Commuters Curious Why Trains Are Often Late

WBZ

Thousands of people rely on it for the daily commute and to get in and out of Boston for games and other activities. But a lot of you say you're not happy with the on-time performance of the MBTA commuter rail system.

Jeff from Waltham Declared his Curiosity asking:

"Why are the commuter rail trains always significantly behind schedule?"

Here's what some commuters told us about their train rides:

"It's on time, not too often,"
"It's late every morning," and
"It's not more than a half hour late most of the time."

Not a glowing review from those three, but when you look at the stats, there's some good news.

THE GOOD NEWS

"We beat our performance from 2008 by almost nine percent," said Rich Davey, the head of the Mass Bay Commuter Rail (MBCR), the company hired by the MBTA to run the trains.

View: On-Time Performance Report Card

In fact, the numbers have improved for the last two years. But Davey also says his goal is to be on time on 95 percent of the trips - Last year, only the Greenbush line hit that mark. The system wide average was 89 percent.

HOW LATE IS 'LATE'?

What exactly qualifies as "late?" For the commuter rail system it's a train arriving more than 4 minutes and 59 seconds after its scheduled time. That's the toughest standard in the passenger rail industry.

The MBCR makes public its on time performance each month. You can view it on their web site.

In 2009 one line really stands out as having problems: The Middleboro line. Last year it was late 24 percent of the time on average, but in December, it was late 85 percent of the time.

WHY SO LATE?

The single biggest problem leading to delays is mechanical troubles, responsible for more than half the delays. But there's more to the on-time record than that.

"Oh it's terrible, and it's all because of this concrete tie issue," said Davey.

The concrete ties he's talking about were purchased by the MBTA in the late 90's, before MBCR even entered the picture. Many of those ties have failed, years before they should have. As the ties are replaced, the Middleboro line's on time performance is climbing dramatically.

The "T" is negotiating with the manufacturer of those ties in hopes of recovering some of their money. The bum railroad ties are just one example of the kinds of things the MBCR can't control; there are others.

"When it comes to weather, police actions, other railroads that interfere, we can't avoid that, but we need to work with those," said Davey.

The MBCR blames some of its problems on the age of the trains and expects that, in a few years, new locomotives will be in service.

GETTING BETTER?

Not every rider we spoke with had a complaint. Some indicated that the service was pretty good, and they didn't have too many problems.

Will the improvements continue? Well the MBCR has a big incentive to keep the wheels rolling. It's fined when trains are late, except when the lateness is caused by things beyond its control. Last year they forked over $1.4 million in fines to the MBTA.

When you factor out items like weather and other things the MBCR can't control, the on-time performance of the commuter rail system goes way up. They refer to this as their "adjusted" on-time performance. Rich Davey acknowledges that for the riders the "why" of lateness doesn't matter.

"If your train is that one train, it doesn't matter if all other 95% were on time, that's your train," said Davey.

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