Photo via rhythmicdiaspora on Flickr

Despite spending over $300 million on system repairs over the last year, the New York City subway is showing little improvement, with its on-time rate just around 65 percent during the weekday, the New York Times reported. Last summer, after a train derailed at 125th street and left 30 people injured, Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared a state of emergency for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. And while the MTA and its chair, Joseph Lhota, unveiled an $800 million action plan to fix the subway, and new NYC Transit Chief Andy Byford later laid out an aggressive plan to modernize the system, the subway’s “summer of hell” seems far from over.

Out of the $836 million allocated for fixing the system, officials have spent roughly $333 million, with some funding going toward hiring 1,100 additional workers. About $253 million has gone toward operating costs and $79 million has been spent on capital spending.

In the last year, officials say 1,500 leaks have been grouted, more than 240 miles of drains have been cleaned of debris and more than 10,000 track defects have been repaired. The subway doors on more than 6,000 cars have been inspected.

Via MTA Subway Performance Metrics Dashboard

Via MTA Subway Performance Metrics Dashboard

And there has been some improvement. While there was a spike in major subway incidents in May 2018, with 85 compared to 75 the year prior, June saw just 62 incidents. Plus, the on-time, weekday rate rose to 68 percent in June, from about 62 percent last June.

But this minor progress has not felt yet by commuters, as the subways’ 1930s-era signals create delays that ripple throughout the entire system. The percentage of cars in operation for more than 40 years jumped from 4 to 16 percent.

According to the WSJ, the mean distance between subway car failures has improved by 3.6 percent after the action plan was released last year, but it still falls more than 37,000 miles under the MTA standard.

In May, Byford and the MTA released a “Fast Forward” plan to equip the system with a new state-of-the-art signal system and a new fare payment system within the next ten years, a proposal previously estimated to take 50 years. While the plan has been estimated to cost around $37 billion, the MTA has not released an official cost estimate yet.

[Via NY Times]

RELATED:

• Cuomo declares a ‘state of emergency’ for the NYC subway, gives MTA $1B for repairs
• MTA releases aggressive plan to modernize New York City’s subway within a decade
• De Blasio agrees to fund half of the MTA’s $836M emergency subway rescue plan

Via Wikimedia

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) and the New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) have announced that Select Bus Service will be available to riders on 14th Street in Manhattan as of January 6, 2019 ahead of the planned April 2019 L train tunnel closure for repairs to due to damage from Hurricane Sandy. The M14 is expected to become the busiest bus route in the nation during the shutdown, with more than 50,000 additional daily riders expected to move above ground along 14th Street. According to NYC Transit President Andy Byford: “Launching Select Bus Service on 14th Street is a critical part of a multi-faceted service plan to keep thousands of customers moving safely and efficiently as they commute crosstown.”

“With a bus per minute, we plan to work with MTA to combine those signature SBS innovations with other design changes along 14th Street to provide fast, reliable, and safe service,” NYC Transportation Commissioner Polly Trottenberg said. “We had planned Select Bus Service for 14th Street long before the announcement of the l train’s disruption, but now with more than 50,000 additional daily riders expected to move above ground along 14th Street, the need for SBS here is even more urgent.”

The M14 SBS will supplement existing M14A and M14D local bus service on 14th Street, making five stops in each direction between First and Tenth Avenues for transfers to the subway lines along the way. The new route will be extended east to the planned Stuyvesant Cove ferry terminal on the East River to accommodate ferry customers from Brooklyn just before the shutdown.

The MTA’s Select Bus Service is New York City’s version of the internationally successful Bus Rapid Transit concept and features all-door boarding, off-board fare payment, traffic signal priority, dedicated bus lanes, enhanced customer safety street designs and electronic wayfinding signage and countdown clocks, all of which have been proven to decrease commute times by up to 20 percent.

The new bus route will be combined with daily high-occupancy vehicle restrictions on most of 14th Street; crosstown buses will be scheduled no more than two minutes apart during peak hours. 6sqft previously reported on the city’s plans to provide alternatives to the L train during the 2019 shutdown for repairs in the Canarsie Tunnel under the East River; 14th street will become a “busway” for 17 hours each day–among other strategies–to limit car traffic during the shutdown.

Car traffic on 14th Street from Ninth to Third Avenues eastbound and Third to Eighth Avenues westbound will be limited to pick-ups and drop-offs seven days a week from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. Additionally, there will be two one-way bike paths on 12th and 13th Streets.

RELATED: 

• Agencies announce May town hall meetings to discuss impending L train shutdown
• Could an East River pontoon bridge be a viable L train alternative?
• MTA releases plan to address impending 15-month shutdown of L train
• The MTA considers a ‘car-free busway’ as L-train alternative

Image: Todd Shaffer via Flickr.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the MTA has presented data showing that lower New York City mass transit use numbers matched up with an uptick in taxi and ride-hailing trips. Even as the city’s population grows, subway and bus ridership has been declining. New York City Transit Executive Vice President Tim Mulligan explained in a presentation Monday how dips in weekday subway ridership between 2016 and 2017 coincided with increased use of taxi and for-hire vehicles.

6sqft reported in February on the notable drop in subway ridership. According to Mulligan the data showed more than just a correlation, “but actually causation” between fewer subway rides and the rise of for-hire car and taxi travel. For 2016 and 2017 for-hire vehicle ridership grew 13.1 percent, an amount Mulligan pointed out was “strikingly similar” to a reduction in subway and bus ridership during the same time period. Though the Uber brand wasn’t mentioned by name, it holds a dominant share in the app-based for-hire car market in New York, accounting for most of the city’s 70,000 app-based for-hire vehicles (there are only 13,600 licensed yellow cabs in operation here, by comparison).

Though according to U.S. census data New York City added nearly 500,000 residents between 2010 and 2017, annual subway ridership stagnated in 2015 before falling by 0.3 percent the following year and by 1.7 percent in 2017. This year, ridership is down down 2.1 percent. Total trips on unlimited 7-day and 30-day MetroCards have slid 3.5 percent between 2015 and 2017. The biggest declines can be seen in off-peak ridership and travel within and between outer boroughs. Neighborhoods farthest from lower Manhattan saw the heftiest increase in for-hire vehicle rides. Subway ridership within the Bronx and Queens fell by 8.2 percent and 6.6 respectively, between May 2017 and May 2018.

Mulligan said the transit ridership decline in New York City is in keeping with the same phenomenon in other cities nationally and internationally as the rise of app-based ride-hailing picks up steam.

The MTA says some of the ridership decline is due to its own service outages such as increased overnight and weekend line closures and the closure of some stations for months at a time while it carries out renovations. Mulligan was asked to analyze the data to see if there is a correlation between ridership declines and whether a subway line is consistently on-time or not.

A spokesman for Uber Technologies, Inc., commented on the news, adding that “The best way to boost subway ridership is to improve service,” and that congestion pricing for drivers who wanted to enter the busiest parts of Manhattan would help boost public transit use.

[Via WSJ]

RELATED:

• The NYC subway saw 30 million fewer trips last year
• Amid decline in ridership, MTA boosts service on six train lines
• Report breaks down how much time New Yorkers waste waiting for delayed subways
• Subway delays could cost the city’s economy up to $389M annually

Image by Ged Carroll via Flickr CC

Metropolitan Transportation Authority officials announced Wednesday it will stick with its plan to increase fares and tolls that net four percent in 2019 and 2021 as the agency faces budget deficits in the coming years, the Daily News reported. The MTA said it expects to lose roughly $376 million over the next four years, or $90 million per year, due to a drop in ridership. Between 2016 and 2017, there was a loss of 69 million rides on the city’s subway and buses. The fare hike would be the sixth since 2009 when the state legislature approved a plan that included increasing fares every other year.

The last fare hike went into effect March 2017. The agency opted to not increase per-ride costs, but instead increased the price of weekly and monthly MetroCards from $31 and $116.50 to $32 and $121, respectively. There was also a decrease in the “bonus” riders received when adding money to their MetroCards.

Although a fare hike has been planned for next year since 2009, some board members are pushing back on the timing of the hike, as service continues to disappoint. The system’s on-time rate is the lowest rate since the 1970s, a time when the city was suffering from a transit crisis.

“I think we all agree all of our systems are under duress,” Mitch Pally, a board member who represents Suffolk County, said. “It is, in my opinion, not the appropriate time to ask our riders for more money at this time.”

Even with the expected fare and toll hikes, the MTA is looking at a budget gap of $634 million in 2022.

Funding is being allocated for system maintenance and repair of the system, including the more than $836 million action plan and NYC Transit’s bus plan and Fast Forward subway modernization plan. But in a year since the action plan has been announced, and with over $300 million spent, transit service hasn’t seen significant progress. The subway system’s current on-time rate sits just around 65 percent during the weekday.

MTA Chief Joseph Lhota says the drop in ridership is not from declining service, but instead the increase of for-hire vehicle services like Uber and Lyft and from people jumping the turnstiles.

“We’re not unique,” Lhota said. “That said, I think it’s a combination of a couple of things – it’s service, it’s for-hire vehicles, it’s fare evasion.”

[Via NYDN]

RELATED: 

• Despite declining service, MTA will most likely raise fares in 2019
• MTA says Uber use is the cause of NYC subway and bus ridership drop
• One year and $300M in repairs later, on-time subway rates are still awful

Photo via The New L Train

As the doomsday clock ticks down the minutes to the dreaded L train apocalypse–the line is being shut down between 8th Avenue in Manhattan and Bedford Avenue in Brooklyn for Hurricane Sandy repairs starting in April of 2019–the powers that be have been telling us to take the bus, take the bus and take the bus or ride a bike. But Gothamist reports that a service called The New L hopes to keep us out of commuter hell by offering ultra-luxe commuter vans with professional chauffeurs at the wheel plus wi-fi, breakfast bars, and phone chargers.

Since developers laid down the law some years ago that everything involving Williamsburg must use the word “luxury” in front of it, the classic carpool van concept has added some lifestyle upgrades and plans to hit the road come shutdown time. So how will a new fleet of vehicles added to daily traffic keep us from getting gridlocked? No one seems to know that particular answer, but at least we can enjoy our stalled commute with like-minded riders who also forked over the $155 monthly fee for the only service “exclusively focused on solving for the L Train shutdown.”

The fee only covers the trip into Manhattan, but the “group of Brooklynites and transportation professionals who were sick of not having a good answer” tell us on their website, which features a teeth-achingly diverse, cute and beaming squad of commuters, that their wheels are #worthit. One interesting aspect of The New L service is an attempt to reach out to business customers looking to help their employees get to work on time, raising the question of whether subsidized shuttle rides will be the new hot employee benefit.

While “The New L” has the highest of hopes for disrupting the disruption, the best-laid plans end up stuck in traffic when there’s too much of it. In addition to expanded bus routes, beefed-up subway service, and a contingency plan that calls for a partial auto-ban along 14th Street from 5 A.M. to 10 P.M. with no known strategy for enforcement, the current official plans may lead to more private cars on the road as displaced riders get frustrated with transit options. What happens then?

It’s not an unlikely scenario that major thoroughfares would become “bus parking lots,” according to Annie Weinstock, a transportation planner and President of BRT Planning International. Which puts The New L behind a bus somewhere on 14th Street in what Danny Pearlstein of advocacy group Rider’s Alliance calls a “nightmare L-pocalypse scenario.”

[Via Gothamist]

RELATED: 

• Agencies announce May town hall meetings to discuss impending L train shutdown
• Could an East River pontoon bridge be a viable L train alternative?
• MTA releases plan to address impending 15-month shutdown of L train
• The MTA considers a ‘car-free busway’ as L-train alternative

When it comes to New York City’s subway system, you may think you know the letters (A,B,C,D,E,F,G,J,L,M,N,Q,R,S,W,Z) and numbers (1 through 7), all too well. But a few of the fun facts and staggering stats that add up to the seventh busiest public transit system in the world might surprise you. From the longest route (the A line is 31 miles) to the world’s highest rapid transit station at Smith-9th Streets (it’s 88 feet above street level), there are plenty of figures that even the most well-versed New Yorker likely doesn’t know.

Image © 6sqft

In 2016, 5.7 million people–the highest since 1948–rode the subway on the average weekday. In that year, 1.757 billion people rode the subway.

That number makes the NYC subway system by far the busiest in the United States. But it’s only the seventh-busiest in the world. The teemingest is Beijing with nearly double the number of riders in a year (3.660 billion), followed by Tokyo (3.411 billion), Shanghai (3.401 billion), Seoul (2.620 billion), Guangzhou (2.568 billion) and Moscow (2.384 billion).

Record high: The only time the city’s subway system has surpassed its 2015 high was during an almost unbroken period from 1926 through 1948. The all-time, as yet untoppled, annual record was 2.067 billion passengers in 1946.

It’s the mileage: The city’s fleet traveled 358 million miles in 2016

The longest route with no change of trains: The A Line runs from 207th Street in Manhattan to Far Rockaway in Queens–more than 31 miles.

The longest uninterrupted run between stations is the A Line’s run between the Howard Beach/JFK Airport and Broad Channel stations in Queens (3.5 miles).

It’s the mileage, 2.0: With the opening of the 7 Line extension to 34th St.-Hudson Yards in 2015 and the new Second Avenue Q Line in 2017, the subway system now contains over 665 mainline track miles.

Laid end to end, NYC Transit train tracks would stretch from New York City to Chicago.

The subway system opened on October 27, 1904 with 28 stations in Manhattan; there are now 472 stations, most of which were built by 1940.

The first female subway conductor was hired in 1917.

The lower Manhattan skyline from the Smith and 9th Street subway platform. Image: wikimedia commons.

The system’s highest station above ground is the one at Smith-9 Streets on the F/ G Line in Brooklyn. At 88 feet above street level, it’s actually the highest rapid transit station in the world. The deepest station is 191 Street on the 1 Line in Manhattan at a sepulchral 180 feet below street level.

The worst subway accident in the city’s history happened in 1918 when a conductor who was filling in for a striking employee lost control of his train while entering a tunnel on Brooklyn’s Malbone Street. The resulting crash killed 97 people and injured over 200 others.

In 1916 a worker excavating under the East River survived being sucked through the river and shot up into the air after the pressurized tunnel he was digging cracked.

Photo via Norris Wong/Flickr

In 2016 the busiest subway station, not surprisingly, was Times Square (N/Q/R/W/S/1/2/3/7/ 42 St A/C/E) with 64,531,511 annual riders passing through.

If that’s your daily stop, consider this: The MTA will email or fax you a “late letter” of explanation if a train delay makes you late for work.

Subway tokens, now just memorabilia. Image: K.L. via Flickr.

The subway began accepting only tokens instead of coins in 1953 when the fare was raised to 15 cents because the turnstiles were only able to accept one type of coin. Thieves were known to intentionally jam turnstiles with coins, then (ew?) use their mouths to suck out tokens that were stuck in the slots. In response, token booth clerks took to (ew!) sprinkling the slots with chili powder or mace.

Tokens were permitted until spring of 2003, when they were officially deemed obsolete in their 50th year.

MetroCard swipes are tracked.They are said to have been successfully used as an acceptable alibi in criminal investigations.

The first air-conditioned subway cars were rolled out in May of 1967, but all trains didn’t have a/c until 1993 (the 7 train was the last to cool off).

In an attempt to curb graffiti officials at one point painted 7,000 subway cars pure white–which predictably had about the same effect as trying to curb drawing by handing out clean, white sheets of sketch paper.

Photo © Stephen Mallon

In 2008, 44 decommissioned subway cars were dumped into the ocean to function as an artificial reef.

Michael Jackson’s music video for “Bad” was filmed at the Hoyt-Schermerhorn subway station.

In 1993, 16-year-old Keron Thomas impersonated a train conductor and drove an A train for three hours, safely shuttling passengers to their destinations before getting busted by accidentally triggering an emergency brake. He received several months of probation. Thomas had no bad intentions other than really, really wanting to drive a train.

Getting the point: All train conductors must point to a black-and-white striped board in the middle of every subway station when their train comes to a stop. The conductor does this to assure that the train has stopped in the right place–and that he or she is paying attention.

In 2013 a pair of clever New Yorkers shook up the daily subway grind by standing in stations holding signs beneath the striped bar when trains approached that read, “Point here if you are dead sexy,”  and other irreverent instructions. If conductors weren’t paying attention before, they had a better-than-usual reason to do so.

RELATED:

• The NYC subway saw 30 million fewer trips last year
• Amid decline in ridership, MTA boosts service on six train lines
• Report breaks down how much time New Yorkers waste waiting for delayed subways
• Subway delays could cost the city’s economy up to $389M annually

Photo via Wiki Commons

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority on Monday morning began work on the N, R and D line tunnels running in Brooklyn from 36th Street to 59th Street, causing massive delays. But the agency never told rush-hour commuters, who checked the MTA’s website to find it labeled it as “good service” on the yellow lines. Only after about an hour of frustrated tweets directed at the MTA did the agency announce the long-term structural project, via Twitter.

Here’s what went wrong on the D, N, and R lines this morning and the actions we’ve taken to drastically cut delays moving forward. pic.twitter.com/T76PRNDddb

— NYCT Subway (@NYCTSubway) July 30, 2018

According to the MTA, the year-long plan will repair and replace steel, concrete and tunnel lighting in the express tunnel between Sunset Park’s 59th and 36th Street stations. The N train will run local between those stations in both directions.

And excuse me, now I am at 59th Street and this blue wall is literally blocking the N express line. Yet utterly no explaination why? There is not even basic signage. WTF is this? How can anyone plan their trip “accordingly” with a literal wall like that just being there?!? @NY1 pic.twitter.com/5kt1GW6S0k

— Jack Szwergold (@JackSzwergold) July 30, 2018

But with no signage posted and no updates made to the MTA website or app, commuters were left waiting in stations. One commuter, Jack Szwergold, posted a photo on Twitter of a blue construction barrier blocking the N track and asked: “WTF is this?”

The agency responded by explaining the blue wall “reduces the need to perform ‘flagging’ which slows trains down.”

“We deeply apologize for our significant errors today and know that we need to do better,” a statement read from the MTA’s @NYCTSubway account. “We are working through our policies and procedures to ensure this does not happen again.”

RELATED: 

• MTA set to hike fares next year, despite poor service and fewer riders
• MTA says Uber use is the cause of NYC subway and bus ridership drop
• One year and $300M in repairs later, on-time subway rates are still awful

Image courtesy of the NY Transit Museum Collections.

Throughout the 1970s and ’80s, New York City struggled with infrastructure failure, poverty, crime and garbage. One front in what seemed like a constant battle against total chaos was the attempt to keep subway cars graffiti-free. Inspired by a single white car sitting in a train yard in Corona, Queens that somehow managed to remain tag-free for two months (behind a security system that included a chain-link fence, barbed wire and guard dogs, but never mind that) in September 1981, the MTA rolled out one dozen all-white 7 trains–7,000 cars in all. The new program was dubbed “The Great White Fleet,” and officials hoped the bright white cars would do their part to keep graffiti at bay.

Images via nycsubway.org

By January of 1983, 7,000 cars– the entire IRT Flushing Line fleet–were painted white. Which predictably had about the same effect as trying to curb drawing by handing out clean, white sheets of sketch paper. In a fraction of the time it took to paint 7,000 subway cars, the whitewashed fleet became canvases on wheels.

Eventually it was discovered that the best way to keep the cars graffiti-free was to clean them as soon as the as soon as they were tagged. This continued until the world decided graffiti was actually cool to look at, and its talented creators realized there wasn’t much money in tagging subway cars and went to work for sneaker shops.

Fortunately the Great White Fleet was captured on film in the moments that it remained in its pale, pristine state, so we can get a look. It’s a great look, perfect for fans of Scandi minimalism; in fact, the city might want to consider it as a 21st century design choice now that graffiti is strictly a gallery affair.

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Are subway platforms really as hot as the inside of a rotisserie, or does it just seem that way? On Thursday, August 9, 2018, the Regional Plan Association (RPA) sent out an intrepid task force of staff and interns to measure the temperature in the city’s ten busiest subway stations. The temperature outside was 86 degrees. The data they collected helped to inform a report titled, “Save Our Subways: A Plan To Transform New York City’s Rapid Transit System.”

Here’s a snapshot of the findings:

Above ground high temperature (above ground): 86 degrees
Highest temperature recorded on a platform: 104 degrees (14-Street Union Square
Downtown 4/5/6 Platform)
Average temperature recorded on platforms: 94.6 degrees

The oppressive heat in underground subway stations isn’t just a nuisance, it poses a serious health risk–for subway workers as well as paying customers. According to the NYC Health Department, “A heat index above 95°F is especially dangerous for older adults and other vulnerable individuals.” The city issues a heat advisory when the heat index is expected to reach 95 to 99 degrees for two or more consecutive days, or 100 to 104 degrees for an time at all.

According to a 2015 Academy of Sciences report, the average temperature in New York City has increased by 3.4 degrees between 1900 and 2013. It’s definitely time to turn down the heat on subway platforms. The RPA report suggests several ways the MTA could leverage modern technology like regenerative braking and CBCT–which they are already in the process of installing–to cool off subway platforms by reducing the heat generated by trains.

Images courtesy of Regional Plan Association.

RELATED:

• The NYC subway saw 30 million fewer trips last year
• Amid decline in ridership, MTA boosts service on six train lines
• Report breaks down how much time New Yorkers waste waiting for delayed subways
• Subway delays could cost the city’s economy up to $389M annually

Image © 6sqft

Instead of airing grievances about the subway on Twitter, you will soon be able to complain to the boss of the system face-to-face. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority announced on Sunday that Andy Byford, president of NYC Transit, will host a series of town hall public meetings about the Fast Forward plan, the ambitious proposal to modernize the subway over the next decade. The first meeting will take place at York College in Queens on Tuesday, Aug. 21 from 5:30 pm to 8:30 pm.

Signals on these lines will be upgraded as part of the MTA’s plan

At the town halls, which are planned for every borough, Byford, along with NYC Transit staff, will present the action plan and gather feedback from the public. Questions for the MTA from commuters are encouraged.

“The Fast Forward Plan is a massive undertaking that requires buy-in from all stakeholders – our customers, our colleagues, advocates, the business community, and elected officials at every level of government,” Byford said in a statement. “The future success of New York City depends upon the success of this comprehensive plan to modernize our transit system, and we’ll be out there in every borough making the case.”

In May, Byford released his Fast Forward plan, which aims to modernize the subway with a new signal system and fare payment system. It also intends on making stations more accessible, rolling out a new fleet of subway cars and buses and redesigning the bus network. Officials expect the plan to be completed within the next 10 years, much faster than the 50 years of work previously estimated.

The MTA said it will announce the details for meetings in the other boroughs soon. The Queens townhall is located at the Milton G. Bassin Performing Arts Center at York College in Jamaica. Those who wish to speak must register ahead of time and will be called in the order. Can’t attend Tuesday’s meeting and still have questions or feedback? Submit them here.

RELATED:

• MTA releases aggressive plan to modernize New York City’s subway within a decade
• One year and $300M in repairs later, on-time subway rates are still awful
• MTA documents reveal that 4,000 L train riders will be displaced during shutdown

The West 35th Street/Hudson Blvd entrance under construction. Image via Wiki Commons.

The Manhattan 7 subway extension makes it the only line south of 59th Street to offer service west of Ninth Avenue, providing a long-awaited public transit option–with a station at 34th Street and Eleventh Avenue–for the Jacob Javits Convention Center, the High Line, and Hudson River Park and serving as a selling point for Hudson Yards and the many new developments rising on the far west side. Delays plagued the extension overall, with its opening in September of 2015 happening two years behind its original scheduled date. It was announced at the time that the station’s second entrance on 35th Street would take longer to complete. Now, two years later, the second entrance is open.

“Funktional Vibrations” at the 34th Street entrance, via Wiki Commons

The new entrance at West 35th Street and Hudson Boulevard East adds three low-rise escalators and a set of stairs from the street to the mezzanine level–the platform level of the station is 125 feet below street level. It’s also the location of the third and final mosaic in the installation “Funktional Vibrations” by Xenobia Bailey, consisting of 2,788 square feet of mosaic tiles, commissioned by MTA Arts & Design through an international competitive selection process. The station’s modern amenities include an air-tempered platform level, 14 Help Point Intercoms which enable customers to communicate with station agents or the Rail Control Center in case of an emergency, eight On-the-Go digital information kiosks, five other digital information panels and cell phone/Wi-Fi connectivity.

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Entrance to the new 1 station at WTC Cortlandt via Wiki Commons

Three days before the 17th anniversary of the September 11th attacks, the Cortlandt Street subway station that was destroyed that day will reopen as the last piece of the WTC site. The MTA announced today that the new 1 train station, now dubbed WTC Cortlandt, will be back in use tomorrow, Saturday, September 8th, at noon.

As 6sqft previously reported:

Located directly under the World Trade Center site, the station was crushed by the collapse of Two World Trade Center. In order to restore service to Rector Street and South Ferry stations, workers demolished the rest of Cortlandt and built walls where the platforms stood. The line was able to reopen a year after 9/11, with trains bypassing the station.

The new station was originally supposed to open in 2014, but funding disputes between the Port Authority and the MTA pushed the reopening back four years. Work began in 2015 with a total cost of $158 million. It will have four entrances into the larger World Trade Center Transportation Hub, linking it to 11 other subway lines and the PATH.

In a statement the MTA said, “The station’s name references its location within the World Trade Center site as well as its legacy under Cortlandt Street, which existed above the station when the 1 line originally opened in July 1918 but was demolished during the construction of the World Trade Center in the late 1960s.”

WTC Cortlandt will feature mosaics by Ann Hamilton with words from the United Nation’s 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the 1776 Declaration of Independence. It will have modern improvements such as wheelchair access, climate control, and fewer columns.

Via rhythmicdiaspora on Flickr

In August, Twitter users shamed the Metropolitan Transportation Authority for vaguely announcing a tunnel closure on Twitter in the middle of Monday morning rush hour. And this month, the MTA is facing backlash after being too honest with its commuters. One straphanger tweeted at the agency, “The @MTA really needs to get its shit together. People got places to go.” In response, whoever was running the agency’s NYCT Subway Twitter promised they are working on “fixing things within the next 5-10 years with our Fast Forward Plan.” That post did not bode well.

Good morning. A cord was pulled on a train at 14 St-Union Sq causing delays and changes in service. We know this is frustrating. Please know we are working on fixing things within the next 5-10 years with our Fast Forward Plan. ^CB

— NYCT Subway (@NYCTSubway) September 13, 2018

Twitter user “meany” wrote back, “5-10 years? That is pathetic.” Another user, Conor Greene, wrote, “In other others, it’s gonna take 10 years to recover from 8 years of disinvestment by the current governor.”

Many users questioned what is actually fast about the “Fast Forward” plan if it’s going to take a decade to fix one delay. But the MTA told the New York Post that the social media post was referring to NYC Transit Chief Andy Byford’s longer-term proposal to improve the entire system over the next decade.

[Via NY Post]

RELATED:

• MTA ‘deeply apologizes’ for announcing N train tunnel closure via Twitter
• There will be no G-train service between Bed-Stuy and LIC every weekend in September
• The L-train will not run between Brooklyn and Manhattan for 15 weekends

Via Dan Phiffer on Flickr

Signal problems caused subway train delays during morning rush hour every weekday during the month of August except one day, according to a report released last week by the Riders Alliance. Between 6 am and 10 am each weekday morning, except on Thursday, Aug. 23, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority issued a delayed train alert. Every line except the L train experienced signal and/or mechanical problems during one or more of the 23 morning rush hours last month, WNYC reported.

“When the entire month of August has only one morning rush without signal delays, that’s a blinking red light that it’s past time to modernize our subway system,” John Raskin, the executive director of the Riders Alliance, a transit advocacy group, said in a statement.

“Every one of those signal malfunctions throws thousands of people’s daily lives into chaos,” Raskin added. “In a functional transit system, that would be a rare event that merits an apology. In 2018 New York, it has become routine.”

Riders Alliance analyzed the MTA’s daily status report for the month of August. According to the group’s findings, the D and R trains suffer from the most delays, with 16 each across 23 working days. Signals delayed those trains 11 times, with mechanical issues responsible for five of the delays. The N train ranked third for most delays, with eight caused by signal problems and seven because of mechanical issues.

In addition to the Great Depression-era signals still in use, delays are being caused by people going onto the subway tracks. According to the New York Times, the number of incidents is on pace to be higher this year than last, which saw nearly 900 incidents involving people on the tracks. There have been 621 subway incidents so far in 2018.

“In New York, we have more incidents of people on tracks than anywhere else I’ve worked,” NYC Transit Chief Andy Byford, told the Times. “It’s a real challenge, and it’s one of the many factors we need to tackle in this all-out push to improve the reliability of our service.”

Currently, officials do not know for certain why the number of incidents has increased, but subway leaders said it could be the larger homeless population in the stations or the increased use of smartphones that can drop on the tracks.

In other cities, officials have installed platform doors that block anything from falling onto the tracks. But the MTA said installing them systemwide, at all 472 stations, could cost more than $1 billion.

The delays persist even after spending over $300 million on system repairs over the last year. Last summer, Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared a state of emergency for the MTA and unveiled a more than $800 million subway action plan to modernize the system. But the subway’s on-time rate hovers around 65 percent during the weekday, the same rate as last year and the lowest rate since the 1970s.

The main goal of Byford’s “Fast Forward” plan remains to equip the system with a new state-of-the-art signal system within the next ten years, a proposal previously estimated to take 50 years.

In their report, the Riders Alliance also called on Cuomo to push congestion pricing legislation to raise money for the Fast Forward plan. This means charging vehicles that enter Manhattan south of 60th Street. Congestion pricing could raise up to $1.5 billion per year for improvements, according to estimates.

“It’s time for Governor Cuomo and members of the state legislature to pass congestion pricing and fund the MTA’s Fast Forward plan, so we can rebuild the transit system and end the pain for millions of New Yorkers who rely on it every day,” Raskin said.

And like clockwork, delays on Monday morning were extensive. The MTA reported delays on the B, D, Q, E, M and F Lines due to a sick passenger at Rockefeller Center and signal problems at Broadway-Lafayette.

MTA, @NYCTSubway might as well close up for the day after a Monday morning rush hour this terrible pic.twitter.com/BmMccTkJp3

— Dan Rivoli (@danrivoli) September 17, 2018

[Via WNYC]

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• Delayed train? MTA is on it (within the next 5 to 10 years)
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• One year and $300M in repairs later, on-time subway rates are still awful

The MTA has reopened the 72nd Street B, C station on the Upper West Side after five months of extensive upgrades. In addition to the new digital signs and energy-efficient lighting, the station now features a ceramic mosaic designed by Yoko Ono. Titled “SKY,” the design includes six separate mosaics on platforms and mezzanines that show a blue sky with clouds, with hidden messages of hope written throughout. Yoko has lived in the Dakota, the famed co-op building above the subway station, since 1973. Strawberry Fields, the memorial dedicated to her late husband John Lennon in 1985, is located across the street.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

Imagine seeing the blue sky underground as you enter the subway at 72nd Street (B,C), where @yokoonoofficial has created “SKY”, a series of intricate ceramic mosaic murals of cloud-filled skies, fabricated by @instamosaika. As passengers move through the station, messages of hope that appear to be handwritten, float in the vast open sky, as the perspective shifts in each artwork. The transformation of photographs into mosaic sky paintings with subtle gradations in color and tone creates a visually striking environment. “I’m thrilled that my new work, SKY, is at the 72nd street subway station just steps from my home and Strawberry Fields, which I created in memory of my late husband. It brings the sky underground, so it’s always with us. I hope this will bring peace and joy to my fellow New Yorkers for many years to come.” – Yoko Ono. Ono has lived in the apartment building located above the #72Street subway station, since 1973. PatrickCashin/MTA. #MTAArts #YokoOno #Mosaika #ImaginePeace #SKY #subwayart #publicart #mosaic #RememberLove #dream #yes #remember #TheDakota #StrawberryFields #Imagine

A post shared by MTA Arts & Design (@mtaartsdesign) on Oct 5, 2018 at 7:07am PDT

The MTA installed Ono’s design where wall tiles needed replacement. The messages of hope appear in the clouds as riders move through the station and as perspectives shift. “I’m thrilled that my new work, ‘SKY,’ will be opening at the 72 St subway station just steps from my home and Strawberry Fields, which I created in memory of my late husband,” Ono said. “It will bring the sky underground, so it’s always with us. I hope this will bring peace and joy to my fellow New Yorkers for many years to come.”

The Central Park West station had been closed since May to allow crews to work on track and platform infrastructure repairs. The MTA repaired slabs and steel columns, waterproofed areas known for leaks, cleaned and repaired rusted infrastructure, and replaced floor slabs and tiles.

“This station is nearly 90 years old but after these much-needed repairs to its structure and modern enhancements to bring it into the 21st century, it will be a completely new and different experience for the thousands of customers who use this station regularly,” NYC Transit President Andy Byford said in a statement.

RELATED: 

• Destroyed on 9/11, Cortlandt Street subway station reopens this weekend
• The second entrance at 34th Street-Hudson Yards 7 station is finally open
• Three Harlem and Bronx subway stations to get upgrades for the first time in 114 years

All images courtesy of the MTA on Flickr

Via rhythmicdiaspora on Flickr

To find innovative solutions for New York City’s crumbling subway and bus system, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) is turning to tech companies. The MTA launched on Wednesday the nation’s first “transit tech lab,” an accelerator designed to find and test new transit technology, as first reported by the Verge. The agency is seeking answers to two major challenges: How can we better predict subway incident impacts and how can we make buses run faster and more efficient?

“The MTA is committed to exploring every avenue to ensure that we modernize our system for the next generation of riders,” MTA President Pat Foye, said in a statement. The Transit Innovation Partnership (TIP), a working group formed by the Partnership for New York City and the MTA, came up with the idea for the lab.

As part of the application process to the lab, companies must have a working version of their technology and a track record of integrating customers. The MTA will then select companies to participate in an 8-week accelerator, which will allow the customers to learn about the MTA and modify their technology.

To deal with the more than 2,500 delays happening across the subway system per weekday, the MTA is looking for companies to develop a way to better predict subway incident impacts. For the second challenge, companies will have to come up with ways to make buses travel faster. (In Midtown, the current average bus speed of 3.4 miles per hour, a similar rate to an average walker’s speed).

The MTA believes this challenge will open up a world of new, transit-improving tech possibilities, including cameras, sensors, and new software. The tech could potentially identify any bus lane obstructions, improve coordination of routes, and create more streamlined ticketing.

At the end of the 8-week program, the MTA will select companies to run a 12-month pilot with the transit system. The pilot program and the lab will not provide any compensation to the companies chosen.

Last year, the MTA and Gov. Andrew Cuomo launched a “Genius Challenge” as a way to find nuanced ideas to fix the subway. The winners, selected in March, presented ideas that included ultra-wideband wireless technology, onboard sensors and cameras, rolling out longer trains, and even a robotic installation system to control systems in subway tunnels.

Applications to join the first lab cohort are due November 30, with the 8-week accelerator to begin in late February. The MTA expects to launch the pilots in June of 2019. More on the transit tech lab here.

RELATED:

• MTA $1M Genius Transit Challenge winners suggest faster trains and robot workers to fix subway hell
• Governor Cuomo and the MTA announce a competition to fix the NYC subway system
• Cuomo declares a ‘state of emergency’ for the NYC subway, gives MTA $1B for repairs

Via Dan Phiffer Flickr

During the L train shutdown, 1,000 new alternate roundtrips will be added every week, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Starting in April, extra service will be added to the A, E, F, J, Z, M, and G lines, NBC reported. The L train will not run between 8th Avenue and Bedford Avenue for 15 months while the Carnarsie Tunnel, heavily damaged by Hurricane Sandy, is repaired. About 275,000 of the L train’s 400,000 daily riders are expected to be affected by the temporary shut down.

The MTA will operate 66 more G-train trips daily between Court Square-23rd Street in Long Island City and Bedford-Nostrand in Bed-Stuy. There will be 16 additional J and Z roundtrips, with both trains making all stops at all times. And there will be 62 more M roundtrips on weekdays.

Plan for two additional A roundtrips between 10 p.m. and midnight, 26 more E trips, and 12 additional F roundtrips.

In addition to the extra service, the MTA plans to make 14th Street a dedicated bus lane every day, between 5 a.m. and 10 p.m. The M14 SBS will supplement existing M14A and M14D local bus service on the street, making five stops in each direction between First and Tenth Avenues for transfers to the subway lines.

The agency announced earlier this month it will also launch temporary ferry service that will run from Williamsburg to Stuyvesant Cove by the East Village. According to the MTA, a 240-passenger ferry will provide “up to 61 percent more capacity than originally planned.”

Other less conventional transit alternatives proposed have included electric scooters, a luxury shuttle service, and a pass for discounted Via rides in Williamsburg, Bushwick, and Lower Manhattan.

[Via NBC]

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• L train shutdown haunted house and nightclub brings transit terror to Bushwick
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Via Roman Kruglov Flickr

Fixing the Metro Area’s mass transit system may cost $60 billion in a five-year spending plan, Politico New York reported this week. The capital spending plan includes system-wide repairs for the subway, Long Island Rail Road, Metro-North, and the bridges and tunnels overseen by the authority. This updated price tag is nearly double the MTA’s existing five-year plan of roughly $33 billion.

The plan’s estimated cost, which was shared with reporters by a specially convened task force, includes the first half of the MTA’s Fast Forward plan, a ten-year plan released in May aimed at improving the NYC subway system.

Out of the whopping $60 billion, $19 billion would be set aside for the Fast Forward plan, $20 billion for repairs and maintenance, and another $21 billion for the LIRR and Metro-North systems.

But the MTA has not yet confirmed a price tag for the system-wide repair work. Jon Weinstein, a spokesperson for the agency, said its too early to release final estimates.

“There are lots of numbers being thrown around, nothing is final, “Weinstein said in a statement. “As we’ve said we need reliable, sustainable, predictable sources of funding.”

The MTA is facing a steep deficit of $634 million in 2022, expecting a loss of $376 million over the next four years. New sources of funding could come in the form of four percent fare hikes next year and in 2021. The deficit could also mean service reductions (which could mean the total elimination of some bus routes), reduced training and track inspections, and toll increases.

In August, the MTA announced it is delaying the rollout of the plan to expand select bus service over the next few years to cut costs. Temporarily postponing the expansion will save just $28 million through 2022.

Congestion pricing has been pushed by officials and transit advocates, but Joe Lhota, who leads the MTA, has said it won’t be enough. If the state passes a congestion pricing plan, it’s estimated to bring in just $1.5 billion annually for the MTA.

The Metropolitan Transportation Sustainability Advisory Workgroup is coming up with its own recommendations for a capital plan and new revenue sources for the MTA.

[Via Politico NY]

RELATED: 

• MTA launches ‘transit tech lab,’ seeking solutions for NYC’s subway and bus crisis
• MTA set to hike fares next year, despite poor service and fewer riders
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Photo © 6sqft

The 86th Street B, C station reopened last week after five months of renovations and upgrades. The improved Central Park West station now features six colorful mosaic and ceramic murals translated from artist Joyce Kozloff’s “Parkside Portals” artwork, which depicts different perspectives of the neighborhood. The art shifts from aerial views of Central Park to close-ups of Beaux-Arts and Art Deco elements found on the iconic facades of surrounding buildings.

The artwork of Kozloff, who was a part of the Pattern and Decoration art movement of the ’70s and lived on the UWS for a decade, uses mapping and geography to create layers of cities and their histories, according to the MTA.

As one ode to the history of the park, the artwork includes a map of Seneca Village, the 5-acre settlement founded by free African American landowners in 1825. The settlement, the first of its kind in the city, lasted until 1857, when the construction of Central Park began.

Kozloff’s style is apparent in the station’s murals, which used Google Earth technology for the aerial park views. The art is framed with the trees of Central Park during the four seasons of the year. Kozloff worked with Miotto Mosaic Art Studios and Travisanutto Giovanni SRL to translate her paintings into tiles and glass mosaics.

In addition to the bright new murals, 86th Street station also received substantial repair work. The MTA fixed structural steel and concrete, repaired stairways, added new railings and guardrails, cleaned and repaired damaged tiles and concrete floors, and replaced platform edges.

The authority also installed new tech features, like digital wayfinding and customer information screens, countdown clocks, USB charging stations, and security cameras.

 

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Artist @joycekozloff has created new artwork, “Parkside Portals”, for the newly improved 86th Street (B,C) station. The six colorful glass mosaic and ceramic tile murals offer a view of the #UpperWestSide through a micro and macro lens. The perspective shifts from aerial views of #CentralParkWest using #GoogleEarth technology, to a zoom on the lavish design elements found on the neighborhood’s majestic building facades, which Kozloff embellishes with her eye for color and knowledge of the community, from the decade she lived on the Upper West Side. Framing these details are the trees of #CentralPark during the four #seasons. The artwork pays homage to the architecture of Central Park West, and its beaux arts and art deco ornamentation, and includes a map of #SenecaVillage, a 5-acre settlement founded in 1825 of mostly African American landowners, the first such community in the city. It was situated where Central Park now lies. Kozloff collaborated closely with #MiottoMosaics and #Travisanutto, Giovanni SRL who translated her intricate paintings into glazed tiles and glass mosaics. #MTAArts #JoyceKozloff #86Street #ParksidePortals #subwayart #publicart #UWS #CPW #beauxart #artdeco #mosaic

A post shared by MTA Arts & Design (@mtaartsdesign) on Oct 26, 2018 at 10:40am PDT

RELATED: 

• 72nd Street B, C station outside the Dakota reopens with mosaics by Yoko Ono
• 3 Manhattan subway stations will shutter through the end of the year
• Destroyed on 9/11, Cortlandt Street subway station reopens this weekend

All photos © 6sqft

Photo via Flickr cc

L train riders, be warned. You have exactly six months until all hell breaks loose. The MTA announced that the line will officially cease running between 8th Avenue and Bedford Avenue for 15 months on April 27, 2019 (a Monday, in case you were wondering) so that the Canarsie Tunnel can be repaired from damaged sustained during Hurricane Sandy. For many, however, the L-pocalypse has already begun; the line was not running between Manhattan and Brooklyn for most October weekends, weeknight service has been suspended through November, and more weekend suspensions are to come in February, March, and April.

Elected officials just got a briefing from ⁦@MTA⁩ about this informational ( I dunno, “van” let’s call it?? ) that will be making stops along key routes to tell people how they can navigate the shutdown of the L Train. pic.twitter.com/dd71wAqMd1

— Zack Fink (@ZackFinkNews) October 30, 2018

Somehow, the MTA thinks that the addition of roaming info buses and meetings starting in January will lessen the blow of being stranded for over a year. In a press release, the agency says, “Customers will be able to meet in person with MTA NYC Transit and NYCDOT team members to plan their routes, through a series of open houses, pop-up events or one of the three mobile information centers – two vans and a bus – which will make stops to meet with customers.” Of course, the Twitter-verse is already pondering why the cash-strapped MTA has decided to spend money on these “mobile information centers.”

Here are some other takeaways from the announcement:

• Alternative service options–five additional bus routes, a new M14 Select Bus Service on 14th Street, and a ferry service–will begin on Sunday, April 21, 2019, “to allow for customers to sample and become acclimated to new travel options.”
• The addition of 1,000 new roundtrips/week on the A, E, F, J, Z, M, and G lines will begin on April 28, 2019.
• Construction for the project is on schedule.

As for those pre-shutdown shutdowns, overnight and weekend closures in February, March, and April are as follows:

• February 2-3
• February 9-10
• February 16-17
• February 23-24
• March 2-3
• March 9-10
• March 16-17
• April 27-28

As 6sqft has previously reported, about 275,000 of the L train’s 400,000 daily riders are expected to be affected by the temporary shut down.

RELATED:

• MTA will add 1,000 new roundtrips each week during the L train shutdown
• MTA will run a temporary ferry service during L train shutdown
• MTA to launch 14th Street Select Bus Service to help move 50K more daily riders during L train shutdown