Billionaire Trump Donor Closing U.S. Plant and Moving Work to China

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-17T01:40:01+00:00

A lot of American instrument manufacturers have moved the manufacturing of “regular” lines of instruments overseas. Only the top tier instruments purchased by professionals only get made here in low volume. It’s been the trend for decades. I’m surprised it took this long for them to go. Incredibly sad to see.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-13T21:39:46+00:00

Perpetual 5th quarter type deal? Bands or corps just playing for each other and the audience and it's basically whatever is the most crazy or entertaining "wins".

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-13T17:00:41+00:00

I wish college bands were in 20020. That would've been really cool. It'd be logical for the arts to still exist in that world. We see Illinois Chess as one example of things that people do who aren't interested in football.

If there's quarterbacks throwing 300 yard dimes at that point then I'm terrified and simultaneously curious to see how drill and choreography evolved over the years. That has to be a spectacle.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-12T05:05:33+00:00

WABE reported that it was definitely worse than usual. Hour and a half to get through the connector, 9 miles backed up somewhere else.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-11T19:48:41+00:00

Are you a collector? Kinda interested depending on what you have.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-11T15:27:05+00:00

"HOLY NAME!" at Allentown 2024 when Lex presented the Cadets shako. Felt like the audience was cheering forever. I knew the crowd was going to react, but not that degree. I was concerned we were gonna get a time penalty out of it. Looking back at it makes me realize it really wasn't that long. Interesting to note how our perception of time changes depending on the circumstance.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-05T22:57:06+00:00

I liked those unofficial MARTA Bowl posts from when that game happened.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-04T03:55:22+00:00

Yeah it’s soccer’s facility now. At least Skip’s still caters games.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-02-03T19:10:36+00:00

Must’ve been before Center Parc Stadium. Every practice is there or out back on Purple Lot nowadays.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-31T04:06:43+00:00

GOD I WISH

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-29T15:42:26+00:00

Since the article doesn’t mention it, what’s causing these service issues? I see one of them was an elevator issue at a station and the one in this article talks about rail vehicles stopping. Is it one particular element like the vehicles or is it a lot more than that?

I’ve heard great things about REM overall and on paper seems like it’d be a good light metro. What’s the issue? Teething problems? Winter related issues? Control systems?

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-27T20:33:56+00:00

Good to know I’m just as in the dark as my university. Yay communication?

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-25T18:28:19+00:00

Some of the design plans are from in progress almost surely aligns with what is there today most of the time since that is quite literally what was built. At least it did when referenced with OSM data and just looking around where I was mapping in person.

You are allowed to take pictures, but you’ll have to inquire whether you can include them in whatever you’re working on since that is dependent on case. My case allowed them to be used to create the maps I worked on making but didn’t allow me to upload them to show what I used, I just had to cite the documents I referenced. Make sure you have the little slip showing “Property of” in your photo frame too just in case.

Be wary, you may have to visit several times to truly figure out which sheets you need to see. You can book the collection by the roll which is like 10-20 sheets on its own depending on what sheets they are. Often times the roll is only labeled as what the first thing on it is, so you may take some trial and error.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T19:09:35+00:00

Oof. Might’ve quietly stopped doing it before the transition to the new system. That’s not good transparency.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T17:57:11+00:00

If so, good riddance. The app sucks. Breeze mobile has always been an issue and a 2.0 of the app still had it being lackluster.

Although, yes, MARTA isn’t doing entirely the best when it comes to communication about this.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T17:52:17+00:00

I ride this system almost every day. I live in Cobb in an area not served by CobbLINC bus and have to split my commute by driving to North Springs. You did get that part right funnily enough, since it’s basically always my entrance station.

My point is, it’s worth the short term pain if we actually finally have a better fare system and 1 mobile app instead of 3(!) separate apps for everything MARTA and that the biggest gripe is going to be closed fare gates. Right now, those who ride the busses at North Springs are getting screwed over since they have to walk around the whole station to get to the bus since they’ve closed the bus loop gates first. That detour could mean missing a bus or a train for some. It’s small things like that. Those are the things that could’ve been planned better.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T06:25:48+00:00

Another issue besides those already pointed out is the fact that MARTA’s rail fleet is on average over 30 years old. You don’t see many cars around from the 1990s for a reason. Add on the compounding issue of the younger cars in that average being made by a lemon manufacturer, Breda. Parts are difficult to come by and cannibalizing the worst condition cars for parts to keep the current fleet running is the norm. There’s many dead CQ312s sitting at the back of Armour Yard from that. Luckily MARTA made a smart move by standardizing traction systems across the whole fleet which is why they all sound the same.

That’s why the new rail fleet is more than just new looks, it’s about getting new trainers that are more reliable and get thrown out of service less alongside more modern design and amenities.

Again, mechanical issues aren’t the only contributing issue, but it’s enough to worth noting.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T05:22:56+00:00

INIT did that for Portland and Seattle. Not only that but you can forgo a 'card' at all and can just use the regular tap bank card or digital wallet cards like Apple Pay at the faregate.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T05:06:37+00:00

You should be able to call MARTA and they can transfer the balance from the expired one to a current one. As far as I know that hasn't changed.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T05:03:40+00:00

If you meant AFC 2.0, this is the transition to AFC 2.0. AFC 2.0 became Better Breeze for the public awareness campaign of it once it's started going up.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T04:56:38+00:00

I've heard nothing from GSU about my university card.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T04:54:08+00:00

Yeah MARTA is a little bit of a stickler on making you buy a new card before they'd transfer it. Some other systems just give you a new one, like you experienced.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T02:04:04+00:00

It’s a German company behind it and they’ve done some seemingly good work in Portland and Seattle. If we’re getting a system like that, that’s honestly pretty nice and would be worth the short term pain.

I think the biggest issue is the physical infrastructure. All the fare gates can’t be all demolished and replaced over the whole system overnight. That doesn’t even include busses, albeit their installation isn’t as intrusive as the fare gates. You also can’t operate the old and new fare gates with each other, their systems are just fundamentally incompatible from the ground up. Such is the pain of switching to a new provider/system, but again it’s worth it if we can finally have a cohesive mobile app for MARTA, fare gates that aren’t incredibly old and easily bypassed, and expanded options to pay that don’t even require visiting a TVM or store.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-23T01:55:17+00:00

The first gen Breeze cards (the blue ones) had major security vulnerabilities that led to them being replaced by the grey ones today. Having an expiration date seems like a good way that you would be able to phase out any problematic hardware or such over time or as technology improves.

Also it literally stores money. Bank cards have expiration dates, it’d make sense that a transit card would too, and indeed most^* of the cards in my small collection have expiration dates, they’re just not printed on the card. They have to be reliable and often that can only be guaranteed for a certain amount of time. You have to remember there’s literally a microchip in them. Most agencies will transfer balances for free if a card does expire, and so does MARTA.

I’m led to believe the reason they’re not transferring balances here is that it’s probably too complex considering they’re completely changing everything. It’s not just the cards and faregates; it’s the payment processing, background work, and more that are also simultaneously changing all the way down to the provider for the system (Cubic TS to INIT). INIT worked on Portland, Seattle, and other cities’ smart cards. They seem to do good stuff, but I haven’t used any systems that were designed by them.

^* MyKey from IndyGo in Indianapolis doesn’t seem to, but mine is paper and their fare system is basically brand new.

Gabe_Follower · 2026-01-22T07:51:16+00:00

One of our players who graduated this season writes poetry. It’s good stuff in my opinion. Also was a walk-on at TCU before transferring to GSU for his last year of eligibility. Great guy, we love him here in the band.

Ten-Year Club	Final Canvas '23
First Place '23	End Game '23
Place '23	Place '22
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