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Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
31–40 of 42 posts
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#32You can see just fine out of Metro North windows, which are apparently the same half-inch of polycarbonate glazing. So what’s the difference? Does Metro North replace the windows more frequently?
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
That’s a ridiculous takeaway. It seems like you’re looking for hyperbole or otherwise have a bone to pick.
I mean literally the commenter listed out places all over the world with a tiny fraction of the resources that don’t have these types of problems and the counter examples are all American cities, it is no secret that US public transit is consistently worse than those practically anywhere else regardless of how proud those people may be.
The windows have to comply with the safety standards. Do countries like Indian and China have the same safety standards?
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#34> not being able to see which station the train is at, especially if no announcement is made Wait, they're admitting they know this is a problem? It's such a pain having inaudible announcements or none at all. Is it really so hard to get on the PA for each stop? Then why not have it automated? Or an overhead sign in the car showing eta and name of next station? Ideally both.
>Or an overhead sign in the car showing eta and name of next station? I believe the cars (definitely the newer ones) have exactly that. It seems like an odd complaint to me, but it's totally possible NJ Transit moved older cars that don't have this feature from more heavily trafficked lines to lines that don't have as much traffic.
Every car I've been on has about a dozen characters' worth of space. It's very easy to miss a visual announcement on those - I've missed my stop a few times, though I freely acknowledge that it's due to me not paying attention.
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean literally the commenter listed out places all over the world with a tiny fraction of the resources that don’t have these types of problems and the counter examples are all American cities, it is no secret that US public transit is consistently worse than those practically anywhere else regardless of how proud those people may be.
The windows have to comply with the safety standards. Do countries like Indian and China have the same safety standards?
Literally “the same”, no, but look at the track records of literally any country and you’ll find that they remain far safer (and in China’s case, orders of magnitude) more reliable and safe than whatever train wreck is going on in the USA.
(Believe the statistics or not, comparing the antique, hardly used, minuscule network of the USA to the state of the art, enormous, and insanely heavily utilized Chinese railways is pretty hilarious hubris for Americans, and I’m speaking as one—who left the country, though)
https://pedestrianobservations.com/2011/06/02/comparative-ra...
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#36You can see just fine out of Metro North windows, which are apparently the same half-inch of polycarbonate glazing. So what’s the difference? Does Metro North replace the windows more frequently?
Likely due to less sun exposure -- either at their train yards, or the orientation of their lines being more north/south than east/west.
Also, Metro-North's two west-of-Hudson lines (which are co-branded/shared with NJ Transit, in terms of tracks and rolling stock) do have this same problem.
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#37It’s crazy that one of the largest commuter rail systems in a state with some of the highest taxes cannot just spend $8 million to replace the windows. I’m sure an audit of contracts or overtime payments could quickly find some extra money.
In terms of the state subsidy, NJ Transit doesn't have a permanent dedicated source of funding in the state budget.
It's a really messed-up situation. The governor prefers to waste billions of dollars on an unnecessary turnpike extension widening project, instead of funding public transit.
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#38They chose polycarbonate plastic over glass but it suffers from the elements more than glass.
On the other hand, it's far harder to break than glass, which is important for equipment that will be subjected to vandals.
Vandalism is only an issue at all because the US is allergic to enforcing “broken windows” laws
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#39Since this is polycarbonate can’t it be just buffed, like the car headlight cleaning products do, using a very fine sandpaper? It’ll just take a thin layer off and can then be polished. It should cost less than replacing, I think..
Reading the article it sounded like this was a job for those ceramic coatings they sell to fix this same problem on car headlights. It will be a lot of hours of buffing and applying coats of sealant to fix this, but compared to the cost of replacing the windows it seems like a bargain.
Re: Commuter train window cleaning conundrum in NJ
#40I found an article that quoted people at the Chicago commuter rail system (Metra) saying that their rail cars should get a major rehab (which includes new windows) every 14 years.
Looking at Wikipedia, the NJ Transit rail cars with the affected windows would have started hitting 14 years old (they were getting 10 delivered per month for a few years) right as the Covid-19 pandemic started shutting everything down.
This is most likely just bad timing, and because of budget issues, supply chain problems, lack of maintenance capacity, etc. - something that they haven’t fully recovered from.
(Just a guess)