Twenty-four hours earlier, things would have gone smoothly. But on Sunday afternoon, the driver of a yellow taxi barreling past the MBTA’s Charles/MGH stop toward the Longfellow Bridge almost ran straight into an obstacle: a line of cars heading straight at him from Cambridge.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” yelled a State Police trooper standing at the intersection at the Boston end of the bridge. “Back it up!”
The taxi driver, a sheepish grin on his face, quickly moved his vehicle into reverse and zipped away past the MBTA station.
On the first day of the partial closure of the Longfellow Bridge — no cars allowed from Boston to Cambridge and vehicles coming into Boston directed onto the opposite side of the bridge — there was some confusion but no chaos.
The new rules of the road mark the beginning of the 3½-year, $255 million project to rehabilitate the famous span, which was built more than 100 years ago. The project aims to upgrade the bridge’s structure and make repairs to the MBTA tracks that run down its middle. But with such a significant traffic change on a major thoroughfare, the project will not be able to avoid creating headaches for motorists....
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NEXT DAY UPDATE:
"Monday’s traffic was different. It was the first workday commute after the partial closure of the Longfellow Bridge. For the next three years, no cars will be allowed to cross it from Boston to Cambridge, and for now, vehicles coming into Boston are using the opposite side of the bridge, a change that seems destined to create traffic nightmares for many commuters. “It was better than I expected, not too bad.”
Maybe you should have called a ride-share:
"Ride-sharing is one of the business models springing out of the smartphone revolution that seem to have been made for, and by, the young, tech-savvy set who use the Web for everything from marketing their businesses to watching TV — and see a real taxi as belonging to an older generation."
Related: The Globe and the New Media: Hailing a Cab
Looks like the kids take a back seat to no one.
Also see:
Menino should move now on major reform of taxi system
Boston takes first steps on cab industry abuses
IRS agents raid Boston Cab headquarters
Judge eases freezing of cab owner’s assets
Related: Sunday Globe Specials: Waves of Immigrants
Can't stop 'em.
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
"Boston police have responded to the scandal. In April, police placed Mark Cohen, the civilian employee who directs the Hackney Unit, on paid leave from his $110,000-a-year position pending an internal review of a reportedly heated exchange that he had with a subordinate. Police are investigating possible mismanagement of funds intended to aid families of taxi drivers who die on duty, money that was collected by Cohen’s unit and is now unaccounted for. Both reviews are pending."
Welcome to AmeriKa.
Related: Sunday Globe Specials: Waves of Immigrants
Can't stop 'em.
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
"Boston police have responded to the scandal. In April, police placed Mark Cohen, the civilian employee who directs the Hackney Unit, on paid leave from his $110,000-a-year position pending an internal review of a reportedly heated exchange that he had with a subordinate. Police are investigating possible mismanagement of funds intended to aid families of taxi drivers who die on duty, money that was collected by Cohen’s unit and is now unaccounted for. Both reviews are pending."
Welcome to AmeriKa.
"Black boxes, in most new cars, stir privacy concerns" by Jaclyn Trop | New York Times, July 22, 2013
When Timothy P. Murray crashed his government-issued Ford Crown Victoria in 2011, he was fortunate, as accidents go. Murray, then lieutenant governor of Massachusetts, was not seriously hurt; he told police he was wearing a seat belt and was not speeding.
But a different story soon emerged. Murray was driving more than 100 miles an hour and not wearing a seat belt, according to the computer in his car. He got a $555 ticket and later said he had fallen asleep.
Mendacious Murray?
Related: Murray Makes His Move
Trying to pa$$ you.
Mendacious Murray?
Related: Murray Makes His Move
Trying to pa$$ you.
The case put Murray at the center of a growing debate over a little-known piece of equipment in the innards of a car: the event data recorder, commonly known as the black box.
About 96 percent of new vehicles sold in the United States have the boxes, and in September 2014, if the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has its way, all will have them.
The boxes have long been used to assess vehicle performance. But data stored in the devices are increasingly being used as evidence in accidents and criminal cases. The trove of data has raised privacy concerns, including questions about who owns the data and what it can be used for.
To regulators, police, and insurers, the data are indispensable in investigations.
Black boxes “provide critical safety information that might not otherwise be available to NHTSA to evaluate what happened during a crash — and what future steps could be taken to save lives and prevent injuries,” David L. Strickland, the agency’s administrator, said in a statement.
But to consumer advocates, the data are the latest example of governments and companies having too much access to private information.
“These cars are equipped with computers that collect massive amounts of data,” said Khaliah Barnes of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a consumer group. “Without protections, it can lead to all kinds of abuse.”
Consumer advocates say government has yet to provide consistent guidelines.
“There are no clear standards that say this is a permissible use of the data and this is not,” Barnes said.
Either way, the government has already logged your travel records.
Either way, the government has already logged your travel records.
Fourteen states’ laws say that even though the data belong to the vehicle owner, law enforcement officials and those involved in litigation can gain access with a court order.
In these states, lawyers may subpoena the data, making the information accessible to third parties, including law enforcement and insurers that could cancel a driver’s policy or raise a premium based on the recorder’s data.
In Murray’s case, a court order was not required to release the data to investigators. Massachusetts is not among the states with a law governing access to the data. Murray, who did not contest the ticket and who resigned as lieutenant governor in June to become head of the Chamber of Commerce in Worcester, declined to comment.
Most states require that the presence of the black box be disclosed in the owner’s manual. But drivers who do not read the manual thoroughly may not know their vehicle can capture and record their speed, brake position, seat belt use, and other data.
The recorders capture only the few seconds surrounding a crash or air bag deployment. A separate device extracts the data, which is then analyzed with software programs.
The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, a trade group, supports the devices.
“Event data recorders help our engineers and researchers understand how cars perform in the real world, and one of our priorities for EDRs continues to be preserving consumer privacy,” said Wade Newton, a spokesman. “Automakers don’t access EDR data without consumer permission, and we believe that any government requirements to install EDR’s on all vehicles must include steps to protect consumer privacy.”
Beyond privacy, critics question the data’s reliability.
Black boxes, which sit under the center console, date to 1990, when General Motors introduced them.
Been tailing you that long, huh?
Been tailing you that long, huh?
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Globe acting like this still an issue. Privacy is gone! NSA is gobbling up all communications of the entire planet, all your fancy gizmos promoted by the bu$ine$$ section of the paper are also stealth tracking devices, your TV is watching you, there are surveillance cameras all over the place, etc, etc, etc.
It's OVER! There IS NO MORE PRIVACY in America. That is why it is AmeriKa now!
Of course, you need those black boxes:
"Two Sunday morning wrong-way crashes caused four deaths and multiple injuries on roadways in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, according to authorities, and a North Adams woman was also killed in a head-on collision in New York on Saturday night, according to news reports."
All alcohol related?
All alcohol related?
How come we were never told black boxes were found on 9/11?
Were there any to find, or was my television nothing more than an illusion??
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
Man ejected from car in I-95 crash dies at scene
"A man charged with drunk driving is being held on $250,000 bail after police said he crashed into a car driven by a Minnesota couple on their honeymoon in New England, killing the bride and seriously injuring the groom."
"State Police have arrested four Worcester teenagers who crashed their car and allegedly fled the scene carrying $148,030 stuffed into two shopping bags, which they said they had taken from a parked car."
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
Man ejected from car in I-95 crash dies at scene
"A man charged with drunk driving is being held on $250,000 bail after police said he crashed into a car driven by a Minnesota couple on their honeymoon in New England, killing the bride and seriously injuring the groom."
"State Police have arrested four Worcester teenagers who crashed their car and allegedly fled the scene carrying $148,030 stuffed into two shopping bags, which they said they had taken from a parked car."
