MBTA Radio

[darxus]

Now you get to hear them making noise constantly, with the bonus of advertisements.

http://www.mbta.com/about_the_mbta/news_events/?id=13647&month=&year

"in case you were wondering how riding the T could be made less tolerable"

There is a feedback form, please use it: http://www.mbta.com/riding_the_t/feedback/

I just did:

Please cancel this T-Radio thing. There is enough noise, and this will only make me more miserable when I'm around it, and less likely to take public transportation.

Comments

I haven't heard it yet...

[cathijosephine.livejournal.com]

I think that if the MBTA can make money by selling ads on this thing I'm all for it. Public transportation is expensive, and I think the T should continue to seek other incomes.

I can just hide behind my awesome $15 mp3 headphones.

Re: I haven't heard it yet...

[xuth.livejournal.com]

Well, that would be good if they could but per this globe article Dan Grabauskas "does not know how much profit, if any, the MBTA would reap in the deal".

Re: I haven't heard it yet...

[xuth.livejournal.com]

Oh, and currently less than 1% of the MBTA is financed with advertising (look here for a simple funding breakdown). Note that state taxes provide ~55% of the income and local taxes provide ~10%. Another interesting tidbit is that 17% of the money spent was interest and 8% was principal payments on loans.

Re: I haven't heard it yet...

[xuth.livejournal.com]

uggg... the T has $8.1 Billion in debt. $2.9B of that was passed to the MBTA from the state in 2007. This is ostensibly debt from the Big Dig.

[drwex]

Done. I pointed out that I like to talk to my wife, and listen to my children and would not enjoy an unavoidable noise source. At least with the musicians I can move to another part of the platform.

[ectropy.livejournal.com]

I left a "please don't" comment as well. Even though I rarely take the T, I really, really prefer quiet and will go to serious lengths to avoid noise.

[beowabbit]

Here’s what I sent them a few days ago:

I am fortunate enough not to have been in any of the stations where the T-Radio pilot program is operating [alas, no longer true], but I think it's a very bad idea, and I do not want more noise in T stations distracting me from my commute or from what I'm listening to (whether live musicians, music via headphones, or a conversation with my travelling companions) or what I'm reading. Honestly, I bought the house I did specifically so I could take the T to work, but if the stations I regularly travel through end up having canned music and talk (other than transit-related announcements) pumped into them, I may spend the $700 bucks annually for parking at work and start clogging up the roads and pumping
hydrocarbons into the air again. I really, really hope this project is dropped.

Sincerely,

Jay Sekora

[beowabbit]

PS — What I hope is that this is a ploy on the part of the MBTA to put pressure on the legislature to properly fund the T, and not pass the Big Dig’s cost overruns along to the T.