Recent comments in /f/boston

hurricaneho t1_j9q8vvt wrote

Reply to How to study for the learner's permit? by leandrosierra1

Just read through the driver's manual and make note of any hard numbers that it presents - like blood alcohol level or stopping distance, etc. For the most part the questions on the exam are pretty obvious but they do throw in a few questions that are harder and specific, hence I mentioned to pay attention to any hard numbers in the drivers manual.

I believe you only need to pass 70% of the exam and when I did it (many many years ago), the exam would just stop once I got 70%. Don't worry too much about it. You are getting a learner's permit so you aren't expected to know everything - just enough of the rules of the road to be competent.

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DJ_Gordon_Bombay t1_j9q7adq wrote

Reply to Suffolk or Umass Boston? by [deleted]

Apply for financial aid at both and see what they come back w. Suffolk may be slightly nicer/more fun, but not worth triple the debt.

Recovering from deep student loan debt was a serious undertaking that I wish I'd considered more, before pulling the trigger on my college decision. I fucking loved my school, but I have no doubt that there would have been a negligible difference in education quality, if I'd have chosen to go to one of the other schools I'd applied to, at half the cost, my 20's would have been a lot more comfortable.

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lelduderino t1_j9q6ftx wrote

Reply to comment by Maxpowr9 in The MBTA and Green Line are mentioned: We Finally Know Why It Costs So Damn Much to Build New Subways in America by timboot

It's also not just a problem with design or project management firms.

The T, for many many years, has been understaffed in the trades for even small capital projects.

Carpenters, plumbers, electricians, etc. they're all coming out of the same unions whether they're T employees or working for a contractor. Same group of people, same expertise. However, the ones who are T employees have much lower fully burdened costs per hour. The outside labor not only gets greater wages in their pocket (job security being part of the tradeoff for slightly lower base wages as a T employee), but those costs are then obviously marked up by whoever the contractor is.

Unfortunately, the optics of having low(er) publicly accessible direct payroll constantly wins out over the true cost of the labor.

Obviously the T doesn't need to have permanent staff to handle projects as large as the GLX, but smaller regular ongoing renovations, upgrades, etc. often end up costing the taxpayers 2-3x what they would cost if the T were properly staffed and managed for efficiency over optics.

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