there are time when to the Red Line from Alewife Station to South Station is to expose oneself to (in the words of the immortal Ambrose Bierce) "the perils of senility".
Such was the case yesterday when it took Humble Elias some two full hours to get from Alewife to Northern Ave below South Station. This was all thanks to an unfortunate medical emergency at Charles Street (Hope yer feelin' better whoever you are) compounded by the inevitable "switching problem" at Park Street.
Last week it was a switching problem in Harvard Square...the damns things seem to crawl around free & untroubled.
I find that at least once at week one's inbound or outbound commute is blown to hell either by slow trains with balky doors, the aforementioned switching issues or some other unforeseen misery. That is all without factoring in the whole mishaugas with the buses. For example last week, the No 62 & 84 Bus out of Alewife both seemed plagued during their late eafternoon runs with appalling transmission problems that made getting up the Route 2 Access Road an adventure in serene torpidity.
That is ten train-bus combos at week with a build in ten percent failure....pretty bad news for Dan Grabauskas the MBTA's new Chairman.
Of course...one of my sources tells me, the Red Line hasn't had a serious maintenance upgrade for nigh on ten years now. It is sorely overdue but it is overshadowed by all our "other" front burner transport issues. Maybe Grabauskas can get some money out of his former Boss Mitt Romney. I doubt he can but he can try.
Meanwhile with all the delays and slow downs, Humble Elias is getting a lot of reading done.
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