Author: Ben

Ben http://benjaminfenster.com/

Fast Comparisons of Fast Food

I detest “fast food” (even having never seen Super Size Me) so Fast Food: Ads vs. Reality is particularly interesting to me.  The site shows side-by-side pictures of how food looks in advertisements and how the same food looks in reality.  Absolutely nobody will be surprised to learn there’s a difference.  In fact, I was rather surprised a couple pairs look so similar.  Wendy’s Chicken Club might even look a bit better in reality with its melted cheese than in the advertisement.

I’m delighted to see that the only entries that look acceptable in reality are from the two establishments I might consider actually eating (including Subway, where I now eat regularly).

(via Lifehacker)

Stop Elimination Redux

In 2004, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority closed four stops on the B Branch of the Green Line, to the approval of almost 73% of riders surveyed.  The stops remain closed today.  Now it’s time to close more.

Eliminating stops ultimately makes trips faster.  Each stop requires trains to accelerate and decelerate, and more importantly adds hold time at the platform as passengers board and disembark.  On crowded trips, the boarding process alone can take upwards of a minute at every stop even when everyone hurries.

The goal in any mass transit system must be to separate stops as widely as possible without unnecessarily inconveniencing riders.  The question is what distance is both “far enough” without being “too far.”

Underground stations on the Green Line between Government Center and Kenmore (where B trains run) are spaced 583 meters apart, on average.*  That’s about the distance diagonally across Boston Common, and about the same density of stops in Manhattan. Of course, passengers will generally walk only half that distance to get to the closest station.

Above ground, however, between Kenmore and Packard’s Corner, stops are only 306 meters apart, or about the length of a single crosstown block in Manhattan.  Imagine a New York subway train stopping every block!  Some of these need to be eliminated.

Of the eight stops in question, the shortest trips are from Boston University East to Boston University Central and from Boston University West to St. Paul Street.  The middle segment, from West to Central, is the longest.

Suppose we keep West and Central as they are, then, and eliminate the adjacent stops, beginning with St. Paul Street, barely a block away.  Babcock Street could also go, putting the three remaining stations 416 and 546 meters apart, respectively.  That’s about the underground average.

Across the turnpike, Boston University East is also a perfect candidate for removal based on distance, and I support that, but it’s also benefited immensely from the costly beautification work done there just recently, so I don’t have high hopes for its elimination.

The only valid counterargument I’ve heard to eliminating any of these stops is that the individual platforms are not large enough to support the required number of passengers.  In other words, the reason St. Paul Street and Boston University West are practically touching is so they can act in combination as a larger platform.

Anecdotally, I’ve never seen such a problem.  The crowds on these platforms are light, even on heavy rush hour trips that are far behind schedule.  During the Boston University Commencement, which surely generates the heaviest travel in the area, crowds would overhwlem any platform, which is why we always see MBTA staff supervising operations (and, at least last year, manually turning the entire platform into a fare-controlled area).

However, if there’s real evidence against these platforms’ adequacy, there are several solutions.  First, they can easily be lenghtened.  Even if four-car trains will never arrive (as seems likely, since we have yet to see even three-car trains in regular service), a four-car platform is perfectly usable.  Second, and admittedly costlier, sacrificing a few parking spaces would allow ample room to widen the platforms into the street — a small price, even in Boston.

Most importantly, crowds at every platform will diminish as service speeds up.  Fewer people can gather during a five-minute window between trains than can in a window that’s 15 minutes long.

We need to eliminate these stops.  Let’s skip over them for six months, and if crowds on any platform truly become unmanageable, we can put them back in just as easily as they came out.  If, instead, there’s no harm and service gets faster, at least 73% of riders will be made happier.

*I performed all measurements in Google Earth using the “ruler” tool.  For underground stations, I used Google’s placement of the station icon to estimate the platform’s position.

The Real Netflix Prize

Back in 2006, Netflix offered to pay $1,000,000 to anyone who can improve its movie recommendations by 10%.  A reliable supply of recommendations will keep a customer who’s otherwise run out of movies to watch from canceling his account.

For comparison, let’s analyze the technique Netflix is currently using to pick movies for me.  I’ve rated some genres in the past (comedy: 5 stars, horror: no stars), and this afternoon it crunched some numbers and recommended this new genre:

Romantic British Dramas
Your taste preferences created this row.

• British
• Dramas
• Romantic

Just imagine what a 10% improvement will do!

Cartography in the City of Cars

After checking into the Hilton Suites in Phoenix, my girlfriend and I immediately asked for a map of area restaurants, since neither of us had eaten all day.  Hilton offered this apparently detailed map of the area.

Hilton Map
Hilton Map
Phoenix à la Google Maps
Phoenix à la Google Maps

We decided to head to the Arizona Center for lunch and an early movie.  Someone completely unfamiliar with the city might estimate that to be about a one-block walk.  Fortunately, I’d glanced at Google Maps when planning the trip and knew the major streets were all several blocks apart.  Let’s approximate my sketchy memory with this non-interactive Google Map of a nearby area.

Even in the desert heat, that would be a tolerable walk.  We set out, leaving our bags, and unfortunately also leaving the map.

Unsure of exactly where we were headed, but knowing it to be south, we walked merrily on for many blocks before growing unsure of ourselves.  We passed nobody on foot and began to worry we’d already passed the shopping center, perhaps a few blocks to the east.

The Full Walk
The Full Walk

Turning in that direction, we ran into our first passerby, whom we immediately asked for directions.  “Well, I’m a tourist,” he said in a faint New Zealand accent.  Then, after a beat, “but because I’m a tourist, I have a map.”

We’d now walked all the way to McDowell Avenue, and our fellow tourist’s map confirmed that the Arizona Center should be just three blocks east. Already starving and now dehydrated in the middle of the Arizona desert, when we found no obvious sign of the Center at 3rd street, we gave up and walked wearily back to the hotel.

The total journey, counting some weaving between Central Ave and 3rd Street, was about five kilometers.

After numerous glasses of iced tea and a much-needed meal, plus some time to sit motionless on our couch and recuperate, we renewed the idea of watching a movie.  But this time we’d take the train, and we’d take the map.

The journey to McDowell on our second try took only minutes, and the walk to 3rd Street even less time.  We could see now that the Center should be only a short distance south on Filmore street.  We walked.  And walked.  And walked.

Growing again dehydrated and again exhausted, and now frustrated at having a useless map, we passed intersection after intersection.  We passed over the whole of Interstate 10.  We passed one apartment complex after the next.  By the time we encountered someone else to ask for help, she confirmed the Center would be “straight ahead” and (as people always add when giving directions) that we “can’t miss it.”

We didn’t miss it, but in all we ended up walking another two kilometers from where we got off the train.  We’d walked all the way to downtown Phoenix, passing six train stops, in sweltering desert heat, carrying now ater, and for most of the trip carrying no map.  Tellingly, we passed almost nobody on foot.

Surely no intelligent person would deliberately walk seven kilometers in the Arizona desert (even in the comparatively cool May weather), yet the very occasion of our visit was to celebrate my girlfriend’s new Master’s degree.  Two adults with graduate degrees should not end up in such a situation.

Of course, we’re entirely at fault for not bringing water, but we place the blame for everything else on shoddy map-making.  Although we would not normally have expected to walk anywhere in Phoenix, this map recommends “Alexi’s Grill,” which is ostensibly a “short 1/2 mile walk,” and which appears on the map to be the same distance as the Arizona Center.

The map does disclaim itself “not to scale,” but that’s rather an understatement, and removes none of the real blame.

Spring Awakening

Spring Awakening now comes with the strongest of recommendations.

This musical manipulates what we know as traditional musical theater to tell a real story, with literally nothing held back. While the family behind me rushed their preteen daughters out the door before the first act had ended, I stayed to the end and have seldom found anything so enthralling.

A saleswoman roamed the aisles during intermission hawking CDs of the soundtrack, but this wasn’t the sort of catchy score I’d want to take home. More like the instrumentation underlying a motion picture, I considered the music merely a backdrop to the story: a way of conveying the necessary level of emotion.

And the story… I saw on stage simultaneously myself and everyone I knew in high school. While women may identify less strongly with a story principally about adolescent boys, Martha and Ilsa’s interlude was painfully moving, and the central plot surrounding Wendela is universal.

I discovered this show first through Kimiko Glenn, whom I liked before and like now. Steffi D, of Canadian Idol fame, wonderfully portrayed Ilsa, and Kyle Riabko, reprising his Melchior from Broadway, won me over entirely. But complete credit for the show’s hardest emotional pull goes to Christy Altomere as Wendela.

I want into the theatre knowing little more than that this musical has some graphic moments, including the simulated sex that drove that preteen family from the theatre, but left understanding parenthood, adolescence, and the compelling power of a well-told story about first love.

It’s Called “Freak You Out” Disease

I had my teeth cleaned this morning.  I learned that my teeth are still in excellent health, but on my way out I overheard another patient getting this news:

I’d like to send a photograph of this to use in our classes, ’cause what I’m seeing here is… well, come over here and take a look.

Any condition that’s so unusual they need to show all their students while they have the chance can’t be a lot of fun.

Listen to Your Mother

Sophie is learning higher reasoning, apparently. After calling Mommy and talking for a while, she said goodbye and hung up the phone. When Grandma asked to talk, Sophie explained the situation:

Sophie: Mommy hung up. She doesn’t want to talk to you.
Grandma: Why doesn’t she want to talk to me?
Sophie: Because then I’d have to eat before I play.

Naturally, if Mommy got involved, Sophie would have to follow her usual rules, even under Grandma’s care.  She gets a lot of credit for reasoning that out, but she still needs to work a bit on subterfuge.

Phoenix: City of a Thousand Stories

A collection of events from the airports I traveled to get to and from Phoenix, Arizona (namely Houston and Minneapolis/St. Paul):

All in Good Fun

The security reminder announcement (“…threat condition orange…”) in Houston includes this memorable line:

You are also reminded that any inappropriate remarks or jokes concerning security may result in your arrest.

This did not stop the gate agents for my flight from joking with one passenger, “Wait, this boarding pass is ripped.  Susan, what does that mean?  Don’t we have to put her on the next flight?”  I chuckled a little, but the passenger herself wasn’t amused, having already been delayed and rerouted twice that day.  Oops.

No; Are You a Security Threat?

Walking through Terminal E in Houston, I saw a woman flag down a uniformed airline employee.  This exchange followed:

Her: Excuse me, are you security?
Him:  No.
Her: Oh.

She walked on.  Just in case she knew something I didn’t, I walked the other way.

Sterility is a Relative Term

On the inside of a Jetway door in Minneapolis/St. Paul (i.e., the door facing into the airport), was a sign that read:

Now entering the sterile area

The “sterile area” is, of course, the part of the airport where everyone has already been screened.  If airport security works correctly, no weapons of any kind will ever be found in the sterile area.  Nor will too much toothpaste.

This begs an obvious question: shouldn’t the tarmac, where the planes are, also be part of the sterile area?

Am I Putting Him On or is He Putting Me On?

I overheard this snippet of a phone call while strolling through Terminal E in Houston:

In the upper right corner there’s a box that says “Search Mail.”  …  Right, it says “Search Mail.”  …  Yeah … Yeah … Okay, so do you see the box that says “Search Mail?”  … Right, it’s in the upper right corner … It doesn’t matter; just click Inbox.  Whatever.  Now in the upper right corner do you see the box that says “Search Mail?” … Okay, good.  Now type “Continental” … In the box that says “Search Mail” … It’s in the upper right corner.

The airport offers wireless Internet access for $8 a day.  After a few more minutes of that, that sounds like a bargain.

Airport Manners in the Twenty-First Century

The woman across the aisle from me on my flight into Boston caught our flight attendant’s attention.

The gentleman in seat 20F switched seats with me, and I’d like to buy him a drink.

I was first struck by how nice a gesture that was, and then immediately struck by how low our standards for manners have gotten, at least aboard aircraft, if a $5 drink as repayment for a kind act is as noteworthy as I interpreted it.  (To be clear, I find no fault whatsoever with the woman herself or her offer, which was indeed a nice gesture.  My concern is for the rest of society who have rendered it more impressive than it ought to have been.)