By Carlos Miller
In the latest installment of transportation officials not knowing their own photography policy, a group of university students entered a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority station to take photos, only to be told it was forbidden.
However, the MBTA policy on photography, which is clearly stated on its website, states that non-commercial photography is allowed as long as the photographer provides identification as soon as they start getting harassed by employees.
Photographers shooting commercial photography must first obtain a permit.
But according to the photographer whose name is Elizabeth, the MBTA employee informed them she had undergone training three years ago and learned that “all photographic activity on MBTA property was strictly prohibited.”
The fact that Elizabeth pulled up the policy from the MBTA website on her cell phone did nothing to change their opinion.
The employees called dispatch and the students ended up leaving before anybody arrived.
It was almost like a deja vu of my incident at the Miami Metrorail station where we showed the guards a copy of the statute that proved we were allowed to shoot non-commercial photos inside the stations, only to get permanently banned from the entire system.
Fortunately it didn’t get to the point like it did with Duane Kerzic who was arrested by Amtrak police for taking pictures for an Amtrak-sponsored photo contest called “Picture Our Trains.”
Or maybe they should have let it get to that point because Kerzic ended up winning a five-figure settlement.
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7 responses so far ↓
1 Rusty Carr // Jul 16, 2010 at 2:24 AM
And the idiocy continues.
2 Nabinut // Jul 16, 2010 at 6:16 AM
I was just in Boston two days ago and never had a problem photographing in the subway stations or Bus stations. The policy was modified in 2007 which may explain the employee’s statement
3 Erik G. // Jul 16, 2010 at 12:37 PM
Just don’t use flash or a tripod and you are perfectly legal.
That T employee is probably some politician’s niece.
4 Mike // Jul 17, 2010 at 7:25 PM
The T does have a lot of clueless employees, but it also has some who know the rules. The MBTA Police seem to be the most likely to actually know the rules, while “station attendants” tend to be pretty bad about knowing the rules. More worrying to me, though, is the fact that the same rule that permits photography actually REQUIRES employees to report photography and for officers to come out and check the ID of photographers. While this policy was an improvement over the old policy which required a permit (which while free, required you to submit to a full background check and to come back “clean” before it was issued), it’s still a far cry from genuine freedom.
5 Atc Logistics // Jul 18, 2010 at 6:58 AM
hi nice post i really like to read this and thank you for sharing this useful information.
6 Valley Crier // Jul 21, 2010 at 2:18 PM
The MBTA have been clueless for a long time. About the same time as your first arrest there was also an arrest here in Mass.
http://www.mbtapolice.org/
7 Doc Hopper // Aug 9, 2010 at 6:04 AM
It looks like the MBTA doesn’t mind photography when it helps them out…
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/08/08/massachusetts.flasher.nabbed/index.html?hpt=T2
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