The MTA's problems begin and end at a weak senior management unwilling to standup to Cuomo's frivolous micromanagement and a transit union unwilling to modernize.
Politicians should be pushing for serious procurement and labor work rule reforms, otherwise the systemic managerial and operational deficiencies will ensure that the deterioration of service we see now will repeat it self in 5 to 10 years, regardless of how much money or technology is poured into the MTA.
London and Toronto have been able to modernize much of their transit systems in last 5 years and its not because they have more money. Once you fix the top everything else will fall into place.
Look what Andy Byford has been able to do in 4 short years at the TTC. His 5-Year Plan to modernize the TTC focused on transforming corporate culture and updating internal processes, in addition to new equipment. The results of these changes have been overwhelmingly positive with the TTC recently being named best public transit agency in North America and The TR Class of TTC subway cars in May having a MDBF of over 924,000 miles.
If your interested in getting involved with transit activism in NYC I highly suggest you follow @2AvSagas on twitter.
When is the last time America built any impressive infrastructure? I'd say in the 70s.
Most airports, most of the interstate highway network, most subway systems, bridges, tunnels, and dams were built from the 1930s and on to the 1970s. The railroads are even older.
And after that; Silence. It's like you didn't even care to maintain it.
First time I arrived in America, I was taken aback by how old and run down everything was. The only places in Europe I had seen worse roads were in Eastern Europe shortly after the fall of the Wall. In the middle of Manhattan some streets were in a state that in Europe you would only witness in the Balkans or in rural areas. The airports and the link from airports to the city were even worse. The subways didn't even have info tables saying when the next train would arrive. At the same time in Europe, many cities were switching to driver-less trains.
Clearly, the US could afford to expand and maintain the infrastructure. And the US is usually on the forefront of technology. So it's about priority, more than ability. Public infrastructure is just not prioritized that much in the US.
Do people in London and Toronto care enough to pressure their leaders about this? In my experience it's hard to find people in the U.S. who even bother to pay attention to who has oversight when it comes to transportation (and not just transportation, this is true for a lot of local issues).
>"The MTA's problems begin and end at a weak senior management unwilling to standup to Cuomo's frivolous micromanagement and a transit union unwilling to modernize."
Did you read the article? The problems began in the 1995 under Governor George Patakis administration. Cuomo has only been in office for 6 years.
> London and Toronto have been able to modernize much of their transit systems in last 5 years and its not because they have more money. Once you fix the top everything else will fall into place.
TBF NYC does have the exceptional — almost unique — feature that it runs 24/7.
I don’t understand why American governments are so bad at providing public services. Money often isn’t it. The NY subway has an operating budget of $8 billion for about 1.7 billion riders per year ($4.7 per rider per year). The London Tube has an operating budget of (2.2 billion pounds—$3.5 billion pre-Brexit) for 1.4 billion riders ($2.5 per rider). The systems are in extremely similar cities, are almost exactly the same route miles, and are similarly old. Yet NYC’s system costs almost twice as much to run.
IMHO the real source of a lot of these problems is that the subway system is a city resource that is primarily payed for by city taxes (and fares of course) but it's actually administered by the state government (which the MTA reports into).
If it was a city controlled thing it would be a huge huge issue in every single mayoral election. But it gets somewhat drowned out in governor elections.
The subway used to be controlled by the city which lead to politicians keeping the fairs intentionally low to gain popular support. In 1968 the city could no longer afford fund the subway and it was transferred to newly created Metropolitan Commuter Transportation Authority, which was renamed to today's Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
The city retaking control of subway raises the question of who will pay for the operation and capital costs. The MTA derives allot of its funding from tolls through the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority which generated $1.8 Billion in 2016. It's unlikely the state will give TBTA back as well.
>”... hundreds of mechanic positions have been cut because there is not enough money to pay them — even though the average total compensation for subway managers has grown to nearly $300,000 a year.”
I know this isn’t the primary reason the subway is falling into disrepair, but it’s clearly a symptom of a system that lacks real accountability. There has to be some reasonable push back to compensation (backed ultimately by the tax payers of New York) that is tied to real performance and efficiency.
I know this isn't a popular idea but any thoughts on why privatizing them is a bad idea? It works in Japan. There are at least 10 train/subway companies in Tokyo alone. JR, Tokyu, Keikyu, Keio, Odakyu, Eidan, Seibu, Tobu, Toei, Keisei and they seem to be best in class by most measures.
The NYC subway system started as 3 organizations; only one of which was city owned. I am normally not for privatization but it is probably the only thing that can save the MTA. The NYT points out a lack of funding but really their funding has not dropped tremendously. Politicians do not have the right mindset to run this. Sure Democrats tend to spend more on infrastructure, but then support obscene union contracts. MTA police make 130k + The LIRR has conductors that clip tickets getting paid 80k base with tons of overtime and benefits. The maintenance workers are (un)lucky if they work more than 3 hrs a day. There is nothing that is going to change with this unless someone goes in and rips it apart as the union is politically powerful and politicians have other interests than running the subway properly.
Subway systems are a natural monopoly; privatising something when there's no real competition has limited benefits and can be actively harmful if it reduces accountability. It works in Japan because under the keiratsu system nominally private companies are still closely tied to the political system and each other, so they have accountability through that channel.
Also a lot of the value created by a subway shows in land values rather than being captured directly in fares - the article says the MTA is 60% funded by fares which is high but, well, not 100%. You need a mechanism for those who benefit (i.e. owners of buildings near subway stations) to fund the subways. In some countries the transport authority will essentially own large shopping mall complexes around each station and fund the subway that way; in Japan employers often pay for workers' subway tickets.
However, it doesn't work in London. There are a dozen train franchises, remnants of the privatized and sliced-up British Rail system. They are all atrocious in service quality, frequency, capacity and usually price when compared to the parts of the system that were never privatised (the Underground) or that were renationalised (the Overground).
The world's best subway by many measures is the MTR in Hong Kong. Not only is it entirely privately run but it turns a profit which they then take to build more lines. The MTR Corporation is also building London's new 73 mile Crossrail line which opens up next year after being under construction for less than 10 years. 13 Miles of Crossrail is in underground tunnels beneath the densest part of the city. In terms a New Yorker would understand, this project is like if the entire length of the 2nd avenue subway in Manhattan got built along with extensions into the Bronx and Brooklyn in 10 years and under budget.
I can't see NY selling off their subway to a private entity anytime soon but what if a Mayor allowed MTR or another corporation to come in and build a competing line in some part of the city? The amazingly efficient new line might light a fire under the ass of the broader NYC subway to start operating more efficiently. Or as the new line begins to make more profit it could buy NYC lines one by one until it's running most of it. This way the debt bomb of the MTA won't destroy the city because it won't affect all major transit lines.
I believe it works because it was already a good system before being privatized. Most of the cost of building the system and making it work well was done when it was private. Even now the best system in Tokyo, Tokyo Metro, is a joint venture by two different governments
On that same idea, I would love to see private buses replace the subway. There is a large van that takes 15-20 people from Queens to Chinatown that runs everyday 12 hours a day and it costs under $5.
Would love to see similar systems for Queens -> Times Square or Brooklyn -> wall street.
NYC has one of the highest combined state/city tax rates.. what the heck are we paying for, if not convenient, reliable subways. and they dare increase the fares.. ok that is fine IF you decrease the tax rates. You can't have your cake and eat it too.
What's most obscene is that no effort is made to compensate for lost trains on partially shutdown express/local lines. The mayor could fix that immediately by just demanding more service on the sections that run rather than forcing everyone into sardine cans. It's pretty clear that MTA is using repairs as an excuse to cut spending on service and are unlikely to ever run it at full capacity.
The system carried more passengers in the 40's. They did it by running trains more often. It's not rocket science.
Yeah, but the demand in the 40s had a completely different pattern from today's demand, so you can't just ramp up train frequency across the system and meet it.
The L train to Bedford Ave carries way more people now than it ever did in the 1940s, when Williamsburg was a modestly dense working-class neighborhood. On the other hand, those letter lines to outer Brooklyn are much less used today than they were in the 1940s, as are parts of the system in the Bronx. And, of course, there were elevated lines over Second and Third Avenues in the 1940s.
The parts of the system that run at crush capacity are already running with the highest possible train frequency. Some of the lines might not seem maxed out on headways, but they have to deal with interlining; the frequency of the F train can't be increased because the line it shares with the E train in Queens is fully loaded, etc.
It's not rocket science. It's just called CBTC and is what the MTA has on the L train line because it was in comparison built much more recently and is "simpler". You can't stack the old cars close together until they roll out all the CBTC upgrades, which is a massive engineering project. I don't think they're as efficient as they could be, but we shouldn't underestimate the amount of work.
To be fair, the 4/5 between Union Square and 125th St is a sardine can from 7-10 AM and 5-7 PM daily even when they run every 3 minutes or whatever the rush hour gap is.
New York's transport is baffling to me. The lack of a proper subway or special express train option to get quickly to the airports is doubly baffling. I guess the cross-state jurisdiction is one of the issues with Newark, but the AirTrain solution over at JFK is way subpar if compared to other major cities.
I've been there twice in a few months and it's simply a disaster. 2.5 hrs by car to get to Newark from Williamsburg at 2pm on a Friday. I wonder what rush hour looks like.
From Penn St you take the NJ Transit train to Newark airport, or the LIRR train to Jamaica where you transfer to the AirTrain which brings you to your desired terminal at JFK.
LaGuardia doesn't have a train option though.
But yeah, taking a car from Newark to Williamburg in the afternoon, I guess you've learned not to do that again. :) NJ Transit is your friend.
I think politicians in places like New York should lead by example and show us that much-hyped, long-awaited "smart government" before they angrily demand I support the latest government program.
I think a good response to the guy asking "What do you want, for us to make $15 an hour?" would be "No, but bringing you down to $50 an hour might be a reasonable starting point."
$50 an hour is $104k a year, figure MTA has not been hiring many people as their effective budget has shrunk, so what started as a low $100k salary has risen as their workforce ages.
>The pay for managers is even more extraordinary. The nearly 2,500 people who work in New York subway administration make, on average, $280,000 in salary, overtime and benefits. The average elsewhere is $115,000.
DC's system is pretty bad too. this morning I had to choose between a 50 minute commute via metro for $4, or a 20 minute Uber ride for $10. I'm so so glad I got the Uber.
"Make government programs work": An issue politicians seem incapable of prioritizing over giving the government dominion over more areas of American life.
The Europe vs US road/rail infrastructure debate is misinformed, woefully tired, and generally meaningless.
It's all state by state, or country by country anyway, and when we are specifically talking subways, it's city by city. It's at the city level that the debate leaves out of consideration the one city that is orders of magnitude above and beyond any other city in the world in terms of complexity and operational performance: Tokyo.
Forget the NY Subway, forget London's Tube, forget the Paris Metro or the Berlin U-Bahn, or the Hong Kong MRT for that matter... Everyone's attention should be focused on really understanding the Tokyo system and how it works.
NYC has 25 services over 20+- lines (depending on how you count.) That doesn't include PATH nor does it include Airtrain or any of the commuter lines that connect to the system and are part of the greater transit network.
Tokyo, when you really look at the whole interconnected system of rapid transit, and not the small part that is arbitrary, and IMHO incorrectly, called the "subway," (referring to the Tokyo Metro and Toei lines generally situated within the Yamanote circle,) you have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of services over hundreds and hundreds of lines...
The fact that all of these lines run on time to the second, with well maintained trains, with well maintained stations, with clear and up-to-date communications, with service focused on the passenger... Tokyo should be the model for the world.
I love Toronto, but its subways (and transit as a whole) need improvement as well. Not just that, council seems hell-bent on throwing 3+ billion dollars down the morass that's the Scarborough extension.
That's almost entirely just to pay the interest on the debt, they're not actually trying to reduce the debt itself.
See the first NYT article:
> Every second of every day, the M.T.A. pays $83 in interest. That’s $7.1 million in 24 hours; for the year, a total of $2.603 billion. Those costs consume 16 percent of the transit agency’s budget, nearly three times as much as in 2002, according to the state comptroller, Thomas P. DiNapoli.
Is that bad? The real problem is when you're stuck only paying the interest, and the debt increases. If you were to buy something on your credit card, you're spending most of your money to pay down the debt - but that's not particularly a problem unless you're living above your means.
The alternative - to wait until you've accumulated enough cash to build a bus depot - seems kind of a bad idea.
I've never been to New York and I've don't know much about the subway system but I was watching a documentary recently that showed they were building some new platforms underneath Grand Central station. I think from memory they were also building new lines to cope with the massive stress the service is under, so it looks like these problems are trying to be resolved?
Grand Central is having new platforms built for the Long Island Railroad (LIRR), which is a commenter train system that is separate from the subway system.
From the article it sounds like a big problem is politicians are (for understandable reasons) happy to allocate money for new platforms or new lines, but not allocating enough funding to the maintenance and signalling that keeps the trains running.
On return from a trip to Norway last week, I was shocked at how shabby, dirty, and poorly-maintained JFK is in comparison to the Oslo Airport. No doubt the New York subways are in serious trouble, but I'd encourage journalists in New York to take an even broader look at the deterioration of public assets and services throughout the city.
[+] [-] notmtaemployee|8 years ago|reply
Politicians should be pushing for serious procurement and labor work rule reforms, otherwise the systemic managerial and operational deficiencies will ensure that the deterioration of service we see now will repeat it self in 5 to 10 years, regardless of how much money or technology is poured into the MTA.
London and Toronto have been able to modernize much of their transit systems in last 5 years and its not because they have more money. Once you fix the top everything else will fall into place.
Look what Andy Byford has been able to do in 4 short years at the TTC. His 5-Year Plan to modernize the TTC focused on transforming corporate culture and updating internal processes, in addition to new equipment. The results of these changes have been overwhelmingly positive with the TTC recently being named best public transit agency in North America and The TR Class of TTC subway cars in May having a MDBF of over 924,000 miles.
If your interested in getting involved with transit activism in NYC I highly suggest you follow @2AvSagas on twitter.
[+] [-] flexie|8 years ago|reply
Most airports, most of the interstate highway network, most subway systems, bridges, tunnels, and dams were built from the 1930s and on to the 1970s. The railroads are even older.
And after that; Silence. It's like you didn't even care to maintain it.
First time I arrived in America, I was taken aback by how old and run down everything was. The only places in Europe I had seen worse roads were in Eastern Europe shortly after the fall of the Wall. In the middle of Manhattan some streets were in a state that in Europe you would only witness in the Balkans or in rural areas. The airports and the link from airports to the city were even worse. The subways didn't even have info tables saying when the next train would arrive. At the same time in Europe, many cities were switching to driver-less trains.
Clearly, the US could afford to expand and maintain the infrastructure. And the US is usually on the forefront of technology. So it's about priority, more than ability. Public infrastructure is just not prioritized that much in the US.
[+] [-] Chathamization|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bogomipz|8 years ago|reply
Did you read the article? The problems began in the 1995 under Governor George Patakis administration. Cuomo has only been in office for 6 years.
[+] [-] masklinn|8 years ago|reply
TBF NYC does have the exceptional — almost unique — feature that it runs 24/7.
[+] [-] michaelhoffman|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rayiner|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] harryh|8 years ago|reply
If it was a city controlled thing it would be a huge huge issue in every single mayoral election. But it gets somewhat drowned out in governor elections.
[+] [-] notmtaemployee|8 years ago|reply
The city retaking control of subway raises the question of who will pay for the operation and capital costs. The MTA derives allot of its funding from tolls through the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority which generated $1.8 Billion in 2016. It's unlikely the state will give TBTA back as well.
[+] [-] matt_wulfeck|8 years ago|reply
I know this isn’t the primary reason the subway is falling into disrepair, but it’s clearly a symptom of a system that lacks real accountability. There has to be some reasonable push back to compensation (backed ultimately by the tax payers of New York) that is tied to real performance and efficiency.
[+] [-] greggman|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] specialp|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lmm|8 years ago|reply
Also a lot of the value created by a subway shows in land values rather than being captured directly in fares - the article says the MTA is 60% funded by fares which is high but, well, not 100%. You need a mechanism for those who benefit (i.e. owners of buildings near subway stations) to fund the subways. In some countries the transport authority will essentially own large shopping mall complexes around each station and fund the subway that way; in Japan employers often pay for workers' subway tickets.
[+] [-] MagnumOpus|8 years ago|reply
However, it doesn't work in London. There are a dozen train franchises, remnants of the privatized and sliced-up British Rail system. They are all atrocious in service quality, frequency, capacity and usually price when compared to the parts of the system that were never privatised (the Underground) or that were renationalised (the Overground).
[+] [-] indoordinosaur|8 years ago|reply
I can't see NY selling off their subway to a private entity anytime soon but what if a Mayor allowed MTR or another corporation to come in and build a competing line in some part of the city? The amazingly efficient new line might light a fire under the ass of the broader NYC subway to start operating more efficiently. Or as the new line begins to make more profit it could buy NYC lines one by one until it's running most of it. This way the debt bomb of the MTA won't destroy the city because it won't affect all major transit lines.
[+] [-] Larrikin|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AznHisoka|8 years ago|reply
Would love to see similar systems for Queens -> Times Square or Brooklyn -> wall street.
[+] [-] alphonsegaston|8 years ago|reply
No such culture exists in the US.
[+] [-] rhizome|8 years ago|reply
The particular competitive business environment in the US makes it almost impossible.
[+] [-] AznHisoka|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kevin_thibedeau|8 years ago|reply
The system carried more passengers in the 40's. They did it by running trains more often. It's not rocket science.
[+] [-] raspbian99|8 years ago|reply
The L train to Bedford Ave carries way more people now than it ever did in the 1940s, when Williamsburg was a modestly dense working-class neighborhood. On the other hand, those letter lines to outer Brooklyn are much less used today than they were in the 1940s, as are parts of the system in the Bronx. And, of course, there were elevated lines over Second and Third Avenues in the 1940s.
The parts of the system that run at crush capacity are already running with the highest possible train frequency. Some of the lines might not seem maxed out on headways, but they have to deal with interlining; the frequency of the F train can't be increased because the line it shares with the E train in Queens is fully loaded, etc.
[+] [-] apaprocki|8 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications-based_train_con...
[+] [-] nerdponx|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] camillomiller|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] crazygringo|8 years ago|reply
From Penn St you take the NJ Transit train to Newark airport, or the LIRR train to Jamaica where you transfer to the AirTrain which brings you to your desired terminal at JFK.
LaGuardia doesn't have a train option though.
But yeah, taking a car from Newark to Williamburg in the afternoon, I guess you've learned not to do that again. :) NJ Transit is your friend.
[+] [-] leifaffles|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fencepost|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] StudentStuff|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nova22033|8 years ago|reply
I know this is NYC but wow..
[+] [-] dzonga|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dajohnson89|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] leifaffles|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] theYipster|8 years ago|reply
It's all state by state, or country by country anyway, and when we are specifically talking subways, it's city by city. It's at the city level that the debate leaves out of consideration the one city that is orders of magnitude above and beyond any other city in the world in terms of complexity and operational performance: Tokyo.
Forget the NY Subway, forget London's Tube, forget the Paris Metro or the Berlin U-Bahn, or the Hong Kong MRT for that matter... Everyone's attention should be focused on really understanding the Tokyo system and how it works.
NYC has 25 services over 20+- lines (depending on how you count.) That doesn't include PATH nor does it include Airtrain or any of the commuter lines that connect to the system and are part of the greater transit network.
Tokyo, when you really look at the whole interconnected system of rapid transit, and not the small part that is arbitrary, and IMHO incorrectly, called the "subway," (referring to the Tokyo Metro and Toei lines generally situated within the Yamanote circle,) you have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of services over hundreds and hundreds of lines...
The fact that all of these lines run on time to the second, with well maintained trains, with well maintained stations, with clear and up-to-date communications, with service focused on the passenger... Tokyo should be the model for the world.
[+] [-] flyGuyOnTheSly|8 years ago|reply
After thinking it through, I realized that I had ridden that exact same subway car in the past.
It was a recommissioned car from Toronto!
So they're obviously doing something to try and save money.
It really made me question my own city's transit system as well.
How could NYC make do with something that Toronto thought was worth getting rid of?
[+] [-] victor106|8 years ago|reply
NYC should learn something from Toronto and London. They have the best subway systems IMHO.
[+] [-] polymath21|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] allengeorge|8 years ago|reply
[rant over]
[+] [-] m_ke|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mabbo|8 years ago|reply
We just need to expand the system further. The Eglinton line and the Finch LRT will help.
[+] [-] Kurtz79|8 years ago|reply
Cleaner, more modern, frequent trains, less delays.
[+] [-] melling|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arikrak|8 years ago|reply
See the first NYT article:
> Every second of every day, the M.T.A. pays $83 in interest. That’s $7.1 million in 24 hours; for the year, a total of $2.603 billion. Those costs consume 16 percent of the transit agency’s budget, nearly three times as much as in 2002, according to the state comptroller, Thomas P. DiNapoli.
https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/11/16/nyregion/subway-new-yo...
[+] [-] trothamel|8 years ago|reply
The alternative - to wait until you've accumulated enough cash to build a bus depot - seems kind of a bad idea.
[+] [-] sovnade|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pattle|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] matt4077|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] a_c_s|8 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Side_Access
[+] [-] lmm|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chmaynard|8 years ago|reply