No one wants to be on a train when it derails, so at first it might be hard to criticize the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority (MBTA) for its announcement on Oct. 22 that it would close the Red Line north of Harvard Square on weekends starting on Nov. 5.
According to the MBTA, the closures are necessary to perform urgently needed repairs to the tunnels, and the scale of repairs means that workers can't make progress during the hours of the night that the T is closed.
While weekend T riders at the Porter, Davis and Alewife stations will not be stranded completely, as the MBTA will offer a bus shuttle service between the stations, it would be foolish to think these buses will run at nearly the speed and frequency of the actual trains.
For Tufts students and all residents living near the three T stops affected, this means that weekend excursions into Boston are about to get a lot more inconvenient until March, when the project is scheduled to be completed.
What is easy to criticize is how the MBTA has handled the situation. Again, no one wants to put his or her safety at risk when they ride public transportation, but the MBTA would not have to take such drastic measures if it had addressed these concerns earlier.
The sections that will soon be under repair were called out in an overwhelmingly negative 2009 independent review as being an "unfunded but critical safety project." The report cited dangers such as, "In some areas, the fasteners are no longer holding the track in place, causing track to move out of alignment and presenting the possibility of train derailment," and, "In addition … water is corroding the signal system along the track and compromising the cable and wire conduits."
While the project hopes to patch up these problems, one has to wonder why, considering these problems were well-known two years ago, riders have only been given mere weeks' notice that a disruptive repair effort will be under way.
The main reason the tracks have been allowed to dilapidate into such poor condition is due to money. The MBTA is spending $80 million dollars on the project as it faces a huge debt.
Performing expensive last-minute patchwork on a collapsing system is not a way to maintain a city's public transportation. We'd be lying if we said we knew how to manage the system, but if things keep going the way they have been, a significant shakeup of MBTA management should certainly be in the cards.
Plans for a large-scale expansion to the Green Line seem like even more of a pipe dream when large sections of the Red Line can't stay open for tens of thousands of weekend riders. Here's to hoping the MBTA, given its demonstrated incompetence, is actually capable of finishing the repairs by the projected completion time.
In the meantime, we implore Tufts to fund a weekend shuttle taking students directly to Harvard Square — where T service resumes.
Given that the university's last fiscal year accrued a $32 million operating surplus, it certainly could afford, unlike the MBTA, to spend some money to improve conditions for its riders.
