Taking the Rapid from the airport

Update 11/03/2009: The fare collection system for the Rapid that I complained about in this post from a year ago has now been improved quite a bit, including allowing the use of credit cards. See this post for more recent discussion of the new system and my new transit commuting habit.

The Plain Dealer published an article today on the Rapid (that's rapid transit line, to you non Clevelanders) to the airport, prompting me to blog about my recent experience riding the Rapid from the airport. See also Rob Pitingolo's informative post on this topic. Update: also see this related post from Christine.

Mrs. Beckley and I returned from vacation on a Sunday afternoon in September, and decided to take the Rapid from the airport to the W. 25th St. station, which is reasonably close to our house in Ohio City.

So, we go into the Rapid station in the airport, and there's nobody manning it, and the entry gate is open and there's a sign on the entry gate saying "pay for tickets on train". There's a ticket/farecare machine there, but it was out of order too.

When the train arrived after a few minutes, we got on the rear car (on a two car train) but realized there was no way to pay our fare there either. We talked to the operator as he was leaving the cab (he had to switch ends because the train changed direction at the airport), told him we hadn't paid our fare yet, and he looked startled and then told us we'd have to move up to the front car to pay our fare.

So we and a British guy who was also trying to get to W. 25th St. all trooped up to the front car. We paid our fares (with cash, and no change is available), but the British guy wanted to pay with a credit card, which isn't possible. When he said, "Well, I don't have any American cash, what should I do?", the operator said, "Have a seat." So, he gave us a bemused look and sat down.

The trip itself was fine, although quite time consuming because it turned out that this was an Indians baseball game day, which means that a lot of people who don't normally ride the Rapid are getting on in fairly large groups at most of the stations in between the airport and downtown. It takes a long time for these people to pay their fares, because they're all paying cash, aren't sure exactly what the fare is, are angry that they can't get change, etc. etc. At one station, the operator left our car and went back to the second car, presumably to collect fares there. He only did that once, though ... I assume that doing it took him so long that he decided it would be better to stay on the front car and let the back car take care of itself.

I admit I was a little taken aback by the whole experience, although now that I've done it and I know how it works, there's no reason I wouldn't do it again. If the airport station had been manned, I think the experience would have been closer to what I expect from riding other transit systems, like New York or Washington. If the stations aren't manned, though, and there's no way to buy tickets from machines, then it follows that you have to be able to pay cash on the trains even though it slows the system down quite a bit, and it seems extravagant to pay someone just to collect fares on the second car, so it follows that everyone has to go to the first car to pay.

If there's one aspect of this whole thing that really aggravated me, in fact, it would be that. If I hadn't happened to talk to the operator while he was switching ends, I would have had no way of discovering that I really had to get on the first car because I couldn't pay my fare if I got on the second car. I don't like being put in the position that I can't tell how the system is supposed to work. I don't know what RTA could do to make this more clear to people, but I really found that aspect unpleasant.

I don't know if some or all stations are manned on weekdays or not. In all the times I've ridden the Rapid, though (probably all on weekends), I don't think I've ever seen a manned station except for Tower City.

So a few suggestions specifically with regard to air travellers and other potential riders who might not ride the system every day:

1) It would be great to be able to pay by credit card. When I travel on business, I always want to do everything possible with my company credit card.

2) I found it kind of off putting that there was only one car that I could actually pay on, but I found it REALLY off putting that there wasn't any easy way for me to discover this fact.

3) Visitors who don't ride the system every day are probably most interested in knowing what the one way and single round trip fares are, so this should be made very clear. To be honest, this may be very clear if you buy a farecard from a ticket booth or ticket machine in the airport station, but none of that was functional when I was there, so I don't know what the actual situation is. My experience in general with buying farecards is that there's a bunch of different multiple trip/pass options, and all options are given equal weight in the explanatory signs. Maybe the one-way/round trip options can be given special emphasis at the airport.

4) It would be nice to know how long it's going to be until the next train leaves, or at least how often they're scheduled.

5) People (i.e. me) are sometimes hesitant to put cash into machines (i.e. farecard machines) because they're afraid they'll get all their change back in nickels. Credit cards solve this, as do human ticket sellers. This reminds me also of something I saw in another city with a subway -- in this particular place, you could buy subway tickets/tokens/whatever at some of the newstands and other businesses of that type that were located near the station. Maybe if RTA can't afford to man the airport station ticket booth all the time, they can arrange for some other nearby vendor to make one way or round trip farecards available along with whatever their main business is.

6) If the airport station is routinely left unattended and with nonfunctional farecard machines, the system may be losing some potential riders based on this alone. Some people will evaluate this situation, decide they don't want to figure out what they're supposed to do, and turn aroud.

7) Paying cash on the train really seems to take the rapid out of rapid transit.

Having said all this, the experience was pretty much positive, all RTA employees with whom I came into contact (principally the train operator) were competent and polite, and I'm aware that RTA is operating under fairly severe financial constraints.

Labels: airport, Cleveland, rapid, RTA

 

¶ 12/01/2008 09:40:00 PM 1 comments