AsidesPublic Transit Policy

Looking to P3 agreements to fund infrastructure

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 14, 2011

As New York and New Jersey continue to hash out funding for the Tappan Zee replacement, New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli has issued a report exploring public-private partnerships as a way to finance the state’s infrastructure deficit. According to DiNapoli’s calculations, New York is on the hook for nearly $250 billion in rail and road improvements, and the best way to find the dollars for these upgrades may involve these controversial P3 partnerships.

The report itself is fairly technical and breaks very little new ground. In it, DiNapoli lays out the oversight challenges and economic hurdles P3 plans face, and he urges the state to ensure that any such partnerships “achieve the correct balance between public and private interests.” It seems though all but inevitable that P3s will have to enter the picture to help bridge the infrastructure deficit. I’ve long believed that adopt-a-station plans would help improve the cleanliness of New York City subway stations, but it will be a challenge to realize agreements that please the private investors and the public interest when the pricetag is a $16 billion one for a new bridge. Still, the report is worth a read. [Office of the Comptroller]

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ARC TunnelAsides

After quashing ARC, Christie to borrow billions anyway

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 14, 2011

When New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie killed the ARC Tunnel project last fall, he did so because the project would probably have gone overbudget by anywhere between $1-$5 billion. It wasn’t responsible for the state to borrow that much to pay for a rail connection, he said. Well, last week, Christie said he would pay for road, rail and bridge upgrades throughout his state by borrowing $4.4 billion and foisting the rest on the Port Authority.

If this plan comes to fruition, it would divert some turnpike toll money into the state’s depleted Transportation Trust Fund and the Port Authority would pick up the slack. To gain New York’s Port Authority approval, the PA would also spend some of its dollars on similar projects in New York. It is, said The Star-Ledger, a clear money grab designed to keep the state’s gas tax at its low level, and it’s a move that reeks of the same financial irresponsibility that Christie has railed against for months. It also elevates road-building over the need for new cross-Hudson rail connections.

NJ Senator Frank Lautenberg did not have kind words for Christie. “The Governor’s transportation plan is short on details, but it made one thing very clear. The plan is more proof that the Governor killed the critically-needed new tunnel to Manhattan so he could use its funding as part of a fix for his political problems. Transportation is the economic lifeblood of our state – the most densely populated in the country – and Governor Christie’s policies are undermining years of planning and hard work to keep New Jersey on the move,” he said. “During Governor Christie’s campaign for office, he said borrowing to finance the Transportation Trust Fund is ‘unconscionable.’ Why is it now acceptable? All he is doing is piling more debt on the state.”

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New Jersey Transit

NJ Transit, PA discuss rail over the Bayonne Bridge

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 14, 2011

The Hudson-Bergen Light rail in action. (Photo via flickr user wallyg)

Think of this story as the natural accumulation of this week. On Monday, I tackled the upcoming changes to the Bayonne Bridge, and last night, I discussed the need for more light rail within the city limits of New York. Today, we learn that if New Jersey planners have their way, the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail line will indeed climb over the Bayonne Bridge and into Staten Island.

As The Jersey Journal’s Charles Hack reported on Thursday, New Jersey Transit officials have spoken with their Port Authority counterparts to discuss adding space for the light rail line as New Jersey prepares to renovate the Bayonne Bridge. Hack writes of the preliminary planning process:

Dan Stessel, a spokesman for NJ Transit, confirmed yesterday there have been discussions about extending the Light Rail from the Eighth Street Light Rail Station in Bayonne – which is slated to open within a month – to Staten Island. “Our involvement has been providing technical data to the Port Authority,” Stessel said. “Any significant expansion of the Light Rail beyond the Eighth Street Light Rail Station would require further study to address capacity constraints.”

Those constraints relate to whether the existing infrastructure – which includes two rail tracks, one in each direction – could handle additional trains and riders that an expansion to Staten Island would bring, he said.

Port Authority spokesman Steve Coleman said it is far too early to say whether or not incorporating a rail line into the bridge is a realistic proposition. Political support for a rail extension across the bridge seems stronger in New York than New Jersey. Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., and Staten Island Borough President James P. Molinaro say that providing space for the Light Rail or an express bus lane on the bridge would cut Staten Island residents’ commute to Manhattan and reduce congestion.

Later on yesterday, Michael Grimm, a U.S. Congressman from Staten Island, voiced his support for the plan. Calling the project a “top priority,” he explained why Staten Island needs this rail link. “The people of Staten Island have spent too much time sitting in their cars stuck in traffic,” he said. “The Port Authority already has plans to raise the Bayonne Bridge, so it makes sense to incorporate light rail into the new design. The people of Staten Island have waited far too long for a light rail connection, which is why I plan to do all I can to make sure that it is built.”

Right now, we don’t know anything about the costs of laying light rail over the bridge, and it doesn’t make much sense to build a connection without activating the North Shore Rail Line or building the HBLR out to the ferry terminal. I also wonder about the framing here. Should New York representatives focus on moving Staten Islanders to Manhattan via New Jersey or should they view this rail link as a way to improve mobility from Staten Island to the job hubs across the Hudson in New Jersey? Without the numbers or any studies to support this contention, I believe the link to New Jersey would be more useful than the promise of a slightly faster ride to Manhattan.

Ultimately, this plan is years from fruition. While New Jersey representatives have called upon the Port Authority to act quickly as it addresses the future of the Bayonne Bridge, it will take multiple studies and much lobbying to see transit realized. But as I said earlier this week, this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to better connect Staten Island, and both New York and New Jersey should work to make it happen.

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AsidesNew York City Transit

Subway signal bar codes found in crew lockers

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 13, 2011

As the scandal over falsified signal inspection reports gains steam, the MTA Inspector General has found multiple violations concerning inspection measures. As The Daily News reports today, the IG raided crew rooms at Times Square and found copies of signal bar codes in various lockers and desks. It is, as Pete Donohue reported, against MTA regulations for workers to possess these materials. “This is a serious infraction,” Transit head Thomas Prendergast said. “We’ve ratcheted up our effort to make sure people are complying with the rules and regulations.”

Donohue notes that these findings could lead to the first dismissals over the falsified signal reports, and with an ongoing criminal investigation, more current and former MTA workers could still find themselves in trouble. Whether the inquiries will reach to former Transit presidents remains to be seen, but the MTA and the IG’s office says they are taking these allegations very seriously. “It is outrageous and alarming that in the midst of an ongoing investigation, and given the recent close public scrutiny regarding falsification of signal inspections, our investigators and officials of NYC Transit found unauthorized bar codes in signal maintainers’ lockers and even in plain view just a few days ago,” Barry Kluger, the Inspector General, said.

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New Jersey Transit

Did NJ Transit let its domain registration lapse?

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 13, 2011

Update (12:15 p.m.): New Jersey Transit’s website is back up and running. Below is the saga of their technologically frustrating morning.

* * *

On any given day, New Jersey Transit’s website, redesigned and relaunched in October 2009, should look a little bit something like this:

This morning though visitors to NJTransit.com found a placeholder instead. Right now, when I navigate to the commuter rail, I see the following:

Essentially, New Jersey Transit allowed its domain name registration to lapse, and its registrar put up the standard link farm. According to the WHOIS record for NJTransit.com, the domain name expired on Jan. 7, 2011, coincidentally the same day that I’ve heard the agency’s CIO stepped down. New Jersey Transit spokesman Dan Stessel said that the agency was “investigating the glitch” and that there is no danger of their losing the website. “There is no risk of anyone buying the website,” he said. “We’ve got it for the next 20 years.”

Of course, if the renewal wasn’t submitted in a timely fashion, the site will inevitably go down for a few hours. According to The Star-Ledger, the agency continued to send out text alerts this morning while dealing with this so-called glitch, and customers using AT&T — but not Verizon — were able to access the website. Either way, that’s an embarrassing and amusing mishap in an age when transit agencies are trying to better integrate technology into their daily operations.

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Public Transit Policy

A stubborn city without streetcars

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 13, 2011

A proper light rail network could redefine public transit in New York City.

Along Second Ave. right now, the MTA is slowly — very slowly — building part of a new subway line at an astronomical cost. By the time Phase 1 of the Second Ave. Subway opens in late 2016 or 2017 or 2018, the total budget for the four-stop extension of the BMT Broadway line will cost $5 billion. For its money, the MTA will alleviate overcrowding on the Lexington Ave. line, but $5 billion doesn’t go as far as it once did.

Around the country, city planners are looking for ways to build mass transit on top of a pre-existing network of roads. Once upon a time, when cars were not ascendant, cities had vibrant networks of streetcars, and public transportation didn’t carry with it lower class connotations. While DC and Los Angeles are both building new subway lines, most American cities are looking to expand public transit at lower costs. Enter the streetcar.

At Slate yesterday, Tom Vanderbilt explored the streetcar/monorail divide and noted how “the future of urban transportation looks a lot like the past.” In other words, although advocates on either side of the debate have their arguments, we’re seeing a decidedly old concept realized on our city’s streets. Dedicated lanes and grade separations dictate the speed and flow of technology, but the idea that to improve mobility, we must dig underground (and spend billions upon billions of dollars) is one no longer viewed as the Holy Grail of transit planning, if ever it was.

Vanderbilt talks about the monorails at Disneyland and discusses the once and former transportation of the future in the context of today’s urban planning:

Modern monorail partisans insist theirs is a viable, if misunderstood, transportation form.. The Web site of their leading organ, The Monorail Society…, extols successful monorails around the world (Tokyo-Haneda, the Shanghai Maglev, a monorail slated for the Philippines!) and argues their benefits: Safe (with some exceptions), popular, and cost-effective. The failure to spread in cities worldwide reflects, they argue, a sense that they are still “experimental.” It is as if they can’t shake the perception that their moment is not yet here. As Wayne Curtis wrote, “the monorail was twenty years ahead of its time, and it has been mired there ever since.”…

Streetcar supporters counter with a battery of well-practiced rejoinders. They say streetcars are cheaper than monorails. Sure, Japanese monorail systems make money, they argue, but so do Japanese trains. Light-rail—a term that has a somewhat slippery definition, but which I’m using here to refer to streetcars (whether modern or vintage in style) that run short routes with frequent stops at street level—has a proven track record in America and has carried infinitely more passengers. Supporters also claim that streetcars promote urban development—which seems possible if not proven….

In a conciliatory note, streetcar fans acknowledge that monorail is suitable “where nothing else fits and there is a need to connect at least two points of high activity”—situations in which you wouldn’t have to build lots of expensive elevated stations or worry about a lot of network “branching.” And if monorails are haunted by their forward-looking past, a rap on many streetcars is that they are simply vehicles for nostalgia rather than real transportation, “Disneyland toys,” as Randall O’Toole snorts. As a famous article, Don Pickrell’s “A Desire Named Streetcar,” noted, municipal officials have persistently underestimated light-rail construction costs and overestimated eventual ridership numbers. (A later study noted planners had gotten better on rider forecasts but no better on capital costs.)

Vanderbilt notes too a Jarrett Walker piece on monorails and why they’re aren’t widely accepted. “The current generation of urban designers is pretty passionate about the supreme importance of the pedestrian experience at the ground plane and resistant to putting any substantial structure directly over a street,” he wrote in 2009.

In New York City, our monorail is confined to the outskirts of Queens. It flies under highways and over parking lots en route from the subway to the airport. It serves its purpose, but it’s been marginalized. In a city once famous for its streetcars, our light rail network doesn’t exist. Vision42’s version of 42nd St. hasn’t gained serious traction, and the plan to bring streetcars to the Brooklyn waterfront is mired somewhere in the bureaucracy of the Department of Transportation.

It isn’t, though, for lack of trying. During the planning stages of the Second Ave. Subway, the MTA included various light rail iterations in the alternative studies. These proposals included a full-route light rail on 2nd Ave. and/or 1st Ave., a short subway line with a light rail connection to Lower Manhattan and a light rail spur from 14th St. via Avenue D and East Broadway to Canal St. But eventually, any light rail at all was discarded in the screening process because, as the analysis of the alternatives says, of “substantial potential traffic impacts.” The cars that pushed out the streetcars are still keeping them out.

Ultimately, that’s the problem with the way the MTA has approached its transit improvements. We’re paying through the nose to build a subway line because we can’t replace auto lanes with transit. We see extreme NIMBYism when the MTA proposes turning car or parking lanes into dedicated and physically separated bus lanes. We see uproars over bike lanes being installed in residential areas. The car reigns supreme, and no one in planning will challenge its hegemony.

It isn’t necessary to spend billions on an overpriced subway when cheaper alternatives that might require a surface-level sacrifice exist. These cheaper alternatives can bring service to areas of Brooklyn and Queens that aren’t due for any significant expansion of subway service, and they can complement our subway network with ease. But until we’re willing to give up lanes, light rail networks and streetcars will remain, at least for New Yorkers, something we see at the zoo, airports and, of course, Disneyland.

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Brooklyn

Media Hit: BIT on the Culver Viaduct

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 12, 2011

As the Culver Viaduct controversy swirled last week, the local Brooklyn media profiled the upcoming work and brouhaha over those who were unaware of the F train shutdowns. On Friday afternoon, reporter Lauren Moraski interviewed me from the Smith/9th Sts. station to discuss the work and Brooklynites’ reactions to it. The story aired earlier this week on Brooklyn Review on the Brooklyn Independent TV station, and I’ve embedded the clip above.

Regular readers of SAS know the story by heart by now, but Moraski managed to track down a few more commuters who were surprised by the station closures. One wants to see a shuttle bus that, due to MTA budgetary problems, won’t run while others will just have to hoof it to Carroll St. While riders all along the F line in Park Slope, Windsor Terrace and Kensington will suffer, Red Hook residents drew the short end of the straw. With limited subway service and no added bus lines, it’s going to be a long year for those who rely on the F for their commutes.

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New Jersey Transit

How quiet the Quiet Cars?

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 12, 2011

In an age of cell phones, New Jersey Transit is trying to strike a balance between convenience and serenity. Not everyone wants to hear people yammer away on their cell phones during schleppy rides home after long days in the office, and thus, in September, the Quiet Car pilot program was born.

As I explained in September, the idea wasn’t to impose silence but to impose a certain subdued environment upon the first and last cars. I wrote:

In this pilot, it is truly social norms of train ridership that are under assault and for the better. The Quite Commute cars, says New Jersey Transit, are intended to provide a “subdued environment for customers who wish to refrain from using cell phones and are willing to disable the sound feature on pagers, games, computers and other electronic devices.” Riders are urged to talk in “subdued” voices and, thankfully enough, are told to use headphones at a volume that “cannot be heard by other passengers.” To rid trains of the blight of loud and leaky headphones would be a true accomplishment indeed.

Recently, NJ Transit expanded the pilot program to include more trains and more routes. The first and last cars on all Northeast Corridor, North Jersey Coast Line, Raritan Valley Line and Midtown Direct trains traveling in the peak direction during weekday peak periods are a part of the Quiet Commute program now. Riders, though, are duking it out over the meaning of quiet. Vincent M. Mazzolli of The Times repeats a common anecdote:

Last Monday morning, Robert Arbeeny and two friends boarded a train bound for Manhattan and began chatting about the holidays. Robert Arbeeny, left, and Steven Heite last week riding in a New Jersey Transit train car designated as quiet. The rules include refraining from cellphone use and talking with “subdued voices.” “Excuse me,” said the woman sitting across from them, raising her reading glasses, and then her voice. “This is the quiet car.”

Mr. Arbeeny apologized and began whispering, which caused further agitation. The woman put down her book and summoned a conductor. “They are not supposed to be talking,” she said, wagging her index finger at the group. The conductor tried stepping quietly between both parties. “They do have a right to talk,” he said in a soft voice, “they just have to speak in a very quiet manner.”

As other passengers began looking on, the woman shot back: “What kind of sense does that make! Why would you allow them to have a sustained conversation in a quiet car, and why are you taking their side over mine!”

Conductors have been caught in the middle of this battle of interpretation, but while some prickly riders want library-like silence, others understand the intricacies of the program. “Cellphones are one thing, but people are getting the wrong impression about these cars,” Annemarie Whitney, a daily commuter, said. “They are quiet cars, not silent cars. Subdued and silent are two different words, and as long as there are misconceptions out here, there are going to be disputes.”

The problem here is one of expectations vs. reality. It doesn’t make sense to expect people to be deadly silent on a train. That’s just not the way we’re used to commuting, and that’s not why the Quiet Commute was launched. (That is, however, why Bose markets noise-canceling headphones.) Rather, it’s about creating an atmosphere free from noise pollution, free from one-sided cell phone conversations and free from bleeding iPod headphones. That is a balance easy to maintain.

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New York City Transit

A response to today’s snow and tomorrow’s

by Benjamin Kabak
written by Benjamin Kabak on January 12, 2011

In December, station platforms and subway tracks were buried by the snow. (Courtesy of New York City Transit)

It is snowing. Cue the plows! Pull out the shovels! Toss the salt! After last month’s snow debacle, the city is going to make sure we’re ready, and as of this writing, three plows have already passed by my window tonight. They might just be tearing up the asphalt roadbed instead of clearing up the one inch of snow on the ground, but they’re out there.

As New York works to keep its streets clear and sidewalks less slippery, the MTA has ramped up its snow preparedness as well. Already, express trains are running local and the authority expects them to do so well into Wednesday. The commuter rail lines are running reduced schedules, and the authority is urging passengers to check its website before venturing out in the morning. For up-to-the-minute reports on transit, the Daily News is running a live-blog.

Meanwhile, MTA officials spent part of Tuesday afternoon assuring reporters that the authority will be better prepared for the current storm. Hundreds of customers won’t get trapped near Howard Beach or on trains above-ground in the deeper reaches of Brooklyn, but potential commuters also must take care to travel only if it is necessary. “If you don’t need to travel tomorrow morning, please don’t,” MTA CEO and Chairman Jay Walder said on Tuesday.

Late last night, the authority elaborated on its approach to the snow in a statement: “Our goal in this and all storms is to continue providing service so long as it is safe for our customers, employees and equipment. We recognize the importance of public transportation especially when conditions are difficult. Doing this safely means service may be temporarily suspended or curtailed to avoid stuck trains and buses.”

But what of that next storm? What of the big one? The authority said today that it’s still conducting its own review of its snow procedures, and already, the agency has established a centralized snow command in charge of coordinating weather-related services. It’s also gearing up to have a response plan for major blizzards. Pete Donohue received advanced word of the MTA’s snow review and clued us in as to what to expect in the future. He writes:

The MTA may shut down at least some subway service during future blizzards rather than risk trains getting stuck, the Daily News has learned. “We may need to shut down the system,” an internal Metropolitan Transportation Authority document says. “We need to change the philosophy of how we operate, particularly in snowstorms. Keeping the service running regardless might not be the best option.”

The agency’s subway division kept running trains in last month’s blizzard. Three A trains with hundreds of passengers were stuck in eastern Queens – including one for about seven hours. Next time there’s such a severe blast, “We need to think about an organized shutdown of the system,” the document says.

The document is a draft summary of a meeting transit executives held last week to improve its storm response.

For years, the MTA has tried to power through the storm on the theory that trains can push snow out of the way, but when drifts pile up, as they did in December, the trains cannot pass. It happened in 1996 during the city’s big snow storm, and it always seems to knock out the subway system. Being willing to cancel service ahead of the storm may leave commuters struggling for other options, but it won’t leave them stuck at an unfamiliar train station and miles away from home.

Unfortunately, the city and the MTA cannot control the weather. They don’t dictate when it snows or how much accumulates. They can fight it as it falls, but as more arrives, it builds up with nowhere to go. To fight the snow, sometimes, we just have to accept it for what it is, and that is seemingly what the MTA’s new plan will try to do.

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