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Benjamin Kabak

MTA, cops ramping up fare enforcement on Staten Island

by Benjamin Kabak June 8, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 8, 2012

As the MTA has vowed time and again to make every dollar count, fare-jumpers have earned headlines. Numerous reports of bus riders boarding in the back and straphangers hopping turnstiles have created some bad press, and while I think the problem is overblown from an economic standpoint, the MTA has been forced to respond from a public relations standpoint. To that end, the authority has ramped up enforcement on Staten Island buses.

As NY1’s Tina Redwine reports, undercover officers have started to target particularly vulnerable buses, and their efforts have led to the arrests of 50 New Yorkers who opted against paying. Some of those arrests, of course, lead to the discover of other outstanding matters, and Staten Island District Attorney Daniel Donovan has vowed to put fare-jumpers through the legal process.

Meanwhile, bus drivers say they’ve noticed a difference. “The word is getting around and it’s calming things down now,” Frank Green said to NY1. “It’s the best thing that ever happened to Staten Island, I’ll tell you really, for me and the passengers.”

June 8, 2012 3 comments

L train set for service bump

by Benjamin Kabak June 8, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 8, 2012

Back in October, the L train made some headlines when the MTA promised service increases. With communications-based train control on tap, Transit knew it could respond to complaints of overcrowding once the technology is ready, and in October, the agency issued a 14-month timeline. Things, it seems, are moving quickly.

As Newsday reports today, the MTA will roll out massive service improvements along the L this weekend. “The MTA will add nearly 100 trains each week along the L line starting Sunday, providing much-needed service for the route, which has seen sardine-like conditions for more than a decade,” Marc Beja reports. “Starting this weekend, 16 additional round trips will run each weekday, 11 more will go on Saturdays and another seven on Sundays, an MTA spokesman said.”

The service increase will cost around $1.7 million annually and should help significantly alleviate the L train’s crush capacity problems. “This is not going to be the silver bullet, but this is real good news for L train riders,” State Senator Daniel Squadron, who has long fought for more frequent L service, said. “Anyone tired of the crushing crowds and overflowing trains will now have an L train trip less likely to feel like hell.” I’m not sure what other silver bullet Squadron wants, and this will be welcome news for L riders.

June 8, 2012 30 comments

Asides Self Promotion

Event: ‘Problem Solvers’ at the Transit Museum

by Benjamin Kabak June 7, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 7, 2012

After two successful events earlier this spring at the Transit Museum, I’ll be hosting one more Problem Solvers Q-and-A next week before taking a little break for the summer. My guest this time around will be Caroline Samponaro, Transportation Alternatives’ Director of Bicycle Advocacy, and she and I will be discussing bike share as public transit. We’ll delve into the ins and outs of the city’s upcoming bike share system and talk about how it can complement and be integrated into the existing public transit network.

The event kicks off at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, June 13 at the Transit Museum in Brooklyn Heights and will run for about an hour. Please RSVP here if you plan to attend. Hope to see you there.

June 7, 2012 3 comments

Taxis

Waiting longer for an Outer Borough street hail taxi

by Benjamin Kabak June 6, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 6, 2012

The green borough taxis are currently held up in litigation as the City Council and Mayor Bloomberg square off over homerule.

If we assume that increasing personal mobility without needing a car as well as the lessening of congestion should be a goal of urban policy, then taxicabs are an important part of a transit network. For those rides when buses and subways just won’t cut it, when someone has a too much stuff to tote on the train or finds themselves off the bus network, a taxi can help bridge that gap.

Lately, much to the chagrin of wealthy yellow cab medallion owners, Mayor Michael Bloomberg has been trying to expand the taxi network. The yellow cab industry recognizes that 97 percent of trips originate at the city’s airports or in Manhattan south of 96th St., but the majority of New Yorkers leave beyond those boundaries. They too need the ability to hail cars on the corner instead of calling ahead and hoping for a free car. By authorizing street hails from livery cabs outside of Manhattan, Bloomberg had hoped to extend the reach of taxis.

The medallion industry though has fought back. These are folks who pay top dollar for their cabs and have seen their investments grow by leaps and bounds. Taxi drivers have little to fear from the livery cab industry, but the medallion owners — a politically powerful group with deep pockets — believe a new class of cabs would threaten their money. What, they say, will keep these new apple green cabs from picking up passengers where they shouldn’t?

With the City Council in their pocket, the medallion owners were able to stymie the mayor, but he went above their heads. A few months ago, Albany approved the street hail plan, but after the medallion owners that filed the lawsuit — one joined shockingly by Public Advocate Bill de Blasio — a judge blocked the plan late last week. Ted Mann reported on the temporary restraining order:

Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron sided with yellow-taxi industry groups that argued the city and the state Legislature violated the so-called home rule provision of the state constitution. That clause says the state may pass a law directly affecting the affairs of a single municipality only if that city’s legislative body has voted to allow it. After Mr. Bloomberg failed to convince the City Council to back a plan to let livery cabs accept street hails in northern Manhattan and the other boroughs—and to issue 2,000 new medallions for the existing yellow-taxi fleet—the mayor turned to the Legislature and Gov. Andrew Cuomo to pass the bill.

The restraining order brings a sudden halt to the roll-out of new “borough taxis.” The Taxi and Limousine Commission had initially planned to begin accepting applications for the new licenses as soon as Monday, one reason for the haste of the judge’s order. The ruling also halts the planned auction of the 2,000 new yellow-taxi medallions, since the legislative deal required that they couldn’t be sold until the new borough taxis were in operation.

The judge didn’t rule on a preliminary injunction sought by the taxi plan’s opponents, saying he would rule on the substance of that motion “with all deliberate speed.” Michael Cardozo, the city’s corporation counsel, said the city would explore an appeal of the decision, and noted that the city budget depends on $1 billion in anticipated revenue from the sale of new medallions.

Justice Engoron was not too kind to the city. “This court has trouble seeing how the provision of taxi service in New York City is a matter that can be wrenched from the hands of city government, where it has resided for some 75 years, and handed over to the state,” he wrote. “Both governments are democracies, but only one is solely answerable on election day to the constituents of the five boroughs, those directly affected by the taxi service at issue here.”

What has happened here is likely a legal right. I believe Engoron has properly interpreted New York’s home rule requirements. Bloomberg’s leap over the city always seemed more than a little suspect, and Engoron believes precedence supports him. On the other hand, though, the policy is wrong. The City Council is in the pocket of the medallion owners, and New Yorkers need this street hail plan. It would change the way we get around the city.

So now, with a restraining order in place, we wait for Engoron to rule on the temporary injunction. The city cannot realize this $1 billion revenue potential quite yet, and those of us who live in areas without an ample supply of yellow cabs must make do with a wink and a nod. We need the green apple street hail cabs, but no one in the city government will rise to the occasion.

June 6, 2012 37 comments

Asides MTA Economics Transit Labor

Lhota: Pensions, health care costs fueling fare hike

by Benjamin Kabak June 6, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 6, 2012

As the TWU and MTA continue to operate without a contract, authority chairman Joseph Lhota took aim at benefits costs yesterday during a hearing with the New York State Senate Transportation Committee. As Pete Donohue recounts, Lhota noted that these costs are “spiral[ling] out of control.” He said, “In fact, but for mandated increases in pension and health care costs, we would not need the 2013 fare increase,” Lhota said.

In response, TWU President John Samuelsen blamed the MTA’s “mismanagement of construction projects,” but mismanagement here isn’t the right word. Perhaps mis-funding is as debt costs have increased the MTA’s operations obligations to the detriment of investment in subway service. Either way the fares are going up 7.5 percent next year.

The truth of course is in the middle. The MTA has turned into an organization funding pension and health care costs for retired workers for years, and these obligations have exerted a tremendous pressure on the operating budget. No one in Albany seems to willing to confront this issue however and the costs continue to mount.

June 6, 2012 8 comments

Queens

Wanting but not wanting improvements in Queens

by Benjamin Kabak June 6, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 6, 2012

Remember Karen Koslowitz, the City Council representative from Queens? A few weeks ago, she railed against the Rockaway Beach Branch line and the various plans to reactivate it. She was awfully vehement in her defense as well.

“It will affect the neighborhood in an extremely negative way,” she said. “The train will burden residents who have built their homes close to those tracks. We cannot allow another train to come through our neighborhood. It’s an intrusion on private property.”

As we know, the Rockaway Beach Branch line came up in relation to the now-dead plan to build a casino in Ozone Park. As one of the many proposed transportation improvements that would benefit both the casino and the Rockaways, rail advocates had pushed an unlikely plan to restore service to this idle right of way, and Koslowitz did not like it.

But now that the casino is dead, and with it, a chance to redevelop part of Queens and lots of jobs, what does Koslowitz think? “Queens is being shafted all the time,” she said earlier this week to The Times. “Other boroughs are getting things. They are promised and it happens.”

Maybe other boroughs get things because they want things. While the Second Ave. Subway has been disruptive to the East Side, most people recognize the need for it. Meanwhile, Manhattan has embraced its various projects, and although the battle has been a raucous one, Brooklyn too will soon have its own infrastructure upgrades and fair share of new projects. In Queens, even redevelopment a bunch of chop shops in the shadows of Citi Field has been a battle.

Meanwhile, Queens advocates say they are going to keep fighting. But as Dana Rubinstein, just as some Queens politicians such as Assembly rep Phillip Goldfeder were lining up behind the project, the rug was yanked from underneath the dormant rail line. The Rockaway Beach Branch line will lie fallow, and rails-to-trails advocates will try once again to make sure that we forever lose the transit option.

Eventually, if New Yorkers want something — infrastructure, transportation improvements — they will have to be reflective about it, and they will have to question their political choices. We cannot have politicians who want all of the benefits of a new project without giving up something. In this case, the ask wasn’t even particularly onerous, but representatives such as Koslowitz couldn’t even accept that. Living in a city — a thriving urban area — is about trade-offs, and transportation improvements benefit everyone even if a handful of people may have to live with a train running in the distance.

June 6, 2012 19 comments

7 Line Extension Asides

MTA Website: 7 line extension in revenue service in 2014

by Benjamin Kabak June 5, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 5, 2012

When last we checked in on the 7 line extension, MTA Capital Construction President Michael Horodniceanu had warned of a potential delay to mid-2014. Due to some extenuating circumstances, he expected the one-stop, $2.1 billion extension to be in the testing phase by December 2013, but it would not hit revenue service until June of 2014. The MTA’s project website seems to bear him out.

A small update to the 7 line extension site reveals the delay: The MTA now says “revenue service to begin June 2014.” There is a small amount of irony involved here too as the 7 line was Mayor Bloomberg’s pet subway project. The city is footing the bill for it, but now Bloomberg won’t be mayor for the ribbon-cutting ceremony. Still, Horodniceanu earlier this year said Bloomberg “will ride a train” to the Hudson Yards.

I’ll see what I can find out about the delays. The MTA did not get into specifics back in January, but perhaps if the six-month wait is official, word will come of a cause.

June 5, 2012 33 comments

View from Underground

What the MTA should do with subway station grades

by Benjamin Kabak June 5, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 5, 2012

As a society, we seem to love grading things. How many Yelp stars does the hot new restaurant have? What’s its Department of Health rating? Everything from movies to shops and everything in between gets subjected to rankings, and now, the subways are in the crosshairs too.

In a way, some groups already rank the subways. The Straphangers assign various scores to the train lines each year based upon cleanliness, timeliness and availability of seating, but controversially, they don’t think any subway lines are worth a full fare. Such ratings aren’t the height of usefulness.

A few weeks ago, though, the City Council started making noises about grading subway stations. Exerting what little influence they have over the MTA and New York City Transit, the Council members decided that riders deserve to know just how dirty and decrepit their stations are. Never mind that no one knew who would fund this effort or as most riders have little choice as to their station, what purpose it would serve. It was a grade, and we love grades.

At the time of the City Council hearing, I was less than impressed with the idea. It seemed like pointless bluster from a body that excels at pointless bluster, and it did nothing to solve the underlying problems with funding and station maintenance. At the time, the MTA said they already conducted internal evaluations of studies but did not release the grades to the public. Now, the Daily News offers us a glimpse at this internal grading initiatve.

Pete Donohue has the story:

But the Daily News obtained three different NYC Transit division reports in which stations periodically are rated on a scale of 1 to 4 for the condition of their walls, ceilings and floors. Separate reports grade stations on cleanliness and litter. Cleanliness essentially is a matter of how much grime, goo and trampled gum there is in a station. Litter is coffee cups, junk-food wrappers, freebie newspapers and other trash.

The reports don’t combine all the various scores given to each station. They don’t provide an overall letter grade for each stop. Someone who paid much more attention in math class than I did would have to do some number crunching to get there.

But the reports are pretty damn close to what the Council members — James Vacca of the Bronx, Domenic Recchia of Brooklyn, and Peter Koo of Queens — advocated for at the hearing. It also appears that NYC Transit didn’t fully inform MTA brass about how much data already is collected when the letter grades idea was raised.

Unfortunately, Donohue doesn’t provide too many more details in this column than what the MTA itself told the City Council. Some stations get failing grades; others do not. That’s hardly the news. What is the news, though, is that, according to MTA Chairman Joseph Lhota, the numbers are used internally in order to assign resources to each station. That’s a public use waiting to happen.

I’ve written extensively over the years about the MTA’s willingness to open its data. Here’s another prime opportunity to do so. Recently, NYC DOT put a whole bunch of street and parking data online in a map. By choosing the right paramters, users can see how recently a street was repaved and how NYC DOT grades those streets. For instance, the potholed-marked street near my office hasn’t been resurfaced since 1999 but DOT somehow rated it “good.” Perfect, the system is not, but it exists.

So the MTA could put that data online, and we would know how they view our station. Isn’t that really what this is all about too? We already know what we think of our subway stations, but what does the MTA think? Do they know how dirty they are? Do they know which ones suffer from perennial leaks even during days without rain and which ones are rat-infested? If they do, so should we.

June 5, 2012 9 comments

Rolling Stock

Bombardier officially announces R179 contract

by Benjamin Kabak June 4, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 4, 2012

The first R179s will be delivered in late 2014. I miss the colored subway bullets on the front. (Rendering via Bomardier)

The MTA voted to approve the deal in late March, and today, the i’s have been dotted and the t’s crossed as Bombardier announced the signing of a $599 million deal to provide Transit with the R179 rolling stock order. The order, built entirely in Plattsburgh, NY, will consist of 300 new cars.

While we know the general contours of the R179 contract, Bombardier’s announcement gives us a timeline. The first 10 cars will arrive in New York City during the third quarter of 2014, and the remainder of the order will be delivered between mid-2015 and early 2017. These cars will replace the R32s and R42s currently in use along the C and J/Z lines respectively.

Raymond Bachant, President, Bombardier Transportation North America, said: “Bombardier’s partnership with NYCT began in 1982 with an order for 825 subway cars. Since then, we have delivered close to 1,900 vehicles to our valued customer. We are proud that NYCT has shown its confidence in our products and technologies once again, and we look forward to providing high quality, reliable, safe rail cars for the millions of people who ride New York’s subway system every day.”

We still don’t have many details about the inner workings of these newest rolling stock order. They will, of course, come replete with dynamic strip maps and the like, but by the time these arrive in New York City, that innovation will have been on the rails for the better part of a decade. We’ll see what other new features the R179s carry soon enough.

June 4, 2012 85 comments

Queens

For a convention center in Queens, a second chance to get it right

by Benjamin Kabak June 4, 2012

written by Benjamin Kabak on June 4, 2012

For transportation and government junkies in New York, Friday evening — always the best time for bad news to drop — was chock full of surprises. A judge put a temporary kibosh on Mayor Bloomberg’s Outer Borough street hail plan while Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that the current iteration of his convention center/casino complex had died. We’ll get to the taxi story later; right now, I want to look at the second chances the city and state will have in Queens.

The story, as we know, was one of backroom dealings and fast promises. During his State of the State speech, Gov. Andrew Cuomo dropped a bombshell. Genting had agreed to the framework of a deal that, pending a constitutional amendment, would have allowed them to build a massive convention center and casino complex in the Ozone Park area. The Javits Center would have been knocked down for a denser, mixed use development, and the plan would have brought table gambling and larger trade shows to New York City.

Transportation was vaguely a part of the plan as well. Genting had promised upgrades, but details were scarce. Transit advocates had hoped to see an ambitious plan to reactivate the LIRR’s dormant Rockaway Beach Branch line while whispers surrounding a super express A train had everyone worrying. Now, it seems, we’ll get a reprieve and a do-over as the plan has collapsed.

During a radio interview on WOR on Friday with former Gov. David Paterson, Cuomo dropped the news. “The conversations haven’t really worked out,” he said. Genting, which pledged to compete for any future project, issued a similar statement. “Uncertainties and difficulties regarding the constitutional amendment, competitive landscape, tax rate and infrastructure support made any decision difficult,” the casino giant said in a statement.

With the Genting proposal in its current form dead, Cuomo will press forward with a proper competition. “They,” he said of the casino industry, “all want to come to New York, and they all have all sorts of exciting ideas — ideas that we didn’t even think of. They want to be here. They’re excited.” According to The Wall Street Journal, interested parties include MGM Resorts, Caesars and Las Vegas Sands as well as Genting.

Despite the fact that industry giants are skeptical of plans to build oversized convention centers anywhere, let alone miles away from the city’s main attractions, Cuomo seems intent to move forward with some sort of competition. This gives transportation advocates to have a louder say, and they need to have a louder say. Any plan to build an attraction center in an area underserved by transit cannot simply rely on vague promises of future improvements. Whichever company wins the competition must make concrete promises to improve rail access to the area.

So what should those improvements be? The Rockaway Beach Branch activation deserves a serious look from everyone involved. It can provide a high-speed link to the convention center and a faster ride for people from parts of Queens who are far from the job centers of Manhattan. Improvements in service along the A line should also be a requirement, and a cohesive effort to streamline bus service in that area of Queens should be on the table as well. The company that wins should also be required to finance these improvements and subsidize some of the operating costs that will result from higher demand. If the area is as lucrative as Cuomo promises it to be, that shouldn’t be a problem.

Perhaps I’m aiming too high here. Perhaps a private developer won’t be so keen on entering the area with these requirements. Still, a convention center and a casino in Ozone Park would be truly disruptive to the area and would present an opportunity to improve transit in an neighborhood that needs these improvements. We can’t let that chance slip away. Who knows when it will come around again?

June 4, 2012 53 comments

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