Thursday’s Headlines

  • Streetsblog gets action! Our Sorriest Bus Stop Contest may cause change in Cincy. (WVXU)
  • D.C. Metro track inspectors who falsified safety reports will probably get their jobs back after an arbitrator ruled they were scapegoated to cover up the poor training they received. (WTOP)
  • The Saporta Report outlines the 60-year history of the Clifton Corridor, a metro Atlanta light-rail line that’s finally becoming a reality thanks to the city’s $2.7-billion transit expansion plan.
  • Ann Arbor is relaunching its bike share under a new operator (MLive). The University of Memphis will launch a bike-share program next fall (Flyer).
  • Good news for Phoenix residents who rely on transit: Valley Metro will shift from Sunday to regular schedules on five major holidays. (KTAR)
  • Riding the downtown Tampa streetcar will be free for the next three years, thanks to a Florida DOT grant. (Fox 13)
  • Reading between the lines of this News-Star article, it seems some NIMBYs in Monroe, La. don’t want a Greyhound bus station downtown.
  • A U.K. startup has created sort of a bat signal for bikes — a laser headlight that projects an image of a bike, making riders more visible to drivers at night. (Digital Trends)
  • The Janesville Gazette in Wisconsin — Paul Ryan’s hometown paper — has the most in-depth story about a parking lot closing I have ever read. (Editor’s note: That’s good enough for me!)
  • david vartanoff

    If they knowingly falsified the paperwork, they should be fired. It is not scapegoating if you took the action.

  • Daisy’s World

    SEPTA is using undercover personnel to investigate claims that retailers selling the transit agency’s new smart fare card are overcharging customers for transactions on those cards.

    The transit agency heard complaints at its September board meeting that some retailers were wrongly charging customers $2 to $4 to add money to their card balance, particularly when the customer paid in cash. SEPTA’s agreement with the 533 retailers authorized to handle transactions on the new Key cards does not permit them to profit from those exchanges. http://www.daisylimo.com/philadelphia.html

    It’s the same agreement retailers who used to sell tokens made, said Andrew Busch, a SEPTA spokesperson. The businesses agree to sell and service the fare cards without a markup, and in exchange, ideally, get an increase in foot traffic.

    Personnel from SEPTA and Conduent, the company that installed and maintains the Key card system, have been doing checks at businesses authorized to sell the card, but that effort is increasing due to the recent complaints, Busch said.