The countdown clocks at Nevins St. last summer forecasted a long wait. (Photo by Benjamin Kabak)
It’s funny to see how technology can take over our lives. We grow so accustomed to something we didn’t have before — something we might have gone years or decades without — but once it’s there, we can’t live without it. When it’s gone, things don’t seem right, and we grow impatient. We want it back. We want it to work. We want that convenience.
A few years ago, the only countdown clocks in New York were a part of a pilot program along the L line. They usually worked (although sometimes threatened 54-minute waits for trains that were just a few stations away), and only a small subset of subway riders had the chance to enjoy them. Today, that picture has changed as countdown clocks are available at nearly every A Division station. If I have a choice between two rides, I’ll pick the route with the clocks. It makes waiting for a train seem like an exercise in calm patience instead of frustrated futility.
That said, the countdown clocks are far from perfect. They’re still very much a work in progress and as they like to remind us, undergoing tests. As with any computer equipment, extreme temperatures seem to cause them trouble, and I’ve received some recent complaints about outages at 86th St. on the East Side IRT and other high-volume stops where passengers grew to depend on the clocks. Considering we didn’t have them a few years ago, straphangers clearly appreciate and depend on the key bits of information these signs provide.
Yet, even as the countdown clocks provide straphanger who are waiting for trains with some modicum of peace of mind, they have their limitations. We might know how far away the next train is based on an algorithm that uses the subway system’s signals, but the people in the stations who are supposed to help out do not have access to the same information.
Take, for instance, this tale posted to Subchat last night. With a 12-9 in the Bronx causing a diversion along the 2 and 5 line, a man and his niece had to negotiate a variety of changes, block tickets and transfers between buses and subways to reach a station being serviced, and along the way, they encountered a bus driver, a station agent and an MTA Customer Service representative on the phone. None of the people they spoke with had the right information about the service change or the fare policies.
I’ve long beaten the customer service drum on Second Ave. Sagas, and over the past few years, the MTA has seemingly tried to improve the way they relate to their customers. But it’s a two-way street. We might benefit from the countdown clocks, but once installed, those are a very passive way of delivering information. The MTA still doesn’t have an efficient way to inform their workers in the field what’s happening or coordinate updates between those folks on the phone and those workers overseeing changes. Thus, customers looking for reroutes are often left in the cold.
When the Fulton St. Transit Center opens in 2014, it will, according to a NY1 report, have all electronic signage. “We will not have paper any longer,” MTA Capital Construction President Michael Horodniceanu said. “When you see, for example, a sign sending you to, let’s say the A, C, 4, 5 and so forth, it will be in electronic fashion that will emulate the way the signs look today.”
Electronic signage can be great for customization. If train designations are changed, if routes are altered, they can be updated with a push of a button. If something is temporarily wrong, they can be used to broadcast that message. Ultimately, though, if no one is there to coordinate updates and provide timely information, real-time delivery solutions can only be one half of a customer service product, and it takes two to tango.
18 comments
I agree that we quickly dependent upon technology that can enhance our lives. The variable messaging systems going up throughout the system have a huge potential for helping riders figure out their way around service disruptions.
I also agree that the countdown clocks/announcements are still in a beta period on those lines that the signal system has not been rebuilt. This morning, the downtown 4/5 platform at 59th Street was showing that the next train was 10 minutes away. As the time ticked down, the automated audio announcements were about a minute ahead of the signage, and the train ended up coming in about six minutes.
It’s great to see the MTA finally catch up with the rest of the world, and I think it’s an exciting time in the MTA’s history, even with all the budget and service issues.
That should have been “quickly become dependent”… sigh.
A station booth agent should know the alternate bus routes from his/her station. Especially if the agent based at that station, there is no excuse. (Had the SubChat poster fully known about his options, he most likely would have taken the Bx19 to Hunts Points Avenue 6 station to go into Manhattan, obviously if 6 had “good service.”)
From observations of my app and the subway’s Twitter feed, it appears that non-scheduled service disruptions are not reported automatically as they occur. In other words, the text is manually put in. If there is some reasonable way to automate the process for instantaneous delivery, that will help in customer service. As in this Wednesday (maybe it was Tuesday), the Manhattan-bound A train I was on was running express on the local track between Broadway Junction and Hoyt-Schermerhorn; the C train that arrived first at BJ had to wait for the A to pass in front of it. And after it left Nostrand the train crawled; around Lafayette it stopped and started. It was at least a 15 minute delay altogether when I left at Jay Street. (The conductor said there was a train in front of us. That’s what I was able to hear in my car full of rowdy kids from a youth group.) I checked my app, and there was no relevant report of the slowdown. Now it may have been an isolated incident, but I felt it was significant enough to post in the service status.
And I would like to see the expansion of the electronic subway system service status into stations, second in priority to the countdown clocks.
The poster realized in hindsight that he could’ve used his transfer (on his MetroCard) to take the Bx19 to Hunts Point Avenue, and then used the block ticket to take the (6) to Manhattan (or he could’ve stayed on until 149th Street/Grand Concourse).
He said that a (2) passed before they announced the service disruption, but it wouldn’t have done him any good (though if the 12-9 occurred at Intervale Avenue, the (2) probably would’ve brought him to Simpson Street, which is fairly close to Hunts Point Avenue. He would’ve then been able to use the block ticket to enter the station, instead of wasting it on the bus.
You’re right: The token booth clerk should’ve known the fastest route to Manhattan and told him about how he could avoid paying the extra fare.
They should consider using LCD screens (i.e. big TVs) to deliver information such as the countdown clocks. They have a high degree of flexibility and low replacement costs.
I totally agree.
It’s ironic, but my default when I hear the announcement ‘this train is not moving, take the local’ or ‘take some other line’ over the loudspeaker I pretty much never listen to that advice. Too often, 2 minutes after you get off a train that the conductor has declared ‘not moving anytime soon’ it starts moving and often beats the alternate route they may or may not suggest by a mile.
I was at grand concourse a few weeks back and 2 trains kept coming but the conductors would say ‘this train is going down the lexington tracks’ which is fine and everyone would grumble and sit down to to wait for the next 2. After the 3rd 2 train came in that was ‘going down the lexington ave tracks’ people started getting pissed and only then the conductor said ‘oh yeah, there isn’t any west side service from this station currently’. There were no signs that this was in effect and not one conductor took a look at the masses of people waiting for the 2 train going down the west side and said ‘you people are waiting for a train that isn’t coming’.
To me, this is so much more important than technology. First disseminate the right info to your employees, train them to actually convey that information, and then use technology to held spread that correct info even further.
They didn’t know when west side service would be restored. The RCC was probably assessing the situation interval by interval. People want real time information but I don’t see how that will ever be possible. Many situations are fluid. Especially when the PD or FDNY are involved.
I remember a couple of weeks ago, there was a 12-9 at Fulton Street, so the (R) was one of the few trains running in Lower Manhattan. The conductor mumbled over the loudspeaker “No (2)(3)(4)(5) trains” (I thought he was explaining something to a passenger), but had I understood what was actually happening, I would’ve taken an alternate route to avoid the crowding and slow speeds on the (R) (Rather than take the (R) to Whitehall Street, I would’ve taken the (N) to 59th Street, transferred to the (R), and then taking the S93 to Staten Island)
These “new” signs look like they were made in 1982.
Why, why, why are there numerals before the subway line number/letter?
Your photo perfectly illustrates this (1. then 3.). What does that mean? Don’t subway lines with a countdown come in order anyway?
I just want a clean-ish station and a working train that isn’t too late. Isn’t that really what we all just want?
I take it you haven’t ridden on the IRT lines lately, right? That photo is from last summer. Since then, they’ve updated the software to eliminate the conflicting number issue and have made it easier to discern the next few trains. It’s better now. Check it out in a station.
Actually, I agree that having the numbers before the subway line/letter was problematic, but now when there’s a two-line sign, you can’t tell immediately upon looking whether the second train listed is the second or third (or fourth) that’s coming. Maybe that’s not such a big deal, but it’s a little annoying.
I believe they’ve fixed that problem too. For local stops, they now only show the next train and the one after that, and at express stops, they just show the next of each line to come. So you’ll see how long you have until only the next 1, 2 or 3 train arrives.
But if you don’t care if your express is a 2 or a 3, you can’t tell if the second line is showing the first express or the second (or third or fourth). (And things get even more confusing during rush hours, when some 2’s go to New Lots, and on the East Side, where there are two types of 5 and two types of 6 all vying for space on those small signs.) If you’re trying to use the sign to help you decide if you should get off the local and wait for the express, you have about two seconds to make a decision, so it’s pretty important to know what the second line is showing.
The number at the beginning gave useful information.
I wonder if the new cableworks going up at certain stations are meant for the train tracking system. Several new thick cables have been going up around the system, most notably at Broadway-Lafayette, where a big chunk of cables (presumably fibre optics) has been strung along the local track walls. Similarly, the Culver/Crosstown line from Carroll to Ditmas has had the big chunks of wires strung along the walls and between the express tracks on the viaduct during the renovations.
No, the B Division doesn’t have ATS and isn’t slated to get it anytime soon.
All-electronic signage seems like a waste. Electronic signs are useful for some things but not others, and they have to be maintained regularly and replaced frequently. Do we really need an electronic sign giving us the name of the station?
As for the Subchat story, he should have used his free MetroCard transfers to get on the bus, and then he would have still had his block tickets available to get back into the subway. The bus operator probably didn’t even know that the subway wasn’t running. (And did he even ask the agent if he could enter for free? During service disruptions, they are sometimes accommodating.) And as for the customer service call, did he make it clear that he was asking about an ongoing outage as opposed to the regular service pattern?
He said that the agent at 174th Street didn’t want to give him the block tickets at first, and then, at 149th Street/Grand Concourse, there was a guard who only let people in with block tickets, but he had given his up on the bus.
Since he was in a hurry, he wasn’t thinking clearly on how to manage it with the fares.
Station agents have to get explicit approval before distributing block tickets – hence the initial delay. I don’t see any mention in his post of a guard who only let people in with block tickets.