I saw two articles today that made me wince.

The first was shared by my friend Ezra. It details the peculiar phenomenon of “Bronies,” or men who like My Little Ponies. (Yes, I’m serious.)

The second was shared by a co-worker, Sheri. It details how the MBTA and MBCR are scaling back trains in inclement weather to prevent the kinds of disastrous scenarios we saw last year, with riders stranded in the cold for hours at a time.

What do these two stories have in common? 

Neither company has any idea who is using its product.

Now, I’m willing to give Hasbro and Discovery Communications a pass here. It would have been difficult to predict a cult following of college-aged 4chan readers. That audience surprised and delighted (or seriously creeped out) the folks at Hasbro and Discovery. It’s a very good problem to have — especially considering the 4chan folk are pretty good about creating content that spreads across the interwebs. Almost every internet meme in history has its roots in 4chan.

The MBTA gets no passes, however — nor does it deserve any. They fail to understand that one of the (many) reasons people take the train in inclement weather is because driving is dangerous. Not inconvenient or uncomfortable — dangerous. As in, when they drive, they risk causing bodily injury to themselves or to others.

The math on this one is really simple. Fewer trains = more cars. More cars + wintry conditions = more accidents. So fewer trains = more accidents.

The killer here is that the MBCR just isn’t listening. Last winter, customers didn’t ask for a greater overall percentage of trains to run on time — which is what the MBCR is solving for here. Customers asked for the trains to run on schedule during the winter. And when they said “on schedule,” they didn’t mean “on an alternative schedule pending the ability of the MBCR to do the work that they should already be doing.”

In essence, customers want trains to run according to the established train schedule, irrespective of weather. Instead of fixing the problems, the MBTA and MBCR just changed the definition of “on time.” And normally this wouldn’t be such a big problem except, again…

…ahem…

Now more people are going to put their lives at risk to get to work on time.

And all because the MBTA just doesn’t understand why people use their services. If they did, they would understand that a true commitment to passenger safety means providing a safer, dependable, and practical alternative to highway travel in inclement weather.

So if you can’t drive, and the train doesn’t run on a practical schedule, how will I be getting to work, you ask?

I’m thinking about riding one of these guys: