In relation to this post, nothing has been resolved. The bad muzak at Tower City near the trains is still too loud. My complaint vanished into the usual bureaucratic vortex of no reply from RTA. There are a myriad strategies one can follow to avoid the ever present bland noise. You can catch an earlier train to the wrong place. What’s that but a new adventure? You can buy an MP3 Player and leave it playing in your ears at high volumes at all times. But beware - just below the speakers that blare what you are trying to avoid is a warning to not play your stereo too loud. If there’s one thing everyone is sure to enjoy, it’s the requirement to be listening to something loud while going to work. Finally, there is the option of going into the small holes beside the trains to live with the Chuds. Say what you will about them, they don’t have muzak.
June 17th, 2008
Deep within the abdominal cavity of Tower City is an train hub for commuters. Like the unknown liquids that drip down the columns from time to time, it’s a a mix of good ideas and something that might be a good idea. To tell travelers when the trains are coming, they have a few methods. You can grab a paper schedule, you can read some of the big LED boards, you can listen to the PA announcers. The only problem with all three methods is that none of them tell you when the trains are actually coming - just when they are scheduled to come. You can also get the schedule on the internet or via the automated voice system, but it’s still just the printed schedule, which may or may not match when the trains will arrive. I don’t know if they lack the GPS or other electronic means to post estimated arrival and departure times. After a while of taking the same train over and over, like you’d take a metallic pill, you learn the schedule. Then the PA announcements start to grate on you a bit. They just announce the scheduled time, over and over. This is something that should be handled by a FAQ, to steal a Net idea, and not foisted upon regular riders.
But one announcer there, manages to grate deeper into the subconscious than others. I know not his name as he calls out in the darkness - only his method.
“The next Waterfront Train will leave Tower City Station at 8:10.”
(long pause)
“8;10 is when the next Waterfront Train will leave Tower City Station”.
(much longer pause, giving you brief hope it might be over, like starlight seen through clouds in Mordor)
“Waterfront Train”
(pause, just for cruelty)
“Tower City Station”
(in case you’re traveling through time and space and are not sure where you are)
“8:10″
(slight pause)
“cracklesnapCRACK”
(as they loudly, and fumblingly, hang up the microphone before turning it off).
April 1st, 2008
