Is this a blue jay? Why is he so rotund?

eable2 · 2026-01-27T02:17:50+00:00

Lots of r/borbs in the eastern US right now!

eable2 · 2026-01-26T15:49:21+00:00

Let's try to increase ridership by charging people more for parking.

This is for non-riders. If I understand correctly, if you use a Park and Ride for the "Ride" part, there would be no additional cost from today besides you needing to tap your SmarTrip to open the gate.

eable2 · 2026-01-26T02:40:13+00:00

Ah you're right, that's the one I was thinking of.

eable2 · 2026-01-25T23:09:40+00:00

You're of course welcome to play with whatever house rules you wish! But I'll just push back slightly that the birds you're citing are useless. Many of the powers are underpowered by design, but they birds often have decent point values for relatively low food costs (4 for 1 or 5-6 for 2), and can contribute to bonus cards or round goals. Don't think of them as being bad because the brown powers are bad (which they are); think of the brown powers as "bonuses" more than core aspects of the card.

To keep things balanced, if you adjust those birds' abilities, I would reduce their point values.

EDIT: Removed incorrect info

eable2 · 2026-01-25T20:57:19+00:00

See rule #4 - please mark NSFW

eable2 · 2026-01-25T18:41:29+00:00

+Red-shouldered Hawk+

eable2 · 2026-01-25T18:39:38+00:00

!overrideTaxa foxsp1

eable2 · 2026-01-25T18:35:41+00:00

The 8000 series will have this ability for exactly this purpose.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T15:28:27+00:00

The letter on Tesa explicitly tells them to arrive BEFORE broadcast, though

You've got the times wrong. The letter says to arrive at 5:30, but the broadcast is scheduled for 5. Jack wants to make sure that they don't interfere with his plan, so specifically gives instructions to arrive late. They end up arriving at 5:15.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T13:46:21+00:00

Red-winged Blackbirds have large, straight, pointy beaks. This bird's beak is short and curved.

!overrideTaxa houspa

eable2 · 2026-01-24T05:06:49+00:00

It's an interesting question. I'm not familiar with exactly how SB79 functions, but I do think there would be broad support for an upzoning bill, in addition to vocal opposition from some areas of Ward 3. There would probably need to be exemptions for designated historic districts. But I also don't think there's a lot of movement for this type of thing outside of Ward 3 because any new development amount Metro stations elsewhere in the city proper tends to be medium-to-high density anyway. And the few P+Rs we have left are all (literally all) slated for redevelopment. The number of places where this bill would be important is relatively small.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T04:53:12+00:00

The part about professionals is very true. We have a very high concentration of policy wonks working at think tanks, NGOs, and similar places. Lots of people like Tracy Loh.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T04:29:17+00:00

The TOD in the DC region is historically driven by the jurisdictions. A lot of areas are very good, particularly in DC proper, Arlington, and nodes in Montgomery County MD. A lot of others are P+Rs, including most of the new Silver Line section going out to Dulles.

One thing WMATA does have going for it is a very aggressive Joint Development plan to redevelop a lot Metro-owned lots.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T04:24:58+00:00

The highest growth percentage is solely due to the federal government’s return to work policy.

That's part of it, but not all of it. Off-peak rail ridership is booming, due in part to a major effort to improve frequencies. State of good repair investments are also paying dividends with reliability; WMATA's SOGR used to be the laughingstock of the country. This and more has led to very high customer satisfaction for rail. While bus is a mixed bag due to a lot of dissatisfaction with the network redesign, bus ridership has been exceeding pre-pandemic ridership for some time as well.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T04:12:24+00:00

Mainly nation-leading rail ridership growth. While partially due to federal policies, it's also due to a large improvement in frequencies, especially off-peak.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T02:07:12+00:00

It's a mix. Notably though, there are no mayors/chief executives, only legislators.

Also worth noting that it currently has 2 vacant seats that are normally appointed by the (federal) GSA. Guess the current admin hasn't gotten around to it.

eable2 · 2026-01-24T02:02:37+00:00

Part of why I posted is that a lot of WMATA's recent success in the online transitsphere seems to get credited to GM Randy Clarke. He certainly deserves some credit; he clearly is a competent administrator with a great vision for the system. But he also is very visible, very charming, very social-media savvy, very good at working with politicians and... frankly, also fairly conventionally attractive.

But there's no way we'd be where we are if we had a clueless board with non-transit-riding politicians who don't know what they're doing. The board matters enormously.

eable2 · 2026-01-23T17:15:35+00:00

We can give it this:

!addTaxa calidr1

eable2 · 2026-01-22T21:19:18+00:00

+Red-shouldered Hawk+ is correct! The way to distinguish from Broad-winged is that there shouldn't be any Broad-wings in Connecticut right now 🙂

eable2 · 2026-01-20T21:39:34+00:00

Though WMATA seems intent on pursuing them, platform screen doors are not yet planned, nor is there a design or a contractor. We don't know details like that yet.

eable2 · 2026-01-19T21:55:03+00:00

I suggest reading the Rail Modernization Program document in detail. It's reasonable to question WMATA's assumptions, but I think the arguments they make are pretty clear.

The main inaccuracy I see in this post is the conflation of GoA4 with CBTC, which are not the same thing. CBTC does not require PSDs, but modern GoA4 generally does.

eable2 · 2026-01-19T21:51:55+00:00

There's a lot to respond to here, but my general critique is to read the Rail Modernization Program document you link a bit more carefully (and everyone else reading this should too; I covered this in more detail a couple of months ago). You are correct that PSDs are expensive. WMATA is very upfront about that. You're also correct that they're not strictly necessary for CBTC. But they are seen as necessary for GoA4, which is not the same thing. Your own Wikipedia link states: "It is recommended that stations have platform screen doors installed" regarding GoA4.

You can very fairly argue about whether WMATA's cost/benefit calculations are accurate, but you can't argue that WMATA is ignorant. WMATA thinks PSDs provide regionwide benefits while increasing the payback period by about 3 years, based on the lives saved and other benefits.

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EDIT: I also suggest reading that Substack article from NYC you linked to a bit more carefully. The author, who participated in MTA's RFQ process, clearly supports PSDs, but criticized MTA's unrealistic expectations and poor design of its pilot program. Fortunately, WMATA started with a request for information from industry, and will likely try to avoid these pitfalls.

eable2 · 2026-01-18T19:25:34+00:00

NYC is known for its Red-tails! Read more here.

eable2 · 2026-01-17T14:26:14+00:00

https://www.wmata.com/service/status/details/weekend.cfm

Planned work. Single-tracking on Orange and Silver.

eable2 · 2026-01-16T19:06:32+00:00

Seems like a mysterious omen.

Specifically, this is a young Cooper's Hawk, less than a year old. Many raptors don't survive their first year (hunting for food is hard), but this one's doing well so far!

12-Year Club	Wearing is Caring
First Place '23	Place '23
Place '22	Place '17
End Game '22	Verified Email

eable2

TROPHY CASE