Comments on: And now they’re gone: station agents

By: Sharon Silver

Sharon Silver — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 01:52:17 +0000

The MTA needs to stand up to the unions and remove the dedicated door operators from the trains. The CONDUCTORS are no longer needs now that the new subway cars have controls and monitors are available for the train driver to also monitor the door operations. The same “eyes and ears” argument that is used to create fear in the public is being used. Conductors cost riders between $650-$700 million a year for a job function that is not needed. I’d rather see the money saved used to hire security guard rules enforcers to patrol stations and trains and issue tickets for littering, report station and train conditions hourly. We can not keep soaking the risers and tax payers and continue to support job fuctions that are not needed

By: Sharon Silver

Sharon Silver — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 01:47:42 +0000

This idea that station agents are the eyes and ears of the anything is a complete joke trumped up by the union ans the politicians they pay off with the union big campaign contribution war chest. Back in the early 1990′s when the average rider bought two tokens at at time the union and the straphangers campaign union shill organization were all over the local news saying how metrocard was going to lead to peoplegetting robbed as they took the cards out of their wallets. The real issue is that they knew that metrocard would reduce the need for hundreds of station agent(fare sellers) and it did. Look at most booths at major stations that are double wide.

By: Platform intercomes to improve station safety :: Second Ave. Sagas | A New York City Subway Blog

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 05:05:25 +0000

[...] days ago, the MTA started to eliminate station agents at numerous entrances throughout the system. In the buildup to this cost-saving measure, the agency [...]

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 18:38:30 +0000

What are the people that have strollers, bikes, packages, ect. supposed to do when the only clerk is across the street on the other side of the station?

Reflect on how for decades they didn’t care that the subway system was not wheelchair-accessible.

By: Kai

Kai — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 13:54:28 +0000

Those designations are also still used in documents by the MTA (eg. capital plans).

By: Andrew

Andrew — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 00:00:06 +0000

The title is misleading: station agents not gone. Every station still has at least one.

Some stations never had more than one. And I doubt any stations have, or had, so many that the entire platform was under full-time surveillance. At many stations, the agent can’t see any part of the platform!

The MTA didn’t place “eyes and ears” at the stations. The MTA and its predecessors placed people to sell fare media. That’s mostly done by machine now. The “eyes and ears” bit is just the fearmongering the station agents started using when they realized that their job was in jeopardy. Station agents are not and have never been security guards. They don’t have the training or the equipment that security guards need. Have past booth closures resulted in increased crime?

The Carroll St. issue was due to the temporary closure of the staffed entrance.

Would you prefer the cost savings to come through actual service cuts? I’d rather pay people to operate trains and buses than to sit in booths and do virtually nothing.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 23:40:38 +0000

Not even for a minute, to allow someone with large packages or a stroller (or a wheelchair!) to enter or exit?

I find that very hard to believe.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 23:39:24 +0000

I don’t think the “low” turnstiles are being locked up.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 23:37:42 +0000

The new General Manager program has five groups: IRT West, IRT East, IND, BMT, and IND/BMT. The old names are back, although they don’t mean quite what they used to.

By: Tony

Tony — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 22:31:12 +0000

So you’re saying it is the clerks responsibility to have maps in the booth? NO it is supervisions job. You know that the clerk has NOT reported the broken receptacle? How do you know this? Clerks are NOT supposed to turn off the alarm by managments rules!