But activism was not confined to the world outside Harvard’s gates. Last week, with cooperation from several Harvard undergraduates, Conrad and his classmate Edward A. Couch ’05 organized a “call-in,” enabling about 100 undergraduates to phone the MBTA and the governor’s office from portable phones near their dining halls.

“We took cordless phones from people’s rooms, we put the antennas pointed out the window, and then we handed out the phones in the courtyard,” he explains.

Conrad, who describes himself as empathetic to the challenges facing administrators of a system as large as the MBTA, says he especially wanted an explanation for the sudden imposition of new regulations on the musicians—an explanation, he says, that was not forthcoming.

Ultimately, efforts from the student community, the musicians and local political leaders—most notably Senator Jarrett T. Barrios, D.-Mass.—proved effective. The Dec. 1 deadline was deferred a week, and Baird and his colleagues secured a meeting with Barrios and MBTA General Manager Michael Mulhern to work toward a resolution.

Mutual Benefit

That resolution came late last week in the form of a compromise with the MBTA that assuaged almost all of the musicians’ initial grievances, leaving only a few contentious points.

In a press conference on Dec. 3, the MBTA presented a modified version of the initial regulations that had emerged from negotiations.

Subway performers now have until the end of the month to acquire a $25 performance permit valid for one year. They cannot perform at a volume of more than 80 decibels, measured at 25 feet, and must stop performing before 11 p.m. The instrument ban has also been scaled back to include drums and trumpets alone.

The MBTA established a review board to which both musicians and MBTA staff members can report future complaints.

Both Baird and Bigelow, who participated in the final negotiations, say they are generally pleased with the compromise’s provisions.

“The MBTA was quite amenable to what we had to say,” Bigelow says.

Still, musicians say the provisions are far from perfect.

The subway musicians continue to lobby against the ban on trumpets and drums, the performance curfew, and the exclusion of key venues from a list of designated performance spots: benches, pillars and station walls which are now marked with official stickers.

“In some of the stations, [the designated areas are] in out-of-the-way performing places,” McNamara explains. Attracting the attention of an audience in such locations can be virtually impossible, he says.

Despite such lingering concerns, Baird says he thinks the compromise will ultimately benefit all parties.