"All of This Has Happened Before, And Will Happen Again..." AKA Cylon Prophecies and MUNI Back Door Boarding
The Cylons in the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica have a prophecy they keep repeating: "All of this has happened before, and will happen again." One could say the same thing about the MUNI test program to allow backdoor boarding to try and combat fare evasion, et al.
The thing is, once upon a time, MUNI had "back door boarding" and the like on busy lines, by paying people as "loaders" to collect money and get people on the bus as fast as possible. This has long since been abandoned, in the interest of cutting the payroll. Is this the best way to do things? Maybe, maybe not. But it is interesting to see MUNI revive ideas and call them "new" when in fact a quick look at MUNI history shows that a lot of this is not really new at all. There are plenty of good ideas out there, and many can be found in the history of MUNI. I suppose we're paying the big kids big bucks and giving out big raises so that they can rediscover MUNI history and re-brand it with the help of expensive consultants.
Awesome.
Comments
MUNI needs to be consistent with how it deals with back-door boarding. I've been on busy lines where the driver is fine with people cramming on every available door, and other times on the same route the driver will shout at back-door boarders to get out and come back in the front door. You can't tell people it's okay sometimes but not other times and expect anything but confusion.
On the other hand, this morning on the 28 line my driver confronted a back-door boarder and was rewarded with profanity and a punched-in door. It's no surprise why many drivers don't want to deal with back-door fare evaders.
Posted by: Chet Marlboro | January 17, 2008 9:06 AM
This is not proof of payment, despite what the Examiner says. We do need POP on every line tho. Need to pay cash? Board the front. Have a non-cash fare? Board thru the back. Fare inspectors should be used for this. as opposed to the current setup where they simply ambush the tourists at Powell.
Posted by: Alex | January 18, 2008 1:30 AM