MBTA

SHARE

MBTA OFFICIALS on Monday outlined a plan to dramatically improve service on the Red Line, but to execute the plan they said the existing procurement for new rail cars would have to be expanded to include the entire Red Line fleet.

The transit agency has already ordered 134 new Red Line cars from CRCC, a subsidiary of a Chinese rail car manufacturer. CRCC is assembling the vehicles at a new factory in Springfield and expects to deliver all of them to the T by 2022. Jeff Gonneville, the chief operating officer of the T, said that by replacing the remaining 86 Red Line vehicles and adding another 30 as backups the MBTA could increase the number of trains operating per hour on the Red Line by nearly 54 percent.

Get the Daily Download Our news roundup delivered every weekday.

Email *

Gonneville said the new trains have braking technology that would allow operators to safely operate at higher speeds and follow more closely behind other trains. By operating the system with new rail cars only, Gonneville said, the MBTA could go from 13 to 20 trains per hour on the Red Line, decrease wait times between trains from 4.5 to 3 minutes, and increase passenger capacity from 20,000 to 30,000 an hour.

The 86 Red Line cars not scheduled for replacement right now were purchased in 1992 and the T is currently preparing to put them through a midlife overhaul that Gonneville said is about nine years late. He said the T’s five-year capital spending plan includes $200 million for the overhaul, which works out to about $2.2 million per vehicle.

It’s unclear how much purchasing new rail cars would cost, but the cars being assembled in Springfield cost about $1.9 million per vehicle, Gonneville said. CRCC’s $566.4 million bid to construct the Red and Orange Line car for the T came in well below the bids of its rivals, prompting many of them to charge that the Chinese company was low-balling to gain entry into the US market.

Gonneville said research conducted over the last year also revealed that a major hindrance to on-time performance on the Red Line is lengthy dwell times as trains pick up and unload passengers at stations. He said the industry average for dwell time is 45 seconds, but the T exceeds that regularly at 14 of its 19 Red Line stations.

Meet the Author Bruce Mohl Editor , CommonWealth About Bruce Mohl Bruce Mohl is the editor of CommonWealth magazine. Bruce came to CommonWealth from the Boston Globe, where he spent nearly 30 years in a wide variety of positions covering business and politics. He covered the Massachusetts State House and served as the Globe’s State House bureau chief in the late 1980s. He also reported for the Globe’s Spotlight Team, winning a Loeb award in 1992 for coverage of conflicts of interest in the state’s pension system. He served as the Globe’s political editor in 1994 and went on to cover consumer issues for the newspaper. At CommonWealth, Bruce helped launch the magazine’s website and has written about a wide range of issues with a special focus on politics, tax policy, energy, and gambling. Bruce is a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. He lives in Dorchester. About Bruce Mohl Bruce Mohl is the editor of CommonWealth magazine. Bruce came to CommonWealth from the Boston Globe, where he spent nearly 30 years in a wide variety of positions covering business and politics. He covered the Massachusetts State House and served as the Globe’s State House bureau chief in the late 1980s. He also reported for the Globe’s Spotlight Team, winning a Loeb award in 1992 for coverage of conflicts of interest in the state’s pension system. He served as the Globe’s political editor in 1994 and went on to cover consumer issues for the newspaper. At CommonWealth, Bruce helped launch the magazine’s website and has written about a wide range of issues with a special focus on politics, tax policy, energy, and gambling. Bruce is a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. He lives in Dorchester.

Using the T’s yardstick, the longest dwell time, 87 seconds, was at Downtown Crossing. South Station was second at 82 seconds, followed by Park Street at 78 seconds. Those stations where the T performs equal to or better than the industry average were Andrew Square, Quincy Adams, Quincy Center, Shawmut, and Wollaston.

The Red Line is the T’s busiest subway line, currently carrying 150,000 passengers a day.

SHARE