What would it take to change rider behavior?

On Dec 7, 12:02 pm, Agent_C <Agent-C-hates-s...@nyc.> wrote:
> On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 07:44:47 -0800 (PST), hanco...@bbs.cpcn.com wrote:
> >Improving these passenger-created problems would significantly improve
> >subway performance.
>
> Indeed it would, but most of the problems you cited are directly
> related to overcrowding and lack of confidence in the schedule. Both
> things the TA must address, through better operating procedures and
> additional capacity.
>
> >But I don't know how to do it.
>
> A good place to start would be issuing summonses to people who hold
> the doors or don't 'yield right-of-way' to exiting passengers. The
> conductor can plead all he wants, but the prospect of a $50 ticket is
> far more motivating. It would also change the ridership culture for
> the better.

Who's going to write the summonses?

On Dec 7, 2:40 pm, Agent_C <Agent-C-hates-s...@nyc.> wrote:
> On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 11:25:42 -0800 (PST), "Peter T. Daniels"
>
> <gramma...@> wrote:
> >Who's going to write the summonses?
>
> The Police, of course...
>
> It would make more productive use of the NYPD 'daily surge' than we're
> currently getting.
>
> I'm sure we've all seen the convoys of 30+ squad cars out on
> maneuvers. Just as often, I see dozens of officers spaced every 20
> feet or so along the platform at rush hour. That would be a very
> effective force to write summonses.

How far apart are the doors? How many people squeeze into them? Are
you going to drag off the train anyone who holds a door? How many
officers will that take? How long will it take to write each summons?
Are pedestrians to be required to carry "subway rider licenses" so
that their identity can be confirmed?

Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> On Dec 7, 2:40 pm, Agent_C <Agent-C-hates-s...@nyc.> wrote:
>> On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 11:25:42 -0800 (PST), "Peter T. Daniels"
>>
>> <gramma...@> wrote:
>>> Who's going to write the summonses?
>> The Police, of course...
>>
>> It would make more productive use of the NYPD 'daily surge' than we're
>> currently getting.
>>
>> I'm sure we've all seen the convoys of 30+ squad cars out on
>> maneuvers. Just as often, I see dozens of officers spaced every 20
>> feet or so along the platform at rush hour. That would be a very
>> effective force to write summonses.
>
> How far apart are the doors? How many people squeeze into them? Are
> you going to drag off the train anyone who holds a door? How many
> officers will that take? How long will it take to write each summons?
> Are pedestrians to be required to carry "subway rider licenses" so
> that their identity can be confirmed?

I don't know, but starting with the R44, some efficiency was lost on the
IND/BMT lines. Longer cars made for fewer available doors, since the
number of doors per car didn't change.

On Dec 8, 2:08 am, "Ed\(NY\)" <ebn...@> wrote:
>
> If the conductors stopped reopening doors when passengers blocked them, many
> passengers would be forced to either release the doors or remain in the
> position of holding them indefinitely. Once they realized it's not going to
> work, they would let them go, especially when other passengers start
> screaming at them. I'm not talking about cases where people are really
> stuck - I think that's rare. Much more common is the case where someone
> prevents a door from closing expecting the conductor to reopen it. If the
> conductors were much more hesitant to reopen doors, passengers would learn
> that jamming them does nothing other than delay the train. This is how the
> trains used to run, by the way, before the fear of spurious lawsuits etc.
> became so rampant.

Are you sure a person can't pry the doors open?

> I started off on the IRT in the Lo-V days, those cars had sensors that
> caused the door to automatically reopen when someone pushed against the
> rubber edge.
>
> I was very surprised when I found that didn't work on the BMT D-types!
>
> On the current fleet, it depends on how far the door has closed, if you
> catch it before it closes about half way, you might be able to reverse it,
> but past that point the internal mechanism has latched and you can't.
> Better wait for the next train.
>
>The problem is that passengers know if they jam the doors the conductor
>will re-open them. If doors had sensors that made them re-open when
>passengers grab them, the conductor could leave the rest of the doors
>closed and wait until the activated set of doors successfully reclosed.
>That would be an improvement. However, it would send a message that you
>can grab any set of closing doors and they will re-open - not a good idea,
>in my book.

VINCE wrote:
> JohnAnon wrote:
>
>> On Dec 8, 2:08 am, "Ed\(NY\)" <ebn...@> wrote:
>>
>>> If the conductors stopped reopening doors when passengers blocked
>>> them, many
>>> passengers would be forced to either release the doors or remain in the
>>> position of holding them indefinitely. Once they realized it's not
>>> going to
>>> work, they would let them go, especially when other passengers start
>>> screaming at them. I'm not talking about cases where people are really
>>> stuck - I think that's rare. Much more common is the case where someone
>>> prevents a door from closing expecting the conductor to reopen it.
>>> If the
>>> conductors were much more hesitant to reopen doors, passengers would
>>> learn
>>> that jamming them does nothing other than delay the train. This is
>>> how the
>>> trains used to run, by the way, before the fear of spurious lawsuits
>>> etc.
>>> became so rampant.
>>
>>
>> Are you sure a person can't pry the doors open?
> A few years back on one of the 60 mins/20/20 type news shows they had
> someone opening a door by praying it open with a quarter

I've seen it done on recent models. I think on R142s.

"Stephen Sprunk" <stephen@sprunk.org> wrote in message
news:fjfupc$fjp$1@aioe.org...
> "Ed(NY)" <ebny27@> wrote in message
> news:2sz6j.260$va7.56@trndny08...
>>> I started off on the IRT in the Lo-V days, those cars had sensors that
>>> caused the door to automatically reopen when someone pushed against the
>>> rubber edge.
>>>
>>> I was very surprised when I found that didn't work on the BMT D-types!
>>>
>>> On the current fleet, it depends on how far the door has closed, if you
>>> catch it before it closes about half way, you might be able to reverse
>>> it, but past that point the internal mechanism has latched and you
>>> can't. Better wait for the next train.
>>
>>The problem is that passengers know if they jam the doors the conductor
>>will re-open them. If doors had sensors that made them re-open when
>>passengers grab them, the conductor could leave the rest of the doors
>>closed and wait until the activated set of doors successfully reclosed.
>>That would be an improvement. However, it would send a message that you
>>can grab any set of closing doors and they will re-open - not a good idea,
>>in my book.
>
> Only reopening the door that was blocked, automatically with some sort of
> sensor, would be a huge improvement. It's done elsewhere and works well.
>
> The problem with popping all of the doors when one is blocked is that it
> opens you to any one of the _other_ doors getting blocked the next time
> closing them is attempted, which results in multiple rounds and people not
> giving up when they're too far to reach a closing door because they might
> get to the door when it reopens. If doors didn't reopen when they weren't
> blocked, people would give up.
>
> I'd imagine that such a system could be retrofitted onto the existing
> fleet without too much difficulty.
>
>But it would still encourage passengers to block any set of doors as they
>closed, since they would know that the doors would re-open. It's like
>knowing that if you grab doors today, the conductor will re-open them,
>except that in this case it would be 100% of the time. You could have
>passengers charging at every set of doors as they closed, so what you'd
>gain by not having closed doors reopen you might lose by having passengers
>becoming more aggressive.

I think if you're going to have doors automatically reopen, let them reopen
enough to allow passengers to disengage, not enter the train,


>

Ed Backslash wrote:
> I think if you're going to have doors automatically reopen, let them reopen
> enough to allow passengers to disengage, not enter the train,

What?

"JohnAnon" <JohnAnon@nyc.> wrote in message
news:37fe2f6a-2086-4b5e-91e2-6aeeede23c35@s19g2000prg..com...
> Ed Backslash wrote:
>> I think if you're going to have doors automatically reopen, let them
>> reopen
>> enough to allow passengers to disengage, not enter the train,
>
> What?

Have a mechanism that pops the set of doors partway (repeatedly) so that the
person blocking them sees that he/she cannot make them open all the way, but
can disengage from them.

The idea is that if you let passengers know that jamming doors will result
in the doors opening completely (either via a conductor or a built-in
mechanism), you're going to encourage passengers to block doors. If they
know that there's no way to get the doors to reopen (beyond a small amount
so they can get their arms back out), most of them will eventually stop
jamming them.

What I'd like to see if a mechanism that would allow the conductor to rock
only the doors that are not secured. That would accomplish the same thing.
(In other words, the conductor closes the doors. Two sets have passengers
jamming them. Instead of rocking (opening/closing) ALL the doors, he/she
rocks only those two sets until the passengers release them. Lessons
learned: (1) when people hold doors, the others won't re-open; (2) the
doors being held will open only far enough to let those passengers remove
their arms.

Again, in the case where people are really stuck, the conductor would have
the option of re-opening all the doors.

In article <fjfupc$fjp$1@aioe.org>, Stephen Sprunk <stephen@sprunk.org>
wrote:

> "Ed(NY)" <ebny27@> wrote in message
> news:2sz6j.260$va7.56@trndny08...
> >> I started off on the IRT in the Lo-V days, those cars had sensors that
> >> caused the door to automatically reopen when someone pushed against the
> >> rubber edge.
> >>
> >> I was very surprised when I found that didn't work on the BMT D-types!
> >>
> >> On the current fleet, it depends on how far the door has closed, if you
> >> catch it before it closes about half way, you might be able to reverse
> >> it, but past that point the internal mechanism has latched and you can't.
> >> Better wait for the next train.
> >
> >The problem is that passengers know if they jam the doors the conductor
> >will re-open them. If doors had sensors that made them re-open when
> >passengers grab them, the conductor could leave the rest of the doors
> >closed and wait until the activated set of doors successfully reclosed.
> >That would be an improvement. However, it would send a message that you
> >can grab any set of closing doors and they will re-open - not a good idea,
> >in my book.
>
> Only reopening the door that was blocked, automatically with some sort of
> sensor, would be a huge improvement. It's done elsewhere and works well.


It's done here as well - but only on the newer trains (R142, R143 &
R160). If a door panel does not latch, it will retract slightly and
attempt to reclose, up to three attempts after the initial try.. Some
people - who apparently don't mind getting hit by doors - have found
that with each close/open cycle, they can get more of themselves into
the door opening until they finally pop through.