DART
Dallas Area Rapid Transit

I love the idea of rapid transit.  I use ours a lot.  I don't own a car although I used to rent one weekend a month and now have access to one by driving for another owner.  That doesn't mean I don't have problems.  Some of the problems end up on this page.  The previous problems that hung around on a forgotten version of the page have mostly gone away, so I am updating to 2009 with a bunch of pruning.

The thing I like most about not owning a car is the lack of random risk, like hail storms and people driving into my side.  The thing I like least about auto commuting is the constant assessment of which route that might be good one day is bad the next - I have to spend all my time driving.   On the bus I can read, draw, think thoughts.  Both places I can listen to my choice in music, although the car is often purer and quieter sound.  Of course, owning a car means you can leave any time and you can do emergency stuff that may be tricky or impossible in a cab - like get an unconscious (and dying as it turned out) dog to the vet or a bleeding scalp wound to a clinic instead of an emergency room by ambulance..

What really bugs me is continuing bad timing on arrivals, especially when it makes me miss the next bus.  On the previous version, when I was commuting to work by bus, I had a continuing bad behavior problem by a driver who delighted in stopping half a bus length short or past when I was at the bus stop post and in leaving both doors open while he left the bus for a break so hot air filled the bus.  Fortunately, there have been no recent repeats of that or the silly behavior of the DART police.  I now often ride using a mobility scooter and find the drivers generally well trained and helpful in securing it.

  I am impressed by the continuing improvements in DART service including the e-mail alerts of rail problems and weather delays, the final installation of bike racks on all the buses, and the features of the new and modified trains with drop center cars for easier access that are appearing on both Red and Blue lines and will be all of the trains on the short version of the green line opening in time for the State Fair later this year (2009).

LEVEL BOARDING PROBLEM - About a week ago, I boarded the new drop center (level boarding) cars for the first time when my travel was entirely in the downtown area where the platform raising has been finished.  I was appalled to find that a pole had been installed in the middle of the lovely 4' wide entry door.  After raising a ruckus during the week, I added to a downtown trip today (2009-06-06) to take pictures and measure only to discover that a poster on the end of the midsection explains that the pole (stanchion) will be removed when all the stations are raised. 
It turns out an image of the poster appears as an inaccessible .jpg on their site.  On this page, http://www.dart.org/factsheet/slrv/default.asp to the right,  is a tiny thumbnail of this image http://www.dart.org/images/factsheet/slrvcard2.jpg  which is the card I found on the train today.
The information contained on this card is important and is not mentioned anywhere on the text of the page, thus being unavailable to all blind users and unlikely to be read by people who do not explore images. [After I sent the message below, the text on the web page was modified so blind users could know the info, but then I discovered that the way the stations are being modified causes problems.
I would ask that the fact sheet be modified with added words similar to the following "In order to prevent inadvertent use of the level boarding entry by persons going to stations where level exit is not possible, a stanchion has been placed in the center of each SLRV door. These stanchions will be removed once all station platforms are equipped to accommodate passengers in wheelchairs, which is estimated to be in late August 2010 when Union Station is complete. Until that time, chairs wider than 24" will not be able to board and must use the raised boarding access at the front of the train. Narrower chairs may enter with caution being cautious that their destination permits level exit."