From: Damien Broderick (damien@ariel.ucs.unimelb.edu.au)
Date: Sun Sep 06 1998 - 06:48:58 MDT
At 09:50 PM 9/5/98 +0200, the Otter wrote:
>How I love those train/bus ticket machines, for example;
>always ready to serve you without a murmur. If only everything were so
>efficient...
The electric trams in Melbourne, which were once served by friendly
fare-collecting conductors who helped little old ladies and mothers with
prams and somehow caused thugs and noisy children to control themselves
just by their presence, recently shifted to on-board ticket machines and
validators. Both kinds of machines, which took an extraordinary amount of
time to develop and bring on line, are now plagued with problems (unlike
those in many other cities and countries; maybe it's the ozone hole). The
neatest detail is that the ticket machines have been placed along the side
of the tram (so that users must stand side-on to the forward motion of the
often-jolting tram) and right next to the well of the central egress,
causing off-balance old patrons and baby-clutching mothers to tumble to
their doom as they try to key in their choice of ticket and feed in their
coins with one hand. Technology cannot defeat stupidity. (And of course,
without the human conductors roaming up and down the tram and catching
their eye, most travellers simply avoid buying or validating their tickets;
tragedy of the commons, again. There is a squad of inspectors, but as a
kid told me the other day, `There's heaps of strategies'...)
Damien Broderick
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