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Announcing Washington Area RailFest 2015


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#41 CNJRoss

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Posted 10 January 2015 - 11:12 PM

The MD MTA has succeeded - in thouroughly confusing me!

 

I've just spent some time going though the various fare pages, and find information that seems to conflict with what I learned during my phone calls with them - and in some cases conflicts with other pages.

 

I've now found a reference that indicates a 1-day fare can be loaded on a Charm Card (and presumably on a SmarTrip Card since ". . . SmarTrip® card and CharmCard® can be used interchangeably throughout Washington, Baltimore and the surrounding region."   Perhaps it is also available on separate media.  I did find a specific statement that it cannot be purchased online.

 

Some references to the TVMs indicate they will take credit cards, yet the 1-day pass section says cash or Charm Card.  Perhaps this is an inadvertant omission.

 

I will call the MTA again tomorrow, and try to sort out the inconsistencies.

 

Ross



#42 KevinKorell

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Posted 15 January 2015 - 03:14 AM

 

Advisory

Posted: Jan 14, 2015 Expiration: Jan 19, 2015

Weekend service adjustments January 16-18, 2015 for rebuilding

 

 

Reconstruction of the Metrorail system will continue over the weekend of January 16-18, 2015 with service adjustments on all lines.

This weekend, Orange, Silver, Blue, Yellow and Green line trains will operate every 20 minutes. Red Line trains will run every 12-22 minutes.

 

Martin Luther King Jr. Day service information
On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Monday, January 19, Metrorail will open at 5 a.m. and close at midnight. There is no scheduled track work on any line. Due to the holiday, trains will operate at Saturday intervals (every 12 minutes from endpoint terminals). Parking at all Metro-owned lots and garages is free.

Metro is investing $5.5 billion to install new rail, ties, platforms, escalators, signals, lighting, communication systems, and more. It represents the largest capital investment -- and work effort -- since the system's original construction in the early 1970s.



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#43 KevinKorell

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Posted 15 January 2015 - 04:44 AM

Guest list has 19 people now, 18 of which are both days, and 1 for Saturday only.   The Saturday person may bring his daughter as well, which would send our total into the 20's.



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#44 KevinKorell

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Posted 16 January 2015 - 01:39 AM

Folks as you know I use Twitter, not only in my quest for blasphemy to make the world a better place, but also  to pinpoint where I am or what I am doing or eating.  It does help to function as an online tool later on to show what we were doing or thinking at particular time, as long as we all use a pre-determined hashtag.   Once more, I will use hashtag #OTOLFEST (can be small latters too) to signify our event. If you are travelling with the group you can use this too.  If you are in town and travelling to meet the group or on your way after leaving us, you can use it your references.  However please remember that Twitter is a public medium seen by anyone on the outside who wishes to look.  Therefore, please if you have one on one conversations with other participants, or with non-participants, please use more private means such as texting or calling them by telephone.

 

In your travels to and from the entire Fest you may also use your own hashtag.  I use #kktrip.  I know that Steve W uses #swtirip, etc.  One you get to the group you can revert to #otolfest until we break up for the 2 evenings.   What we say and what we do can be extremely helpful to me when I try to do the trip reports, as I go back through the logs and see what it is we discussed.



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#45 KevinKorell

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Posted 16 January 2015 - 09:44 PM

Because of the extended headways that Metro is following on our Fest weekend, the entire Sunday itinerary had to be revised.  You can see it here (scroll down to Sunday).

 

The problem in rescheduling is that the Red Line is on a 22-minute headway, and the Orange/Blue/Silver Lines are running on a 20-minute headway.  So the lines don't always match up correctly at their common transfer point, Metro Center.   What's more, to have kept to the plan of doing the Orange Line first to Vienna would have meant a longer dwell at East Falls Church (EFC, the transfer point between the Orange and Silver Lines), which is outdoors in the median of I-66. I believe the station is covered, but it may be a cold rainy day.

 

The following was done:

  • Dropped the Orange Line to Vienna segment and the Green Line trip in the afternoon.  With the longer dwells and for the above misconnect at EFC, Vienna would no longer have been a comfortable option.
  • Slightly later departure from Union Station in order to get to Tysons Corner at a reasonable time for lunch (meaning not as early as the 10 AM hour).  By cutting out the Orange Line and just doing Silver to the end and back to Tysons, the later departure gets us there at 11:17 AM.  I am not certain if eateries are even open that early in a mall on a Sunday, but if not we can just wait until they do.
  • 1 hour 20 minutes allowed for lunch at Tysons Corner.  If we do have to wait a while, we can always leave on the next Silver Line train 20 minutes later.

 

Now we have seen varying weather reports that go anywhere from 0 to 10 to 80% probability it might be raining. Weather "experts" don't know for sure what will happen.  If we see that it is pouring rain and we don't want to stop at Tysons Corner, we've agreed we have the option to just remain on the same Silver Line train we boarded at Wiehle/Reston East and travel back to Union Station by changing to the Red Line.  That scenario would require another 13 minute dwell at Metro Center and put us back to Union Station at 12:04 PM.

 

Discussing with Ross and others tonight,  although there are many places in the Washington area (including those on the Virginia side) that have collections of restaurants accessible underground from Metro, on a Sunday we would find all or most of them closed. Therefore, Union Station it is if we encounter weather that causes us to agree to bypass Tysons Corner.

 

I hope the abridged version of Sunday's activities is satisfactory, given most of us are in town already or on their way here tonight or tomorrow.  It was the best that could be done under the circumstances whose details were not known until today since Metro likes to keep their news under wraps until almost the last minute!



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#46 pennyk

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Posted 16 January 2015 - 09:52 PM

Thanks for sorting out this puzzle. We all really appreciate your hard and continuing work.




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