may feel
> the wrath of voters, he said. Three are Brown appointees.
>
> If anyone is feeling more heat than Brown at the moment, it's Muni
> director Cruz.
>
> Formerly Brown's chief of staff, Cruz has been dressed down by the
> mayor and assailed by the city's media outlets. He has gotten
> credit from some, however, for bravely venturing onto the
> platforms day after day to hear firsthand the diatribes of
> commuters.
>
> "I'm not demanding his resignation," said Andrew Sullivan, of
> Rescue Muni, a 300-member commuter advocacy group formed two years
> ago to lobby the city for transit improvements. "He and his staff
> have been remarkably polite to riders who have criticized them."
>
> Rescue Muni says the system needs to be more professionally
> managed, and has urged the creation of an independent
> transportation board. Currently, Muni's head is appointed by, and
> reports to, the mayor.
>
> Sullivan said the group's World Wide Web site, offering updates on
> Muni's problems and alternate routes for people abandoning the
> trains, has seen a sharp spike in visits since the crisis began.
>
> "We're getting 1,000 hits a day and 10 e-mails a day and voice
> mail messages," he said. Sullivan hopes that if something good
> comes of the mess, it is that San Franciscans, whom he describes
> as "remarkably tolerant of bad public transportation," will
> finally demand that the city make the trains run on time.
>
> Descriptors: TRANSIT SYSTEMS -- SAN FRANCISCO; SAN FRANCISCO --
> TRANSPORTATION; EQUIPMENT FAILURES;
>
> Copyright (c) 1998 Times Mirror Company
Andrew Sullivan
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