R10 2952

In all fairness, David Gunn ran the MBTA before he ran SEPTA (and then NYCT), so not everybody from up there is terrible. The reason the MBTA today is so bad, is because reforms and funding improvements initiated by their governor Deval Patrick were stalled after he was replaced by that GOP dickhead Charlie Baker. When confronted about issues with the MBTA, Baker does a lot of hemming and hawing, but when I read between the lines (and the Boston Globe) it seems he's been pushing for a gradual backdoor privatization of the MBTA. Imagine a less-abrasive, more mild-mannered, Republican version of Cuomo, and you get the picture. The situation up there is not going to change until they get a new (hopefully more progressive) governor.

It's been on the drawing board in some form or another since 1990. Took only 3 decades LOL... In other words, NYCT isn't the only agency in this country that can't get its shit together.

Just my own curiosity; back in the '80s and '90s, did the MTA ever consider ordering GMC/MCI Classics? I'm guessing no, on account that the feds were initially pushing the RTS and the Grumman-Flxible to most transit agencies as a condition of federal funding. Still, would have been nice to see the Classics in NYCT and MaBSTOA service. Personally, I always thought the RTSes looked too future-dystopian; preferred the Orion V by a long shot.

Yup, the TAB exists to collect revenue, not to find the actual facts or reach genuine (not fabricated) conclusions of law. They're a proverbial rubber stamp. Only person I know of who was able to beat the TAB was the guy who had the time and money to get a lawyer, and I was surprised he managed to find a lawyer willing to waste his own time going down to Gallatin Place. That said, my sympathy for the guy in the article ended the moment I read he was a gun nut and a collector of Nazi memorabilia. What's really frustrating about all of this, though, is that before 2005, passing between cars was permitted. That year, the Board voted to change the rules, and from what I recollect it was motivated largely by liability concerns. There had been a few incidents around 2000 when drunk and/or disorderly individuals fell between cars and were injured or killed, and then the families went to court. MTA usually loses these kinds of lawsuits or is afraid to lose them, so the agency would settle these cases until one day they decided it was just more cost-effective to ban passing between cars altogether. The problem is the cops don't treat an urgent reason to use the end doors as a legitimate emergency, unless you have a figurative gun to your head (and at that point it's usually too late to do anything). They don't care, they just want to get their quotas in and don't expect anyone to stand up to their bullying. They don't expect civilians to go through the administrative or legal process equipped with an attorney. I can recall several situations over the years where I had to use the end doors to extricate myself from trouble. A fight brewing that turned into a brawl. A woman's pepper spray that fell out of her bag, hit the floor, released and caused everybody to start coughing. A dude who had something under his coat and was mos def prowling for victims. The list goes on. Since they instituted the passing-between-cars ban, there's been a number of passenger complaints about it on these kind of grounds. For now though, MTA just gonna MTA.

So you're just going to twist my words now, to fit your narrative? You know what, I don't need people pigeonholing me into categories that I've never even been in. Fact is, I did raise a legitimate issue about platform screen doors a few pages back: But if these points somehow make me a NIMBY, a libertarian, or a railfan of all things, then I guess we have nothing to discuss... We can disagree about things, but there's no need to be passive-agressive about it. God forbid anyone should have a contrary opinion around here.

Not with this agency you can't; I've been around long enough to see that. With their shitty maintenance practices, screen doors will just become another thing that malfunctions and messes up travel. As to your second point, it can sound however you want it to; platform screen doors are not going to give the pushers and the jumpers the mental health intervention they need. That's the real solution needed. Otherwise, the mentally deficient will just go somewhere else- they'll jump off buildings, or they'll push people in front of buses and trucks. And then where does the slippery slope lead? Do we put up barricades on every curbside? Do we start mandating helmets for pedestrians? Do we replace all glass with plastic, and all metal utensils with wood? Good intentions are cobblestones on the road to nowhere. Accepting certain risks is the price we pay for living in a society.

@Mtatransit If you had emphasized the issue with the smoke more, perhaps they would have let you off. Anyway it's the second half of the month, quota time for them, so they're out prowling for opportunities to ticket people over trivial BS instead of you know, ticketing the jerk who was smoking. The thing they bank on is that nobody is going to demand a court hearing, or that the officer be present to testify against you. The actual courts (not TAB) tend to be more flexible; there used to be a procedure (don't know if that's still the case now) that if the officer failed to appear for the hearing, the ticket would get dismissed. Transit Adjudication Bureau, on the other hand, is not an actual court. They're an MTA revenue collection entity operating under the guise of being an impartial administrative law unit. Only person I know of who was able to get the TAB to back off was a friend of a friend, years ago, who showed up to their office in Downtown Brooklyn with a lawyer. Good for him, but obviously most people don't have the time or money to get an actual attorney to represent them for a civil summons.

Thank you for bringing up the last two points. Some people on these boards get so hung up on extraneous bells and whistles that they don't think about the bigger priorities. The other day in the news a woman's car got hit by a piece of metal coming off an el. All these structures in disrepair, but we're supposed to jump for joy at the prospect of idiot-proofing the system with fiberglass screens? Too many folks around here see a falling tree without seeing the entire damn forest fire.

For what it's worth, I still remember some people calling the West End, Myrtle and Jamaica Lines by name back in the late '90s and early 2000s. I even remember the Canarsie Line being referred to as such- before all the yuppies and hipsters came in and gentrified that part of North Brooklyn to death.

I may be a bit fuzzy on the details on account of the #75 being cut back about 10 years ago, but from what I recall the biggest problem was inconsistency of service; it was rush-only, and scheduled runs often didn't show up. The second thing that killed it off, if I recall correctly, was the routing itself- an express bus from Newark to Butler detouring through Paterson. Meant to serve everybody, but effectively serving nobody. Why NJT decided around 1990 that this would somehow be more effective than the old #11 up Route 23, I don't know. It's as if somebody wanted to run a route from Morristown through Boonton and Fairfield, and bill it as the most direct bus to Newark... The 3,000-pound elephant in the room, however, is the fact that outer Passaic County does have an active (albeit freight) rail line that goes right through Paterson down into Hudson County. In fact, this Susquehanna Line used to provide passenger service until the late 1960s- every now and then, something pops up in the news about a possible restoration of commuter service (to Hoboken, I think), but these studies never seem to go anywhere.

It's a far cry from the days when NYCT used to send cars for scrapping across the Hudson to NJ.

Are they being shipped to Canada for scrapping?

Great find. In a sense, history comes full-circle. In by rail back in the beginning, out by rail today at the end. Better than seeing them dumped in the ocean, at least. What was the location in the vid, anyway?

Not surprised. I had a feeling that the people in charge at NJT were intent on passing the buck. Hell, if it weren't for the whistleblower at Academy, the case may never even have seen the light of day.

Pretty much. This agency won't lift a finger unless one goes through all levels of bureaucracy, including the electeds. It sucks, because much of nobody (of us passengers) has time to write stuff up that frankly, should be the supervisor or dispatcher's job, but it's the only way to get things done. @JubaionBx12+SBS and if you do reach out to the MTA or the politicians, I would recommend sending a letter by regular postal mail, because frankly, I've noticed over the years that they are far less responsive to phone calls and/or e-mail.

This whole matter with NJT vs. Academy makes me wonder; while the passengers were getting shafted due to the no-show trips, what would have been their recourse in terms of filing a complaint? Would they have been expected to file their complaint directly with NJT, or with Academy? Just something I've been wondering about since this whole thing started. Seen enough bureaucracy in my own experiences that I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out Academy customer service was telling riders "call NJT", only to have NJT customer service tell them "call Academy". @553 Bridgeton sorry for the shout-out, but any thoughts? I'm assuming the circus at Penn Plaza East is still in town?

Anytime I use the name "Andy" derisively, I'm referring to Cuomo and nobody else. You misunderstood what I was saying entirely.

Frankly, I'd like to see NYCT undo all the shenanigans with those cars, that were forced on them by Andy Boy.

From the early days of the fight against graffiti, when decided to paint A Division cars white: System: New York City Transit Line: IRT Pelham Line Location: Westchester Square Route: 6 Car: R-17 (St. Louis, 1955-56) 6865 Photo by: Steve Zabel Collection of: Joe Testagrose Date: 10/16/1982 I wonder why the scheme never spread to the B Division.

It's here: https://www.nycsubway.org/wiki/The_New_York_Transit_Authority_in_the_1980s "Funding was so tight that there was real consideration of closing either the IND Concourse Line or the IRT Jerome Avenue Line, dropping IND service to the Rockaways and running buses instead, truncating the BMT Jamaica Line in Brooklyn and cutting back service on the Staten Island Rapid Transit.33"

Damn straight. I lived one neighborhood south for quite a while, the people up north there always struck me as a bunch of pearl-clutching busybodies. Case in point; several years back when I was learning to drive, one of these a**holes called the cops on me and my driving instructor, even though we committed no traffic violations and were in an area where training/instruction was explicitly allowed. That and one or two other experiences have left me with nothing but utter contempt for the attitude permeating that particular area around Riverdale Avenue north of 250th.

Don't want to derail the topic too much, but since people are bringing up the Rockaway Line, I honestly believe that should have been kept within the LIRR system. The MTA almost admitted as much around 1980 when they were actually considering suspending/abandoning service to the Rockaways.

I was beginning to see the point the residents were trying to make, until I saw them bring up how they're members of NextDoor... tells me all I need to know.

From what I've seen of NJT bus maps and schedules from the 1980s, several areas had better bus connections than they do today. At a minimum, NJT ought to look at bringing some of those routes back. From what I've witnessed, the potential demand is there; not everyone driving around is doing so because they want to- especially not with these gas prices. They're taking the car to work because NJT doesn't give them the choice of a bus, let alone a train. Even the areas that are served by train are almost inaccessible outside of the peak direction in rush hour- I learned that the hard way once when I tried to get a train from Newark Broad Street to Boonton.

For what it's worth, there are several transit deserts in NJ, just not in Hudson County. The lack of service between Freehold and Trenton (or even Freehold to Princeton Junction), Boonton and Morristown, or Paterson to certain points west in Passaic County all come to mind.