Archive for December, 2011
Dec
13
Photo: Art for Second Avenue
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Art at the new 63rd Street station will evoke the former Second Avenue elevated trains.
I’ve been sitting on this one for a couple of weeks, but it’s still timely. A few weeks ago in The Wall Street Journal, Jennifer Maloney profiled my favorite under-the-radar MTA department. She highlighted the upcoming plans for art installations at the MTA’s new stations. Along the 7 line extension and underneath Second Ave., the authority will soon have four blank canvases, and they’re planning new art for each station.
She writes:
As subway riders descend the escalator into a new 7 line station near 10th Avenue and 34th Street in 2013, they will be followed by a mosaic of brightly colored celestial orbs shining from a deep blue sky. At a planned Second Avenue subway stop at 63rd Street, the walls will display photographs evoking the elevated trains that once rumbled above. And a station at 96th Street will feature line drawings fired onto ceramic tiles, playing with perspectives as travelers move through the space.
The designs are part of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s plan to make each of its new subway stations on the extended 7 line and new Second Avenue line a massive work of public art. Building on the MTA’s nearly three-decade history of enlivening subway and commuter rail stations with mosaics and sculpture, the agency has commissioned art that accompanies riders from the sidewalk to the platform and helps shape spaces that haven’t yet been built.
The effort is ongoing: The MTA last week issued a call for artists for the Second Avenue line’s 72nd Street station. “It’s very exciting,” said Sandra Bloodworth, director of the MTA’s Arts for Transit and Urban Design program, who, along with the artists, discussed details of the projects for the first time. “It’s three New Yorkers, three visions. I think that reflects the subway; it reflects our ridership.”
As Maloney notes, the MTA allocates a small portion of the construction costs to artwork. The new installations are expected to cost between $900,000 and a $1 million each and are a part of projects that will cost a few billion dollars each. It’s a great program that livens up the subways, turning them into the city’s most extensive art gallery. Check out Maloney’s piece for more renderings of the upcoming art. Jean Shin’s work at 63rd St., which, according to Maloney, will “depict the 1942 dismantling of the Second Avenue elevated line and the opening of the sky over an area accustomed to rumbling and shadows,” sounds particularly intriguing.
Dec
12
With $320 million gone, cheering the wrong thing
Posted by: | CommentsWith nary a public hearing, a commissioned study or much advanced warning, Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the MTA Payroll Tax repeal into law yesterday afternoon. With the stroke of the pen, the Governor has followed in the footsteps of his predecessors who refused to guard the MTA’s dedicated revenue funds, and he stripped $320 million in annual funding from the MTA’s budget. It was a dark, dark day for the city’s five million daily straphangers who rely on constant service and affordable fares to power the city’s and the state’s economy.
As the dust settles from last week’s surprise announcement concerning this revenue stream, transit advocates remain dismayed. Cuomo, as Transportation Nation’s Jim O’Grady and Colby Hamilton noted, claims the lost money will be replaced “dollar for dollar.” That’s a lofty claim for a governor who has silenced congestion pricing supporters and seems disinclined to invest in transit. Will that money be replaced on a one-time basis for 2012? Will Cuomo identify a new semi-permanent revenue stream that will help shore up the MTA’s budget? Right now, no one knows.
Even before the ink dried on the bill, though, State officials, nearly all from the Republican Party, were toasting the end of this so-called “job-killing” tax. It’s a tiring and wrong point, one I’ve debated numerous times over the past few years, but that didn’t stop the usual gang of New Yorkers from patting themselves on the back. “I want to thank Governor Cuomo and my legislative colleagues for their partnership to help begin repealing the job-killing MTA Payroll Tax,” Sen. Lee Zeldin, one of the most egregious payroll tax opponents said. “The MTA Payroll Tax has been damaging our economy and restricting the growth of quality jobs in New York. Repealing this tax for all small businesses and schools, and reducing the rate for others, spurs real economic development and helps put New York State on the path towards prosperity.”
“The MTA payroll tax has been an enormous burden on businesses and today we are lifting that burden. More than 290,000 small businesses will now have a greater opportunity to invest in their businesses and invest in creating new jobs,” Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos said.
The one Democrat who offered a comment seemed to fail to understand the role transit funding plays in the region. “The reduction and, in some cases, elimination of the payroll tax is a step in the right direction,” Assemblyman Kevin Cahill said “I have been fighting against this unfair tax since its inception, and this brings us closer to doing away with it entirely. While the MTA is important to our state and plays a significant role in our economy, the payroll tax placed an undue burden on underserved Hudson Valley communities, making them responsible for a system from which they receive no benefits.”
No benefits! Hudson Valley, a part of New York State, which is largely supported by New York City, which relies on the MTA for economic success, supposedly receives no benefits from the MTA. It’s a laughable thing to claim in public, and I have to wonder what Assemblyman Cahill thinks of his constituents’ collective intelligence.
Even without such absurd statements from Hudson Valley, Zeldin’s claims hit closer to home. Somehow, funding the MTA is “damaging our economy and restricting the growth of quality jobs in New York.” Zeldin should talk to Brooklyn merchants who see their business decline by 80 percent when the MTA doesn’t provide adequate transit service to their areas. Perhaps Zeldin should read Charles Komanoff’s assessment of the impact of the tax cut. He argues how the $320 million in lost revenue will make travel slower and our roads more congested as transit cutbacks drive subway riders to more frequent use of cars and cabs. That — and not some job-starved desolate landscape — is the future of the city without an adequately funded MTA.
Now that suburban interests have succeeded in rolling back over a fifth of the MTA’s projected payroll tax revenue, the answer should be simple: Make the suburban counties pay for it. As long as the city and its business owners continue to pay the payroll tax, the money should prop up New York City Transit’s buses and subways first and the commuter rails later, if there’s enough left to spread around. Then, perhaps, these suburban representatives will start to learn how much the MTA means to them and their constituents. That — or some congestion pricing plan with dedicated transit revenues — seems to me to be the only far way to ensure that key services are maintained in light of an even higher and more crushing debt.
Dec
12
Photo: The Henry Hudson Bridge turns 75
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Looking from the Bronx, the final crown piece is placed at the center of the plate-girder, steel arch. New York Central Railroad tracks (now Metro-North) continued operating during construction. The small railroad bridge in the distance belonged to Grand Central Railroad and today is used by Amtrak. Photographer unknown. July 8, 1936.
Throughout elementary and high school, I rode over the Henry Hudson Bridge on a daily basis until I started taking the subway up to the Bronx. The span, seemingly forever under construction, is one of the city’s more minimalist bridges with no sweeping suspension cables or iconic brick work. With a northbound upper level and southbound lower level, it simply does the job, and today, it turns 75.
As part of its birthday celebration, the MTA is opening up its trove of historic photos for the public to see. Beginning today, the Riverdale Public Library will host an exhibit of more than a dozen Depression-era exhibits of the construction of the bridge and the land around it at the time. The 800-foot bridge, which opened in 1936, was the world’s longest plate-girder, fixed arch bridge at the time and was constructed by Robert Moses in an era when driving was a leisure-time activity.
“We are pleased to share some of the thousands of historic photos from our Special Archive in celebration of the Henry Hudson Bridge,” said MTA Bridges and Tunnels President Jim Ferrara. “The Henry Hudson was originally designed for leisurely weekend drives but through the decades has evolved into a vital transportation connection in the tri-state region, linking New York City and the northern suburbs.”
At the time, Moses faced opposition to the bridge mostly from those underwriters who believed motorists would not pay a 10-cent crossing fee with the free Broadway bridge mere blocks away, but the master planner knew that the views of the Palisades would make it a popular crossing for weekend drivers. The lower level opened 18 months later in 1938, and the price tag for the entire bridge was just $5 million.
Today, around 63,000 cars per day cross the Henry Hudson Bridge, and the MTA is amidst a $33 million rehab project that will see the original steel curb stringers that brace the upper level replaced. The MTA last year wrapped an $86 million rehab that saw the lower level completely replaced and the pedestrian walkway refurbished. “All of this work is being done to make sure that the bridge remains as strong as it was the day it opened and for many decades to come,” Facility Engineer Walter Hickey said in a statement.
After the jump, another glimpse at the Henry Hudson Bridge under construction. Read More→
Dec
12
Video: Inside the GCT Apple Store
Posted by: | CommentsI didn’t have a chance on Friday to swing by the Apple Store in Grand Central. Even though my office is a few blocks away, the day just slipped away from me. Over the weekend, with Santacon descending upon the city and vistors flocking to the new store, Grand Central looked like a madhouse, and it’ll probably stay that way through the end of the holiday season. So if crowds aren’t your thing, beware.
The MTA, though, in an effort to highlight the new store and combat some lunacy from our politicians, can take you on a tour. On Friday afternoon, the authority released the above video on YouTube. It features Jeffrey Rosen, the MTA Director of Real Estate, discussing the way the new store fits in with the historic train station. His defense of the new store is more subtle than Pete Donohue’s, which properly chides our politicians for pettiness even as they allow the state to strip MTA funding with nary a protest.
Even if Apple products aren’t your thing, the new store allows for some great views of the main hall at Grand Central that were formerly limited only to patrons of Metrazur. For the views alone, it’ll be worth it to check out the space once the crowds die down.
Dec
12
On the need to focus on transit designs
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Once upon a time, subway stations were architectural marvels. (Photo by Benjamin Kabak)
The history of architectural design and the New York City subways is a tortured one. The system’s nicest station was also its first, and it’s been all downhill since then. Maybe that’s why New Yorkers have such a love-hate relationship with the subway system that powers the city’s economy and why straphangers are so dismissive of their underground atmospheres.
When the first subway stop opened at City Hall, it was an architectural marvel. With sweeping Guastavino arches, the Heins & LaFarge-designed station eventually landed on the National Register of Historic Places, but no other station in the system looks like it for one reason: cost. It was far too expensive for the city to build such ornate complexes at every stop, and instead, the IRT builders adapted a cheaper mosaic-based tiling. Today, many of those stations are in need of repair and, as a result of their depths, suffer from water damage. The tiling and mosaics, though, are historic reminders of the early days of construction.
Over the years, subsequent builders maintained tiling to a point. The IND stations used a complicated color pattern to mark various stations, but eventually, pragmatic concerns over cost and so-called modern designs turned new subway stops into giant nothings. The Archer Ave. extension stations are unforgettable, but at least they’re not bright orange like the 1970s reworking of Bowling Green. The “experimental” redesign at 49th Street also dates from the 1970s. It is not a proud moment in subway history.
Today's modern subway stations are more evocative of sterile hospitals than anything else. (Photo by Benjamin Kabak)
Finally, in the modern era, stations are simply bland. The new South Ferry terminal is a sterile white room, and the Second Ave. Subway stations, based on early renderings, look to be more of the same. While I’d say that a few billion dollars doesn’t go that far when it comes to design, the MTA will point to the Second Ave. stations as examples of current design. They stations are wide, spacious, airy and ADA compliant. Beauty is in the ey of the beholder.
But what of the architectural community? Recently, Mark Lamster, writing at The Design Observer Group’s Observer Room blog pondered the lack of attention paid to transit design. While public pedestrian plazas and bike lanes have received the bulk of the attention, we continue to ignore the way the subway system looks. He writes:
Progressive members of the design community love cycling, and I think not just because it is a healthful and environmentally sustainable mode of transportation. Designers, I suspect, are attracted to bikes because designers love making objects—it is what they are trained to do—and the bike is an object that is simple enough that anyone can tailor it to their own specifications…
I wish designers cared as much about mass transit as they did about their bikes. We don’t get very many articles in the design press about our decayed subway system, nor does there seem to be much of a galvanized movement within the design community to do anything about it…Transportation Alternatives, a wonderful organization, bills itself as an “advocate for bicycling, walking and public transit,” which seems bizarrely out of order to me. When the design (and architecture) press covers mass transit here, it’s often to wax nostalgic about Massimo Vignelli’s map of the system—wonderful, I admit.
New York is never going to be Amsterdam. Commuting by bicycle may work for some people, and the more the better, but for the overwhelming majority it’s not going to be a viable option most of the time. New York is a city of public transit, and that’s where the vast majority of our attention should be directed. It is the single most important urban design issue facing the city and its residents. By far. More than 5.1 million rides are taken on the subway on an average weekday. Bus service adds another 2.2 million. Service cutbacks loom. Last week I renewed a Metrocard for a month. The fee was $104. The fee for renewing my driver’s license for ten years? $80. Our priorities need to change.
To me, the issue of design is one of attention. The public faces of the MTA are a bunch of stations that look like they were designed seventy years ago and were never modernized. They’re dank and dark and falling apart. Most design elements that were once appealing have faded, and the nicest looking station rehabs — such as at Franklin St. in Tribeca — aren’t at particularly high-traffic spots.
So should we care then about station design and appearance? Does an interestingly designed station that is well maintained attract more riders? Would such a station also make New Yorkers more supportive of their transit system? I’d have to believe so. Transit design should be on the table. Not every map needs to be a jumble of words. Not every new station has to look as bland as a hospital.
Dec
09
Weekender map upgrade as work impacts seven lines
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Transit has updated its Weekender map in response to rider feedback.
It’s another light week of service, but before we just into these, I have another story: New York City Transit announced today that it has unveiled an upgrade of its Weekender map. The online offering, available starting every Friday at 3 p.m., allows straphangers to view the weekend’s service changes on a Vignelli-inspired subway map.
Here’s what Transit had to say about what they’re calling The Weekender 1.5:
Based on these comments and suggestions, new Weekender features have been introduced – including a searchable station name box that anticipates your station as you type – and an additional level of zoom to the subway diagram to give you a wider view of your trip.
The color on certain graphic elements and text has also been adjusted as a result of feedback from the ADA/vision-impaired community. TripPlanner+, the only route search program that plans your way around the construction, is also now much easier to reach.
Of the changes, Transit President Thomas Prendergast said, “We asked. You suggested, and we listened. These improvements customers will see starting today will make it easier for subway riders to visualize exactly how weekend work will affect subway service.”
Now onto the changes. As always, these come to me via Transit, and they are subject to change without notice. Check signs in your local station and listen to on-board announcements. Subway Weekender has the map.
From 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., Sunday, December 11, uptown 2 trains run express from 3rd Avenue-149th Street to East 180th Street due to rail and plate replacement at Simpson Street.
From 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., Sunday, December 11, uptown 5 trains run express from 3rd Avenue-149th Street to East 180th Street due to rail and plate replacement at Simpson Street.
From 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., Saturday, December 10 and Sunday, December 11, Flushing-bound 7 trains skip 33rd Street, 40th Street, 46th Street, 52nd Street and 69th Street due to installation of cable trays and brackets.
From 12:01 a.m. Saturday, December 10 to 5 a.m. Monday, December 12, Bronx-bound D trains operate via the N line from Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue to 36th Street due to station and line structure rehabilitation from 71st Street to Bay 50th Street. (Repeats next week.)
From 4 a.m. Saturday, December 10 to 10 p.m. Sunday, December 11, Queens-bound J trains skip Hewes Street, Lorimer Street and Flushing Avenue due to track panel installation north of Hewes Street. (Repeats next week.)
From 4 a.m. Saturday, December 10 to 10 p.m., Sunday, December 11, M trains run every 24 minutes between Myrtle Avenue and Metropolitan Avenue due to track panel installation north of Hewes Street. (Every 20 minutes overnight.)
From 12:01 a.m. Saturday, December 10 to 5 a.m. Monday, December 12, Coney Island-bound N trains run via the D line from 36th Street to Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue due to track panel installation south of 59th Street.
Dec
09
In Jackson Heights, a problem with pigeon droppings
Posted by: | CommentsBack in 2007, the early days of Second Ave. Sagas, I had the chance to write two stories about pigeons. In one, Transit had just lost a $6 million lawsuit filed by a plaintiff who had injured himself by slipping in pigeon droppings. In another, the authority had instituted a new plan along the Flushing line to make the elevated structure less hospitable to pigeons. Now, these flying creatures back in the news with vengeance.
According to one Queens representative, the MTA has been negligent in its attention toward pigeons. At the 74th St. station along Roosevelt Avenue, Transit has created a public health problem by allowing pigeon poop to build up. “The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) has neglected its legal responsibility to clean the pigeon poop,” Councilman Daniel Dromm said. “We have complained about it and they still haven’t come out to clean it. They promised they would [on] Monday, November 28, but they didn’t. This is a serious case of neglect and abuse of the Jackson Heights community. They have been a bad neighbor. One has to wonder why they continue to ignore Jackson Heights when it is one of the busiest stations in the whole transit system.”
For its part, MTA officials say the station is cleaned every other week, but pigeons are incorrigible. “We do clean it, but the pigeons come right back,” a spokesman told The Queens Courrier. This is one of the difficult situations that we don’t have a solution to. From what I’ve heard it is pretty awful. It is disgusting, but we do have a pigeon problem throughout the city and we try different things in different place. We will just have to keep trying until we find a solution.” Sounds lovely.
Dec
09
Cuomo set to veto Bloomberg’s five-borough taxi plan
Posted by: | CommentsJust in case robbing the MTA wasn’t enough, Gov. Andrew “I am the government” Cuomo this week essentially torpedoed the city’s plan to expand cab service outside of Manhattan. Despite gaining approval in the State Senate and Assembly, the Mayor Bloomberg-backed plan to allow street hails of livery cabs north of 96th St. and outside of Manhattan has languished on Cuomo’s desk as medallion owners have spuriously claimed the measure would threatened their investments. Claiming that numerous issue are in the way, Cuomo threatened to veto the measure this week.
The backroom details are a bit hazy. The bill is to be presented today to Cuomo for the first time despite a summer approval in Albany, and a compromise plan to sell 2000 medallions that would generate $1 billion for the city has fallent apart. No news outlet, however, has explained the deal fell apart, and sources in Albany have been awfully quiet on the matter. Instead, the original bill be passed to Cuomo for action, and the governor is likely to say no.
If Cuomo does torpedo this effort, Bloomberg said he will try again next year, and supporters are on board with that plan. As Juan Gonzalez of The Daily News wrote this week, Cuomo’s inaction is inexplicable as this is essentially an issue that concerns securing better transportation options for underserved and less wealthy neighborhoods than those that are south of 96th St. in Manhattan. This time, Cuomo will cost the city $1 billion in revenue and more comprehensive cab service.
Dec
09
Cuomo strips MTA of $320 million, lockbox protections
Posted by: | CommentsA few weeks ago, Gov. Andrew Cuomo uttered a phrase that could go down in New York state history. “I am the government,” he said in a radio interview in early November. Since then, Cuomo has run roughshod over Albany, enforcing his whims over those of the state legislature and public, and New York City’s transit service will soon be paying a heavy, heavy price.
The fun started earlier this week when Gov. Cuomo announced an agreement forged with Dean Skelos and Sheldon Silver to reform New York’s tax code. As a favor to suburban legislators who enjoy transit access but want the city to subsidize their commuter rail service even more than we already do, Cuomo threw in a partial repeal of the payroll mobility tax. That tax, by the way, supports the MTA to the tune of $1.5 billion a year. Without it, the authority would be facing massive fare hikes or service cuts.
Originally, the new tax proposal was to cost the MTA $250 million in annual revenue, but that number has since increased to $320 million. No one is happy. The Times editorialized against MTA cuts, and a group of transit advocates spoke out against the decision. In a statement endorsed by the General Contractors Association, Straphangers, the RPA and the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, the group highlighted the issue with the state’s approach:
The problem with this approach is three-fold:
- estimates of what’s needed can be incorrect, exposing the MTA to serious financial risk;
- payrolls can grow over time, subsidies do not; and
- subsidies can be lowered over time, as was the appropriation for student MetroCards;
A better way can be found in the way public schools are being treated right now. These schools now pay the PMT and then apply for reimbursement from the State.
Right now, Cuomo and state leaders claim their find $320 million through alternative funding sources, but as Streetsblog noted yesterday, the MTA’s payroll tax funding has now become discretionary. The state can remove the funding; they can fail to find it; they can do whatever they want because they are the government. While congestion pricing with dedicated transit revenues would likely generate the $320 million needed to cover this new funding gap, that option has been off the table since the fall, and leading congestion pricing advocates tell me it could be a few years before those efforts are revived.
To make matters worse, in a special session in Albany yesterday, Cuomo essentially striped the Transit Lockbox Bill of any bite. What was a strong bill with stringent requirements has now become a shell of its former self. Originally, the lockbox, which passed by the Assembly and Senate with nary a dissent, prevented the state from removing transit funding without the full support of the state legislature. It also required a public statement detailing the amount diverted from mass transit and the impact that diversion would have on the level of service, maintenance and security.
Those key provisions are now entirely gone. In the new bill, foisted on Albany by Cuomo, the governor as the power to divert funds if he “declares a fiscal emergency,” and the reporting requirements have been removed entirely. The public will not know the extent of the raids on service levels unless others report on them. This is a lockbox without a lock, and a group of union leaders and transit advocates are not happy. “We do not support the substitute legislation passed in this special session,” the coalition that saw the bill through originally said. “It does not constrain future raids on transit funds, and deletes the requirement that the of the diversion of transit dedicated funds be reported.”
The bill’s original sponsors have vowed to restore the language next year, but Gov. Cuomo never indicated that he would sign the more powerful piece of legislation. And so we are left with an MTA striped of $320 million, no clear sign from where replacement funds will originate, and a lockbox that isn’t. As Andrew Cuomo said, he is the government, and his is a government with no sense of the role transit funding plays in New York City. Sad times indeed.
Dec
08
To sleep, perchance to miss your stop
Posted by: | CommentsAt one point or another, most straphangers end up dozing off in the subway. Perhaps it’s a beer-induced haze of sleep; perhaps it’s just shut-eye on the way home with a trusted companion or significant other to watch over your stuff; perhaps it’s a wave of sleep that you just can’t escape. Any way you slice, you wake up feeling a little groggy but perhaps a little more ready to tackle the next few hours of the day.
That sleep, however, is not a particularly restful one, The New York Times has discovered. Doctors who study sleep say that dozing on the subway is more akin to nodding off than to the sleep we need over it. In fact, during their 20-minute commutes, straphangers never fall into a particularly deep sleep, and even still, light and noise interrupt that rest. “I suspect all you get is Stage 1 sleep; it’s not going to be restorative,” Carl Brazil, a sleep specialist, said. “It’s kind of wasted sleep.”
It’s not, of course, wasted sleep for pickpockets who target the drunk, and in fact, it can be costly sleep when you awake three neighborhoods and eight subway stops away from your intended destination. But with the lull of the train and the peace after a long day, sometimes that sleep, like MTA service delays, is just unavoidable.
