Metra, which runs Chicago's heavy-rail commuter lines, hasn't changed much at all since the 1970s, as today's Chicago Tribune describes in sad detail:
Metra runs on paper, as in paper tickets. Although the majority of riders use monthly passes, passengers in January still bought more than 666,000 one-way tickets or used 10-ride tickets, which conductors have to punch individually.
... Other open rail systems have done away with punching and checking individual tickets. For example, conductors on Boston's Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority check tickets with hand-held electronic devices. ... On Caltrain, a commuter rail line operating between San Francisco and San Jose, passengers buy tickets from vending machines and conductors make random checks. Anyone without a ticket faces a $250 fine.
[And] it's cash or checks only on Metra. The line doesn't take plastic because of the processing fees that credit-card companies impose, Metra spokeswoman Judy Pardonnet said.
The article also mentions a lack of information about train whereabouts that even our CTA buses provide.
I think the article makes Metra sound better than it really is, simply by comparing it only to its American analogues. The authors ignore, presumably out of pity for Metra, the Shanghai Maglev at one extreme, or even more typical European rail systems like Berlin's S-Bahn and the UK's Oyster Card scheme as examples of how to modernize at the very least how people pay for transit.
All right, maybe Transport for London isn't the best example. Still, when Boston has free Wi-Fi and we can't even pay with credit cards, something is wrong. At least TfL has a dedicated express train running from Heathrow to central London (on which you can use your Oyster Card), and we have...the Blue Line. Sad, really.
I've finally gotten around to producing a .kml file from my last flight, on the 14th. I flew Chicago Executive to Waukesha, Wis., thence Milwaukee (where I made two A320s wait for me, but not on purpose), thence Waukegan, Ill., which is the #1 practice-landing destination in the North Suburbs, as far as I can tell.
Good flight, about 2.2 hours total, all logged as cross-country. I haven't seen the bill yet, but the fuel surcharge dropped from $3.20 an hour to 30c, so right there I'm saving...two cups of coffee.
Obligatory airplane-on-little-airport-tarmac photo:
I should explain that it took a week to get this photo onto this blog because I left my camera in the airplane, and only this afternoon had time to go fetch it. That means I was more concerned with safety than, you know, cameras. Right.
Sunny and 13°C in Chicago today. Result: Parker got almost two hours of walks. Other result: Pithy, pointless blog entry. Everyone wins!
It turns out, the privatization of Chicago's parking meters is becoming a total cluster:
During spot checks around the city, the Tribune found:
- Outdated fee and violation-enforcement information still posted on many meters since the city switched from six parking zones to three.
- Meters that, regardless of what the stickers indicate, charge the wrong hourly rates for the zone in which they are located, increasing the chance of vehicles being ticketed. For example, in the 1800 block of North Clybourn Avenue, an area where 25 cents is supposed to buy 15 minutes of parking time, meter No. 279089 provides only seven minutes for a quarter. A black marker was used to cover up the "15" on the meter's rate sticker with "7."
- A surge in broken meters, many overstuffed with coins.
- Stepped-up writing of tickets for parking-meter violations.
The parking-meter companies last weekend exercised an option in the contract that allows them to ticket vehicles parked at expired meters, Walsh said. Chicago police officers and parking enforcement aides also continue to write tickets, and the city will keep all fines collected.
Asked why the concessionaire would spend resources on ticketing even though it cannot keep any fines, Pete Scales of the Chicago Department of Budget and Management said, "That extra enforcement is an added incentive to fill the meters."
So, pop quiz for anyone who's taken Intro to Microeconomics: what are the incentives for either the parking meter company or the city to provide fair and accurate parking meters, or to keep them in good repair?
Pop quiz for second-year law students: Is a class action suit warranted, and if so, for what relief, and in which court?
I'm David Braverman, this is my blog, and Parker is my 3-year-old mutt. I last updated this About... page two years ago, so I thought it's time for a quick review.
Here are the main topics on the Daily Parker:
- Parker, my dog, whom I adopted on 1 September 2006.
- Politics. I'm a moderate-leftie by international standards, which makes me a radical left-winger in today's United States.
- Software. I own a micro-sized software company in Chicago, Illinois, and I have some experience writing software. I see a lot of code, and since I often get called in to projects in crisis, I see a lot of bad code, some of which may appear here.
- The weather. I've operated a weather website for more than ten years. That site deals with raw data and objective observations. Many weather posts also touch politics, given the political implications of addressing climate change, though happily we no longer have to do so under a president beholden to the oil industry.
- Chicago, the greatest city in North America.
This is public writing, too, so I hope to continue a standard of literacy (i.e., spelling, grammar, and diction) and fluidity of prose that makes you want to keep reading.
So thanks for reading, and I hope you continue to enjoy the blog.
Spring officially begins Friday at 6:44 CDT, but today we're getting a little hint of it. Right now it's 19°C in Chicago; if it can squeak up to 22°C it will be the warmest day since October 12th.
Another trivial tidbit: because the earth's atmosphere bends the sun's rays a little, today, and not the official equinox Friday, is the day when we have 12 hours of daylight. From tomorrow until September 25th, days are longer than nights just about everywhere between the Tropic of Cancer and the Arctic Circle.
Update, 14:05 CDT: Yep, we just hit 22°C, warmest temperature in Chicago for 156 days. Why am I inside?
Is nothing sacred? Not when your company implodes:
Willis Group Holdings, a London-based insurance broker, announced Thursday that it will consolidate its area offices to Sears Tower and as part of the deal, gets to put its own name on the 36-year-old skyscraper.
Willis will move nearly 500 associates into Willis Tower, at 233 S. Wacker, initially occupying more than 140,000 square feet on multiple floors. The company said the move to the new space, at $14.50 per square foot, will result in significant real estate cost savings, and that there is no additional cost to the company associated with renaming the building.
And really, enough with the "Diff'rent Strokes" jokes. Fooey.
At 7pm CT last night, it was 16°C; now, twelve hours later, it's -8°C, a 24°C drop. Can anyone say "cold front?"
It's not the biggest twelve-hour drop in Chicago history, but it does wake you up in the morning.
I got so caught up in the rampant destruction in my office yesterday I forgot to mention it was the warmest day we've had since November 6th, four months ago. At least Tom Skilling reported it, else no one would have known.
Skilling said November 5th, but the official high maximum on November 6th—at midnight, sadly—was 18.3°C, same as yesterday's. Not that it matters; Parker and I haven't had a good, 90-minute walk in about that long.
Now that the press have had a couple of days to digest the Bush Administration's anti-terror legal memos, a consensus of sorts is emerging:
Yale law professor Jack Balkin called [the memos] a "theory of presidential dictatorship. They say the battlefield is everywhere. And the president can do anything he wants, so long as it involves the military and the enemy."
The criticism was not limited to liberals. "I agree with the left on this one," said Orin Kerr, a law professor at George Washington University. The approach in the memos "was simply not a plausible reading of the case law. The Bush [Office of Legal Counsel] eventually rejected [the] memos because they were wrong on the law, and they were right to do so."
In a similarly outrageous bit of memorandizing, the Tribune on its Metromix site completely failed to include Duke of Perth in its list of the best fish and chips in Chicago. I mean, "skate crusted in panko with fries tossed in garlic oil, Pecorino-Romano and chives"? I'd bet it wouldn't even stain a paper towel.
All right, that's not in the same league as asserting dictatorial powers and destroying American democracy, but then again, all politics is local.