Alert readers Michal Bryc and Dick Burkhardt have gotten responses from Sound Transit on when we can expect to have next train announcements at Link stations:
Due to the work being done in the Airport Station the train arrival message will not be activated until the end of November. We have been working on integrating this station into the Central Link system and it requires us to use two different train tracking approach one for the Central Link and different one for expanding to the Airport. As we are so close to opening the Airport Station we decided to hold off on implementing arrival messages for Central Link until we can include Airport Station and its new schedule, and to facilitate our testing of Airport Station.
So there you go.
Excellent! I just hope that “North Platform 1” is filler text and that the actual signs don’t actually say anything like that.
a report from a friend of mine that works by the Airport Link station: says she saw a light rail car go through or near there this morning…
Yes! It’s testing now.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/atomictaco/4070215410/
Its good to know why it isn’t already working.
Will Swifts real-time arrival system be working when it opens?
I know that Metro’s Rapidride A Line will open without real-time information because that system relies on the upgraded radio communication system that is being installed currently.
Well the new radio system is actually active right now. Only a couple of the sites are online and there is no traffic on the system yet. Metro claims it’ll be live Q1 2011. When is the A Line supposed to open up again?
Hmmm okay. There are around 7 radio sites right? Are the rapidride buses that are being delivered right now outfitted only with the new radio system? I think the A Line according to Metro’s website will be launching on February 2010.
I asked a CT rep a month ago when they brought the bus out and she said “No”.
CT’s GPS vehicle location project is on hold right now because of budget cuts. According to my source there, it will be at least a year.
King County Metro has a similar project and I hope that doesn’t get delayed.
I agree; whew…was just waiting at a platform wondering why it wasn’t installed. Thought someone made a major boo boo.
Do we have a date yet on which Airport Link is going to open?
Yes.
What is it!?
You trickster. Spill the beans!
If I told you, I’d have to shoot you.
(Tune in on Friday the 13th)
Well I’ll flying into the airport on December 19th so I hope it is open by then.
Adam, is that a late afternoon arrival, on the 19th…?
Oh I misspoke. I arrive mid-day on the 18th. I underestimated the affect of time zones. Well I’ll be flying out on January 6th so I know it will be open by then for sure.
We’ll get real time arrival info before Minneapolis’ Hiawatha Line. Their line has been open for five years and the signs still show just the station name and time, like ours is right now. They also use signs from the same vendor.
Please Please create the same in the TUNNEL downtown. List the last 10 busses through, the last train time, and the NEXT 10 busses and next train time.
LONG overdue… and would be VERY helpful.
Love arrving in the tunnel, reading the schedule (which is off thanks to a train…) and trying to decide to try to catch a different run up on top, or hang and see if the bus was just late.
Do you mean the last one of the night, or the ones that arrived last? And if the latter, why?
I can understand the latter. If you’re running late and want to know if you’ve just missed your bus, you can see that you have if it’s on the board.
Can you at least tell us if we’ll be happy with the date or not?
We’re on time and on budget, as they say
^ Meant to nest under ST Guy’s response.
If you see that happen, just reply to your own comment and say “admin, can you delete this?” and repost where it should go, and I’ll clean up.
Could somebody explain the basics of how the technology works? Thanks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCADA
OK, I want to know why the Airport station is using such different technology that integrating the two systems is a problem.
This is a massive design failure. The train tracker should have utilized some form of *standardized communication protocols* so that any company’s signs, and any company’s track and signalling, could communicate with no significant difficulty. Apparently it *didn’t*?!?!?
What’s up with that? As a computer programmer, I don’t think much of this as a reason for delay, because it implies a major software design failure in the entire train tracker system.
I can’t speak to any details and I agree with you but I do want to say that these systems, especially if they are integrated into the signal control system can be very proprietary. I’m completely making this up but maybe the first line has an old proprietary system and the new system, because it is a new contract has a newer non-proprietary system.
They should be getting data *out* from the signal control system, which should be specified by contract to provide a data out feed in a specific format providing the needed information. (Obviously for safety they should never be feeding data back into the signal control system.)
Then each sign can even be implemented using a different vendor, and remote signs (in the airport itself, for example?) can be built — because they simply take data from the same feed. Oh, plus the same feed can be fed to a website, and picked up by people with PDAs, and so on…..
It’s not really a “massive design failure” if it works once Airport Link opens.
Will they have to integrate another system, with large delay and expense, for U-Link? And yet another one, at large delay and expense, for East Link? And another one for the Northgate extension?
You see the problem.
If this is a one-time thing — they got it wrong on the first contract and fixed it on the Airport Link contract — that’s fine. If they’re going to be suffering compatibility problems every time they build an extension, that is massive design failure.