the first point is that the bottom of van esss >> right. >> which is at the bottom of church and debose. >> and where we allow the operator to attempt and require it is va. aness. you may not imagine that you will sit at vaness for as long as a minute to 90 seconds and what the operator is doing is going through the protocol to reacquire the control and depending on that is a judgment call between the people managing the service as to whether or not they want to do that but that is in fact what happens. >> so that is one common slow down is at vaness station and one significant problem about that is the failed atcs, acquiring the triangle and what i understand, to be telling us is that he is working on something to fix that. >> so we will start with that. >> the second one comes at the

other end. and the back of it up at montgomery and becomes significant and i understand from my conversations with you. >> now it is smooth sailing and all of a sudden you are leaving the station and there are, because there is nothing stopping them but we know that there is something stopping them which is this slow turn around back around. i get it, that makes sense. and what i understand from you is that we have a proposal that will go ahead and alleviate that situation. >> well, it will, if they will make it better and if i say done correctly, the schedules, it needs to be supervised. it needs to be supervised effectively so that you realize the estimated two minutes and

up that we should save in turning the trains around. >> on this, and i am sorry this is going to take a while and it is easier because tom is not here and she is more polite than he is. and let me make sure that the record got that, please. cheryl. >> i think that the scheduling, and maybe this is just me but the average metro rider is less concerned with the schedule and a meeting of schedules than they are with the time through the tunnel. because most of us do not go down there thinking that we are going to catch the 7:53 train there is enough that we go down there and catch the train, but what aggravates people is when it is slower than it should be and it is in the rush hour because of the turn around. >> i realize this is not a magic wand but i want to say that is a problem that people experience and i am glad that hear that you have a way to address that issue.

>> the other advantage of proper and effective blind something., if you will for lack of a better term to balance everything, is that you can make a decision there, to rebalance the line, if you do have a problem, to change an n, train to an m, train or kt. just heard loud and clear, and it is a desire fr* on our part to minimize the

>> the next thing, there is a mechanical issue and it's unfortunate that the tunnels weren't built with turnouts and ways to deal with this the way you deal with a highway, but it is what it is and we have the situation when we have a train stuck in the tunnel, we need to fix it quickly. you have touched on this a little bit in your

presentation. but more training to do instant troubleshooting and instant overrides and address the situation that we're often waiting for a mechanic or supervisor to arrive and in the process, slowing down the whole system. >> the shorter answer is yes, and here is what what we're doing the operators have principally over the years been focused on troubleshooting doors. what common problems

and they are walked by the controller through had a troubleshooting procedure and when you have seven doors, you -- we can safely operate with as many as two doors and cutoff, and so we want to keep the train in service, not lose it for a door. so that is one instance where the operators do some troubleshooting now, but it's not just the operators. i think what we have done, we have developed a set of troubleshooting trees, if you will, for common problems. no propulsion, no green light and we can walk operators through, but part of it is that we have taken a look at the training and roles and responsibilities for our supervisors. right now the americas make the call and we have transportation supervisors on the rail side and the bus side.

, but i think with rail instances we have to recalibrate their role, so they can play a greater role in assisting the operator, and if necessary move a train in an emergency, support an operator moving a train. i think we have developed kind of some additions to their job duties and what they have historically have been doing and we have been talking to them and the union about that. because it's really critical, especially if you are in the rush hour, especially when you have trains so close together, train two minutes behind or even closer and the trunk of the subway, that if you have to wait for a mechanic, and we have got a limited number. so it's really about us working as a team, and leveraging the

people and the resources that we have out there. and in some cases, it's stretching people out of what they have historically done or out of their comfort zone, but it's not something that is beyond their capabilities and we're confident we can work through issues with that. >> i strongly urge that and i'm not sure if that requires cba changes and levels of that, but really, the operator is the front line for muni there and if there is anything that we can do to make the operator not only an operator, but a problem-solver, the way a pilot or a bus driver or somebody else would be, i think that will really speed it up. the time thing, there was some mention of maybe triple cars. i would also continue to suggest that you consider shuttle service during the

down-time hours i don't get on at castro street station so i can usually get on, but there are an awful lot of people at castro and church street stations and i think we need to consider those people's needs especially with west portal or castro shuttle service. so with all of that, i will repeat what i said before. i am a fan of the system, because i know how it works when it works great, but it's not working great often enough. and so my final question to you is how are we going to measure the results of these things? john has identified the issues as a rider, i think he is hitting all the right issues, because that is what i see. but he may not be able to solve the problems with just these fixes. and so i am willing to be patient to see if these fixs have a meaningful impact. but i think we need a return date. i think we need a measurement statistic and i don't know if it's on-time or time in the tunnel, but we need to let him

do these things and encourage him to do these things and thank him for doing these things and see if it's enough. if it's not, we have to go to something bigger because there will only be more demand. so i am appreciative to him for identifying these issues and identifying solutions, but i want a return date whether it's enough and whether it's work or to give him something bigger and better to fix it. >> i think it's a fair point and i want to acknowledge the incredible work john is doing to take the system that was put in place 20 years ago. had very little in the way of investment and upkeep since then and he is trying to play catch-up and strategic, because we can't replace everything at once. in terms of coming back, some of what we're talking about will happen with the change in summer schedule that includes

shuttle service, provided that we have the vehicle availability, that we need. so probably fall, late fall would be a good time to come back there is a lot of different ways that we're measuring, and john made reference to one k mean destination, on-time is a prop b measure that again most people don't really know what the schedule is. so measuring adherence to the schedule doesn't necessarily av all of that meaning to people, but it's a decent proxy. we are measuring bunches and gaps, something that we incorporated with the strategic plan that you put in place. and then for some of the specific initiatives that john was talking about, such as the embarcadero turnaround, we're going to be measuring the actual turnaround time. we have the analysis that

john's team did to determine what the current turnaround time is on average and what the extremes are. we're going to be measuring specifically that. i think we have the ability through the next bus system to evaluate the delay -- some of the days you were talking about, such as the average time to get from church to van ness station and to get from church to embarcadero station. so there are a lot of ways that we have and use on a regular basis to measure the performance, to evaluate the changes that we're making. >> can i ask about that? >> yes. >> mean distance between failure and on-time performance. we are doing them and they are good measures. two objective criteria had a that are most important are time between west portal and montgomery -- excuse me

embarcadero, and visa rsa and number of trains on a daily basis. >> the number of trains we measure daily and we have the ability to get travel time data between travel points and it's somewhat of a manual process. we have been working with our it folks to evaluate that. on the tep or tep pilots, we really need a way to more easily and systematically measure that time. so we'll certainly incorporate that here and welcoming on ways to make that easier in future to report on any given time point neuter. >> if i could recommend or ask, whatever the right word, is that we take a benchmark of mean distance between failure, on-time performance, number of trains into the system on a daily basis and if i may ask west portal to embarcadero and

visa versa, which i think is the single most important measure for your average rider and benchmark those to-date and schedule the hearing in the fall, after john has worked the magic with the few wands we have given him, which i realize aren't many and report back. if it's making a dent, we'll stick with that, but if it's not, we need to tell our citizens and riders he needs a bigger bag of tricks and go after those. >> we have three of those four measures already. the data for the travel time analysis, we have. so we can get that baseline data in place and report back. but it's not an either/or. and aside from this current bag of tricks, the other thing that john is doing just on the light rail, two other things. one he made reference to is in the overhaul of the vehicles,

that initial overhaul was somewhat limited to the door and step systems. we were able to get some funding to do some of the truck infrastructure underneath the vehicles on a smaller number of the vehicles. but what john and his team have done is identified all of the different component failures that we have on the system, and has laid out what an expanded problem of overhaul would look like. as he said, some of the vehicles are in the offered of 15 years old and they have a 27-year life. so we're not going to have the luxury, as soon as we would like of mid-life overhaul that we should be performing and one of the things we got into the city's capital plan which has since been approved by the board of supervisors is ongoing funding for mid-life overhauls of our transit vehicles and

since most of our bus fleeted will be replaced in the next five years, initially a lot of that funding we would direct to the light rail vehicles. and the other thing john had has been working on is the replacement of the entire light rail fleet. we have a requirement as part of the central subway, a demand for an additional 24 vehicles, bringing us from 151 vehicles to 175. so that procurement we're starting now. but since we do have a fleet that will be aging out, the way john is structuring the procurement is start an initial procurement and he has put on rfp and soon we'll be issuing request for proposals and we'll really be teeing up the

procurement and we have expansion needs identified in our fleet plan of another 50 vehicles. as those come online, our current 151 will start aging out. so we'll already have teed up the replacement of those as soon as they their useful life comes to an end. it's not just let's try some short-term fixes and cross our fingers, but we're doing that and in parallel, doing the longer term and capital projects that john talked about on the communication side and we need do all of these things, because i think john's presentation made clear it's a very complex system that has a lot of different variables and we don't have the luxury to try different things at the same time. >> that is great and my final point is that i appreciate the attention to it. again, i he echo the

compliments for john on this, but i think the public deserves and we as a board need to have a measuring stick. so throw all of your trainsing do whatever you can the next six months and measure the dent we're making and in we're making a dent, we can keep going and if not, we need to reevaluate. >> thank you. we're at capacity in the subway during the rush hour and the mechanical failures exacerbate that. as we continue to make improvements on the surface, because we have talked about this, so many of our lines spend time on the surface and they are not in the subway and we have so much opportunity to speed them up on the surface, as the pilot project only church street is doing for the

jade church. if we don't get our mechanical issues under control, we're almost making it worse. i mean i know we're not making it worse, but it feels like we would be making it worse and we have the trains moving more quickly to the subways where they have greater opportunity to back up. >> right. >> so it really does make the mechanical issues and the stacking in the subway issues even more dire. >> like putting lanes on the east shore freeway and making the bay bridge lanes narrower. >> they can also compliment each other and to the extent that the improvements that we're making on the jay church and through our customer-first initiative and the tep, to better space the trains, parts of the reliability is eliminating the bunches and gaps, so that they are better spaced. the other thing that happens during the delay from church to van ness is not just failed

portal, but trains stacked up. when i ride in, three in a row, because of delays in the sun sets because we're mixing traffic and stopping at stop signs and to the extent we improve the reliability and have the spacing better. that could have positive impact. >> i am still 100% in support of getting our muni metro to the point it's on the surface it only stop to drop off and pick up passengers and with 4th and king with signal priority, doesn't stop at stop signs, because we know from the tep presentations we need fewer train cars or buses when we do that, when they complete their route more quickly. so it is almost like expanding our fleet, if we can get them moving faster on the surface portion. people's trips are shorter and more comfortable and less delays due to overcrowding. as we know, it's incredibly

important that part of the system is just frustrating for people and when it's not frustrating it's brilliant and it's a great system. director ramos? >> i just want to -- yes, i want to express my gratitude to director for all of his great work and i understand you are doing so much with so little and i imploring the different groups and elected officials looking out for resources for us to hustle that along and make it work, so we can actually address some of these concerns. you know, i know there are conversations all the time that are happening in sacramento, at the federal government. i know there are some underway right now, but to me, we can only do so much with an old system that lacks reinvestment. and i thank you for your patience and tenacity in doing what you can with what you have. probably build the case in six months and figuring out that we

have done all we can. i have a feeling that director haley has done all he could and there is just not a whole else we can do without major overhaul of the system. the only couple of questions that i have, that i mean, i would support all of this. i really like the idea of the proposals that i have seen in the tep, to really make the lanes for dedicated in the sunset, particularly, where i typically catch it. i had the pleasure or the privilege of living along with the dedicated lanes exist, and experienced that bottleneck when it mixed it you, once it hits 9th avenue and comes to a screeching halt there. so whatever we can do to actually help expedite that idea of dedicating those lanes past the

avenues. because it goes away from having its own dedicated raised median in the outer sunset also. to expedite that i hope that is something that we could pursue because i know the wear and tear on your vehicles from starting and stopping in mixed traffic contributes to these issues. the other thing i would really like to hear a little bit more about and inquire about is whether or not you have considered the idea directing traffics for these rlvs when they come owl out of the tunnel. as someone who rides a bicycle frequently through the interchange, i see cars and traffic in the peak hours at least and slowing down the j from the tunnel and getting a

handle on the traffic at that particular spot. >> coming on. >> yes, one of the things that you also enabled in your budget is the hiring of more parking control officers, which are also traffic control officers. so one thing john's folks have done, they have identified and made reference on the slides to this, made reference to the most critical locations, where traffic, be it bike, auto, pedestrian is impacted impacting the muni flow. because you authorized the additional pco hiring we have resources that we can start deploying those. i think they they started that a few months ago and we'll evaluate that as well. as far as speeding up the

surface, the draft report should be out on-track for january and the other part of the city's capital plan is a general obligation bond proposal for the ballot next november. so with that, with the capital fund plan revenue for mid-life vehicle overhauls that will work. to both of your comments to the larger resource need, those are targeted at our very kind of most critical, either service needs or optimization needs such as the tep. that the rest of the infrastructure -- you know, we're focusing the resources on the most critical sections of rail. but that is a few miles out of the 72 miles of rail that we have for the light rail. so in terms of making the case that we're doing the best with the

resources that we have. i think that is absolutely incumbent upon us to do. but then being able to artic articulate to the voters and policymakers in washington and regional lawmakers that we need to investment in the infrastructure and vehicles and we'll hopefully be in a better position to make that case. we need to do those things and make the case for that much more significant investment that we as a city have failed to make over the last 20 years. >> director lee. >> thank you director haley for that report and i think director heinicke had great

questions and concerns and i don't want to rehash a lot of this and i don't know if i'm oversimplifying it, but on your presentation, where you identifies some of the problems and here are some of the solutions that we have on the way. can we get more defined dates of when we planned to have some of the processes completed? i know some of it may not, like the technology issue, but i want to have a feeling like okay here is what we identified and here is what we said we're going to do and when are we go to get it done? >> happy to do it in the interest of getting it out on time and i think the other thing is that as ed was saying, as we are putting these in, and we can report as best we can, but you will see the progress or non-progress immediately. i will give you a case in point.

this morning, systemwide, both the bus side and rail side, we had -- we exceeded our yesterday's on-time performance by 13 or 14 points. and especially both sides were improved, but yesterday in the morning rush hour, we had on the order of nine failed entries. this morning we had two, and all of the lines were much more balanced. so in terms of where we are in the mean distance between failure, what we are doing and we need to present it effectively is not just show you the overall number. because if we go back over 18 months, you begin to see the little uptick. but cars that have been rehabed, systems that have been fixed and part of the rehab,

it's the right systems, but we left out key components like propulsion. that is one of the biggest problems that we have. and it wasn't addressed, and even something like doors, and the rehab program, part of the doors were addressed. but we have also used our own forces and we're able to go and work with ed's help and support and the help and support of our colleagues to get modest capital funding money to finish like the doors and the additional trucks, which both stabilize the ride, as well as support the brakes. both of which, obviously, are key components to the safe ride. so my point is that we will -- we should be able to, as we indicated, report on the progress and we can give you specific dates on when we expect to -- on each of these items. >> thank you.

>> director rubke? >> two access disability related items, one the focus of overcrowding and i know just wheelchairs in general and other mobility devices take up more space. so those folks are more likely to be left behind on the platforms and the second thing i want to ask about is the facilities especially in the sunset. i know the platforms, there are not so many accessible stops on the n lines and the other sunset lines. so i know that is a space issue and kind of a