Word: mbta
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Fresh, entertaining and colorful, the street musicians who perform in local Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority (MBTA) stations provide commuters with a diversion from the humdrum of public transit. Were original plans enforced, however, this would have been the first week that T commuters faced traveling without the accompaniment of live music. The MBTA had planned to put its Street Performer Regulations into effect on Monday. The regulations would, among some two dozen other provisions, prohibit amplified performances and use of several acoustic instruments—like trumpets—and impose a dress code for all performers. Fortunately popular criticism...
While the MBTA regulations would not entirely ban street performers, many of the provisions would make some performances illegal as they currently take place. As such, these rules restrict the music that, more often than not, provides an entertaining and uplifting contrast to the drab routine of riding...
...MBTA officials argue that the provisions are necessary to improve communication; music from street performers often obscures announcements from trains, they say, to the detriment of waiting commuters. And yet the MBTA could alleviate communication issues in a more obvious way: Announcements from shoddy, scruffy broadcast system are often difficult to hear in stations without musical performers—the MBTA should first seek to improve the quality of its announcement system before blaming musicians for communication problems...
...trumpets or trumpet-like instruments,” and drums to ensure that subway announcements can be heard. They were established “to promote safety by establishing procedures that ensure a well-managed and coordinated Subway Performers Program,” according to the MBTA. The rules also contain a stipulation suggesting that other instruments can be banned at the MBTA’s discretion—a clause that many musicians feared could quell their performance opportunities still further...
...MBTA gains its authority to enforce rules in the subway stations because of its legal status as the company’s property—a qualification Baird argues is not practically sound...