Archive for September, 2011
Sep
30
DOT, New Jersey come to terms on ARC dollars
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s been almost a year since New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie canceled the ARC Tunnel and made a move to keep the federal dollars explicitly earmarked for the project. After months of wrangling between the government and Christie’s high-dollar attorneys, the two sides have come to an agreement, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said this afternoon. In the final settlement, New Jersey will return $95 million to feds while spending a significant portion of the rest on DOT-approved projects.
Per the DOT press release, the federal government will recover all of the $51 million in New Starts money provided to New Jersey for the ARC Project, and those funds will be made available to other areas for transit projects. The other $44 million were provided to New Jersey via the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and it will be returned to the U.S. Treasury. Furthermore, New Jersey must spent around $128 million it has from the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality project funds on transit-related projects that DOT approved and reviewed. I guess the remaining funds — approximately $48 million — will remain with the Garden State.
“We appreciate the support and encouragement of Senators Lautenberg and Menendez in reaching an agreement that is good for the taxpayers of New Jersey, but also helps to improve infrastructure in the state,” Secretary LaHood said. “I thank the governor and his legal team for reaching this agreement.” Now how about that Gateway tunnel or the 7 train to Secaucus?
Sep
30
Before the ALDS, a Nostalgic ride to the Bronx
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The Nostalgia Train will ferry straphangers from Grand Central to Yankee Stadium tonight. (Photo via MTA)
Another baseball post-season, another playoff appearance for our own New York Yankees. With the club’s 16th playoff berth over the past 17 seasons, the MTA is once again rolling out the Nostalgia Train for a timeless jaunt up to the Bronx. It’s become an annual tradition and one that attracts Yankee fanatics and railfans alike.
Tonght’s Nostalgia Train will be departing from the uptown express tracks at Grand Central at 7:15 sharp. It will stop at 59th, 86th, 125th, 138th and 149th Streets before arriving at Yankee Stadium. Transit will do it again tomorrow before Game 2 and ahead of Game 5 on Wednesday if the Yankees’ series with the Detroit Tigers makes it that far. This year’s Nostalgia Train consists of cars originally operated by the old Interborough Rapid Transit company from 1917 into the early 1960s. Be forewarned though: These vintage cars aren’t air conditioned.
Sep
30
North Shore options include light rail, bus improvements
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The MTA is consider light rail as a possible way to bring transit to Staten Island's North Shore. (Click to enlarge)
Could Staten Island be the home of New York City’s first true light rail line? Based on an analysis conducted by the MTA concerning ways to improve transportation along the borough’s North Shore, it very well might be.
The North Shore Alternatives Analysis, presented last week at Snug Harbor (and available here as a PDF), has been a long time coming. Nearly two years ago, the MTA announced a engineering study that would examine ways to reactivate transit along the old North Shore Rail Line right of way, and the agency started the Alternatives Analysis phase of the project in April 2010. New York’s Empire Development Corporation has called upon the MTA to reactivate the rail line, and now the MTA has whittled its options down to three.
The sexiest choice concerns a light rail network that would run from the Ferry Terminal to the West Shore Plaza. The 15-stop line is estimated to cost $581 million (in 2010 dollars) to construct and would improve travel times from St. George to West Shore Plaza by as much as 35 minutes. The MTA says that light rail would be ” more
compatible than heavy rail with potential plans for connecting services.” I optimistically take that to mean a connection across the Bayonne Bridge.
As far as the light rail details go, the Alternatives Analysis made a few assumptions. First, the Clifton Staten Island Railway shop could be modified to include light rail maintenance. Second, any work would have to include a new car wash, body shop and fueling station in Arlington.
The next option would involve tearing up any rail tracks, paving the right-of-way and turning it into an exclusive busway. By adding eight stops, this alternative could speed travel by as much as 33 minutes end-to-end, but it would carry a substantial price tag as well. The MTA estimates $352 million in capital costs, and for a only a busway, that seems excessive.
The third alternative is called the Transportation System Management. Similar to the required no-build option added to environmental impact statements, this alternative examines ways in which the MTA could improve service by essentially restructuring existing service but doing nothing else. For $37 million, TSM would improve travel times by a whopping 60 seconds.
So what happens next? The MTA is essentially trying to determine which of three alternatives will improve mobility while preserving and enhancing the North Shore’s environment, natural resources and open source and maximizing limited financial resources for the so-called greater public benefit. Over the next few months, the MTA will assess potential ridership figures, conduct traffic analysis for station sites and beging some conceptual engineering and cost refinements. It is, in essence, a pre-environmental impact review designed to identify the locally preferred alternative. They have already begun to solicit community feedback on this plan.
As a believer that no transit options are going to be faster than a dedicated rail line, I’d love to see the MTA pick light rail. It would provide a fast ride across Staten Island and the opportunity to connect into New Jersey. But of course, light rail would present its own set of challenges. New York City has no light rail infrastructure, and bringing it to Staten Island would require the MTA to build up from scratch a light rail support system. It’s not impossible, but for the current MTA, it’s ambitious.
Then there is the 800 pound gorilla in the room. I can see Staten Island becoming one of the MTA’s next great mega-projects, but it’s going to take some time. The $580 million (in today’s money) won’t materialize over night, and the MTA has to finish part of the Second Ave. Subway and the East Side Access project before funding another megaproject. Still, that a potential light rail line would cost something with millions at the end of it instead of billions could be its saving grace. Furthermore, New York City wants to redevelop Staten Island’s North Shore, and providing better transit is a key part of that plan. The dollars might somehow materialize.
So for now, there are rumblings of a plan. Nothing is concrete, but over the next few months and years, transit developments could come to Staten Island. It’s about time.
Sep
29
The next 25 stations to enjoy cell service are…
Posted by: | CommentsAs New Yorkers adjust to life in this new era of underground cell service, Transit Wireless is moving ahead with plans to equip the entire system within the next four years. That would allow New Yorkers — or at least those with AT&T and T-Mobile – to enjoy underground signals before Phase 1 of the Second Ave. Subway opens. Both of these projects are just, uh, zooming by.
Anyway, with the announcement of the six-station pilot earlier this week, Transit Wireless and the MTA said that 30-50 more Manhattan stations would be equipped with cell service within the next 12 months. Among those will be Times Square, Columbus Circle and Herald Square. Now, we learn what some of the remaining ones are. Drumroll please….
96th Street (1, 2, 3)
96th Street (B, C)
86th Street (1)
86th Street (B, C)
79th Street (1)
81 Street (B, C)
72nd Street (1, 2, 3)
72nd Street (B, C)
66th Street (1)
59th Street/Columbus Circle (1, A, C, B, D)
Fifth Avenue and 59th Street (N, R, Q)
57th Street (N, R, Q)
7th Av (E, B, D)
57th Street (F)
50th Street (C, E)
50th Street (1)
49th Street (N, R, Q)
47th-50th Streets/Rockefeller Center (B, D, F, M)
42nd Street/Times Square (1, 2, 3; A, C, E; N, R, Q)
34th Street/Herald Square (B, D, F, M; N, R, Q)
28th Street (1)
28th Street (N, R)
23rd Street (1)
23rd Street (N, R)
18th Street (1)
Unsurprisingly, these list of 25 features stations all in Manhattan and all south of 96th Street. That’s where the system’s more crowded stations are and where the call volume is likely to be highest. If implementation is successful there, it should be far easier elsewhere. I’m still working on finding the remaining 25.
And so as cell phone service begins to inch its way across the subway, I have to wonder what will happen first: underground mobile service for all or the opening of Phase 1 of the Second Ave. Subway? Transit Wireless says they’ll win the race, but with the MTA and its adventures in technology, anything can happen.
Sep
29
Times: Ward set to leave PA post
Posted by: | CommentsOver the next few weeks, Gov. Andrew Cuomo will have an opportunity to make a long and lasting impact on the New York City region’s transportation future for a week after Jay Walder is leaving the MTA, Chris Ward will resign as the Port Authority’s Executive Director, according to a report in The Times. Ward’s departure comes after months of speculation and seems to stem, as Walder’s did, in part, from a similarly icy relationship with the New York state governor. Neither Ward nor Cuomo offered a comment to The Times.
For the Governor, then, the challenge facing him is a tough one. As Michael Grynbaum writes, Ward earned accolades from the transit community. “Under his tenure,” he says, “the Port Authority froze its operating budget for three consecutive years, lowered its number of employees and reduced its budget for major capital improvement and maintenance projects.” Yet, similarly to Walder, Ward has also presided over some steep fare and toll increases and progress at the World Trade Center site, while moving forward, is very slow.
Despite this legacy though, Ward had, as Kate Slevin from the Tri-State Transportation Campaign noted, a “very strong and convincing case for more investment in our infrastructure,” and Cuomo will now have to find not one but two people who are both qualified and willing enough to enter the New York City area transportation morass. It will not be an easy task.
Sep
29
Thoughts on Walder’s last dance
Posted by: | CommentsWednesday morning marked the beginning of the end for Jay Walder, the outgoing Chairman and CEO of the MTA. Yesterday, the Hong Kong-bound transit expert presided over his final MTA Board meeting, and the last part of the meeting was a veritable love-fest. Walder’s fellow board members all wished him luck in his future endeavors, and nearly all of them praised his leadership. I couldn’t help but feel that the kind words were premature.
The praise came fast and easy. “You are the best transportation operator on the planet,” Mark Lebow said. Patrick Foye echoed that praise: “At a time when public and private sector is in retrenchment, you were able to develop new initiatives that made a significant impact on the public and community.” Charles Moerdler, a fairly recent MTA appointee, praised Walder for his willingness to respond to complaints about service in his home borough of the Bronx.
The lone dissenting voice came from Norman Brown. The holdover appointee who is a strong friend of labor rightly criticized Walder for both leaving too soon and creating a strong sense of conflict between management and the authority’s labor forces. Walder, said Brown, isn’t through with the job, but he’s leaving nonetheless.
Walder himself deflected certain questions surrounding his departure. He insisted that he has a good relationship with Gov. Andrew Cuomo despite unsourced reports to the contrary, and he said that the lure of the job in Hong Kong pushed him to take it. He also spoke about any potential predecssor. “Whoever runs this organization should be dedicated to the organization,” he said. That person has to be “edicated to what it does on a day-to-day basis. I think it is helpful to have a knowledge of mass transit. I don’t know that it’s an absolutely essential quality.”
These statements seemed to be echoing sentiments from the Governor himself. “To me,” Cuomo said to Transportation Nation, “the management is very important. Of course, the technical expertise, but you give me a good manager, who can run an organization, and find efficiency, that this organization is going to have to find, that’s going to be paramount.” It sounds as though the governor wants someone who is at least as strong on leadership and creative management as they are on transit planning. That does not bode well for the TWU.
But the real question surrounding Walder’s departure is one of public effectiveness. During the meeting yesterday, one of the MTA Board members — I didn’t see who — issued some high praise: “You have left this place much better than when you came in.” That statement raised my eyebrow. I don’t disagree with it, but I’m not sure the public agrees.
The MTA’s problem right now is one of external perception vs. internal reality. During Walder’s two-year tenure, the MTA has streamlined a significant portion of its operations, and it has come to embrace technological innovations while moving stalled projects forward. It’s budget is leaner than it was half a decade ago, and the agency has programs in place to realize more savings. Anyone looking at it from the inside will see improvements.
Yet, to Joe and Jane Straphanger — the folks who just want their trains to come frequently, run smoothly and have seats for them — the system isn’t really better off. Headways are longer; the bus network is becoming less reliable and convenient; the subways cost more and trains are more crowded. We’re paying more and waiting longer for less service. Does that mean the MTA is better off today than it was before Jay Walder showed up? Publicly, at least, that’s a tough argument to make.
The next MTA head, whoever that may be, has his or her work cut out for them. That person will have to address a combative union, an obstinate legislature and a gaping hole in the capital budget. He or she will have to deal with rising debt costs and the desire to move the system forward. For the public, at least, “better off” might be slipping further out of hand, and the next MTA CEO will have some mighty high expectations to live up to.
Sep
28
Zoetrope of the Day: Union Square in Motion
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Union Square in Motion is the world's largest digital linear zoetrope (Photo via Joshua Spodek)
I wonder how many transit systems can say they are home to two life-sized zoetropes. While Manhattan-bound riders on the B and Q have long spied the Masstransiscope just east of the Manhattan Bridge, straphangers passing through Union Square can now marvel at the world’s largest digital linear zoetrope.
As part of a temporary Arts for Transit installation, the MTA along with a professor from Parsons the New School of Design and his students unveiled “Union Square in Motion” earlier this week. Consisting of abstract and organic images, the scenes move as subway riders walk past the display. The installation is similar to a project designer Joshua Spodek and his team installed in Bryant Park last year.
“When you see two strangers stop to look then start talking to each other, amazed at the art they’re seeing in the subway, you realize what art can do to create community and draw people together,” Spodek said.
The display is current housed in a temporarily vacant retail space outside of the fare control area and below the Food Emporium along 14th Street east of Fourth Avenue. “These works of art will be shown in series, so subway riders will get a fresh visual treat each time they walk through the station,” Lester Burg, Program Manager for MTA Arts for Transit, explained. For more on the project, check out Spodek’s website. I’ve embedded a behind-the-scenes video of the installation process after the jump. Read More→
Sep
28
Port Jervis Line repairs to total $50 million
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Twisted rails and eroded track beds mark the Port Jervis line. Photo by Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Hilary Ring.
The restoration of the MTA’s little-used Port Jervis Line in the aftermath of damage inflicted upon it by Hurricane Irene will cost the cash-strapped agency $50 million, Metro-North said earlier this week. Furthermore, the railroad does not anticipate returning to a full timetable until the Fall of 2012, over a year after the storm.
“We are committed to restoring the Port Jervis Line as quickly as possible. It is an important part of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s regional network,” MRN President Howard Permut said earlier this week. “In the meantime, Metro-North has marshaled the resources of MTA Bus to provide alternative service during reconstruction and Metro-North forces are building access roads to the tracks to literally lay the groundwork for the outside contractor.”
According to initial engineering assessments, approximately 90 percent of the repair work will involve replacing stones and trackbed washed away over a 14-mile stretch from Suffern to Harriman. In the aftermath of the flooding, over 50 washouts destroyed over two miles of the MTA’s right-of-way. The remainder of the work will involved repairs to the signal system.
As Metro-North said, “Water infiltration and erosion of the right-of-way have undermined circuit houses, signal cases and associated battery wells. In many areas, signal and fiber optic cables have been exposed and must be reburied and tested.” All told, the MTA is trying to restore service between Harriman and Suffern first before implementing repairs that will usher a return to the old timetable.
With a lofty pricetag and low ridership — only 2800 people per day use the Port Jervis line — many have wondered if this expenditure is a good use of MTA funds. Between the busing service and repairs, the total bill will top $60 million, and while the authority believes FEMA and insurance will cover some of the costs, they’ll have to foot part of the bill out of their dwindling cash reserves. As I said a few weeks ago, will the MTA take advantage of an opportunity or just throw money at a lesser-used commuter line?
Sep
28
Assessing the impact of the 2010 service changes
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When the MTA announced its sweeping subway service changes last year, the news was, by and large, bad for straphangers. With the V and W chopped, the G train scaled back and load guidelines adjusted to allow for less frequent service, I assumed that most subway riders would feel the pain of the service cuts. The only winners would be those folks from the Middle Village area who could enjoy a one-seat ride into Midtown on the rerouted M train.
Over a year later, the MTA has unveiled its findings on the impact of the service cuts, and the claims are fairly sweeping. First, as I’ve noted in the past, bus ridership has suffered the most. In the wake of the cuts, it’s down across every borough. In fact, subway ridership increased in the year following the cuts by approximately 0.3 percent, but bus ridership declined significantly. The MTA says the economy, demographics changes and fare hikes may be to blame, but as bus routes have become longer and more circuitous and frequency diminished, ridership will flee for more reliable and speedier routes.
On the subway front, the MTA says that 95 percent of all riders were “unaffected or minimally affected.” That’s a fairly bold claim all things considered, and anecdotally at least, it seems to be one that may be tough to sustain. Particularly during off-peak hours, train waits have been longer and trains more crowded. That combination might not make people head aboveground for expensive cab rides or longer walks, but it certainly makes a commute less pleasant. Subway ridership might increase but begrudgingly so.
The part of Transit’s report concerning the cuts though focused on the M/V switch and the reactivation of the Chrystie Street Cut. I thought the M switch would prove to be quite popular, and the numbers seemed to bear out that intuition. Overall M ridership was up by about five percent from September – November 2010 as compared with the same period the year before, and total ridership along the J/M/Z Middle Village-to-Williamsburg segment was up by over six percent. M trains are now at 86 percent of their load guidelines as compared with 66 percent the year before. Transit believes the increase is due in part to former L train riders opting for a one-seat ride on the M instead. I’d like to know if the M rerouting has increased property value along the one-seat ride.
Meanwhile, the one big sore spot among F train riders hasn’t seen much of a decline. A few vocal East Village and Alphabet City residents bemoaned the lack of a second train at Second Ave., and the station saw a slight dip in passengers. However, at Essex/Delancey, average weekday entries increased by over 4500, more than making up for the 363-person decline at Second Ave. Those closer to Essex/Delancey simply shifted their commute patterns.
With any winner comes a loser, and the Southern Brooklyn lines that no longer enjoyed both the M and R service suffered though. Ridership numbers along 4th Ave. did not decline, but R train loads are now at 69 percent of the guidelines as compared with 48 percent beforehand. Queens Boulevard riders who have to take the 480-foot-long M trains as opposed to the 600-foot-long V trains have noticed some additional crowding as well.
Ultimately, this slate of numbers offers us a peak into the impact of the service changes. The MTA, of course, wants to spin this as positively as possible, but the truth is that we have fewer trains and less frequent service today than we did 16 months ago. These trains aren’t coming back anytime soon, and no matter what the numbers say, New Yorkers as a whole all lose out because of that.
Sep
27
It’s cellmageddon in New York as mobile service heads underground!
Posted by: | CommentsIt is a day of reckoning for New Yorkers who have long enjoyed the quietude, peacefulness and tranquility of the New York City Subway system for today is the day that the dreaded cell service reaches underground. Panic in the subways! Rude conversations! Cell rage! Cats and dogs living together! It’s the end of the world as we know it!
Okay, okay, okay. It’s not going to be that bad, but after reading news coverage of this event, you may be forgiven for thinking so. Everyone from CBS to The Wall Street Journal to The Times is reporting this story as though 200 stations and hundreds of miles of subway tracks aren’t aboveground with cell service. Clyde Haberman, tongue firmly in cheek, even called it the dying gasp of civilization. That honor, I believe, belongs to people who don’t know how to use the volume controls on their iPods, but I digress.
The news is, well, not new. Since 2007, the MTA and Transit Wireless has tried to equip six stations in Chelsea and along 14th Street with cell service, and after stops and starts, the pilot officially went live today at the following stations:
- A, C, E station at Eighth Avenue and West 14th Street;
- L station at Eighth Avenue and West 14th Street;
- C, E station at Eighth Avenue and West 23rd Street;
- 1, 2, 3 station at Seventh Avenue and West 14th Street;
- F, M station at Sixth Avenue and West 14th Street;
- L station at Sixth Avenue and West 14th Street.
The signal, while not strong in the tunnel, reportedly can span stations. Jamie Shupak from NY1 said she had full bars to 34th Street during her ride today.
Transit Wireless had originally said that the pilot would go live in mid-2012, and the MTA praised the company for exceeding expectations. “Bringing wireless service into our subway system is the latest milestone in the MTA’s effort to use technology to improve the service we provide for our customers,” \MTA Chairman and CEO Jay H. Walder said. “Whether you’re checking your email, calling your kids or looking for emergency assistance, wireless service will bring the conveniences we’re used to throughout our lives into the subway system.”
Moving forward, Transit Wireless is aiming to provide service in the remaining 271 underground stations before 2015 is out. The next 30 stations — including Times Square Herald Square and Columbus Circle — will be along the west side of Manhattan, mostly in Midtown, and they should be cell-ready within the next 12 months.
Using fiber nodes and a signal delivery system, Transit Wireless is now providing AT&T and T-Mobile service underground. It is a neutral host, though, and hopes to sign up the remaining wireless carriers soon. Currently, the company and carriers are paying 100 percent of the costs of the project, and that total covers the Transit forces that provide flagging, protection and support services. The MTA will split occupancy fee revenues and sub-licenses. “Transit Wireless has created a win-win-win scenario in the New York City subway system,” Transit Wireless CEO William A. Bayne Jr. said. “Commuters have improved access to communication; the MTA realizes additional revenue and the wireless carriers can provide added value to their customers.”
From a ridership perspective, that’s all good news. The MTA makes money while straphangers now have access to data services and cell capabilities underground. That commute won’t be dead time that may hinder productivity. The news media though has tried to turn this into some apocalypse of rudeness. “I’m planning to be more annoyed on the subway,” Chris Wancura said to The Journal.
Others echoed that complaint. “There was always something about transportation – planes, trains, subways – that no one could get in touch with you. And that was a relief,” Abby Stokes bemoaned. “Now they can.”
From quotes to headlines that suggested cell service is only now arriving in the subway, the coverage looked very Manhattan-centric this week. As a native of the island who now lives in Brooklyn, I’ve seen this battle between the so-called City and so-called Outer Boroughs unfold frequently and from both sides. With transportation policy and improvement stories, though, it creates a problematic dichotomy.
In parts of Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx and Staten Island, cell service has long been a part of the commute. Take the 7 to Flushing and folks are on the phones the entire way. Journey to Coney Island, and cell phone patter is just another sound. Some people hate it; some people tune it out. By and large though, most talkers are polite enough to hold conversations at a respectable volume. The world has not ended as cell phones have invaded.
But now it’s come to Manhattan, the purview of newspapers and journalists who don’t need to cross a river. This type of coverage creates a very us-versus-them atmosphere. It’s why newspapers give only perfunctory coverage of poor intra-borough, non-Manhattan transits options. It’s why people scoff at the pipe dream of a TriboroRX line and why the G train is looked down upon by those who do not ride it very frequently. No one is championing these causes in the pages of the paper that matter because for these papers, it’s about Manhattan first and everything else second. The cohesion of a transit network that spans five boroughs is often missing from that news coverage.
Perhaps I’m being too sensitive. Perhaps reporters are just writing what their readers want to hear. Perhaps cell coverage underground — something that seemed technologically impossible for years — is just that much of a novelty. But now that people on the other end of the phone from those in the subway in Manhattan can hear them now, how about the rest of us?
