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What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

nytimes.com

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Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#141

Post by rayiner »

closeparen wrote: post #6
Nelkins wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have enough money, if we get our costs under control. Our capital costs (and operating costs...actually everything) are much higher than most other cities/countries. Some good analysis here[1], in addition to this series the NY Times is running. [1] https://pedestrianobservations.com/construction-costs/

New York isn’t a greenfield project. There’s a massive legacy system with decades of maintenance debt. Of course it’s going to be more expensive to fix than to maintain an already-maintained system.

So is London’s, and they manage to move almost as many people each day for half the money.

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#142

Post by 8ytecoder »

spike021 wrote: post #40

I find this situation incredibly interesting as an outsider. I live in the SF Bay Area where we have a Muni "subway", if you can even call it reminiscent of one and BART. They're both absolutely awful, between not having good/expansive coverage/timely service. A plethora of issues plague both. Both times I visited NYC this year I took the subway everywhere. Out of probably 40-50 subway rides, only a handful were dela…

BART is honestly not as bad as people make it out to be. It's fast - really fast. People overlook that. And it's super frequent during rush hours. MUNI trains do have cleaner and nicer cars but they're so slow above the ground. MUNI buses on the other hand are always stinking.

However, what I uniformly hate about all modes of public transportation in the Bay Area is the casual, lethargic passengers who take their sweet sweet time to get in and out and clog the doorways. New York on the other hand was extremely courteous (in my limited experience) by on boarding and off boarding as quickly as they can.

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#144

Post by Animats »

keevie wrote: post #97
Joeri wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet I have heard horror stories of how it was so run down in the 70's and 80's that people were afraid to even take it at all. Isn't this a case of people glorifying the past? Are there objective metrics that demonstrate service quality has degraded (reduced train frequency, reduced amount of seats, etc...)?

It was really terrible in the 70s when the city went bankrupt. Then it got better, and now it's getting worse again.

The state took over the subway system when the city went broke. The MTA is a state agency.

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#145

Post by Animats »

8ytecoder wrote: post #142
spike021 wrote: post #40

I find this situation incredibly interesting as an outsider. I live in the SF Bay Area where we have a Muni "subway", if you can even call it reminiscent of one and BART. They're both absolutely awful, between not having good/expansive coverage/timely service. A plethora of issues plague both. Both times I visited NYC this year I took the subway everywhere. Out of probably 40-50 subway rides, only a handful were dela…

BART is honestly not as bad as people make it out to be. It's fast - really fast. People overlook that. And it's super frequent during rush hours. MUNI trains do have cleaner and nicer cars but they're so slow above the ground. MUNI buses on the other hand are always stinking. However, what I uniformly hate about all modes of public transportation in the Bay Area is the casual, lethargic passengers who take their swe…

BART was the first modern transit system. Computer control. Active suspension. Solid-state motor controls. Card-based fare collection. Air conditioning. All new technology. All special-purpose. It took over a decade to get all that debugged.

Now it's antiquated, and keeping those one-offs going is hard. It's easier to maintain old electromechanical systems like NYC's than 1960s electronics like BART. The NYC stuff is mostly standard General Railway Signal equipment, with some Union Switch and Signal stuff. Many railways worldwide used those components. Siemens sells compatible relays.[1]

Think of where you'd be today if your transit system ran on OS/2. The NYC transit system is still running hundreds of computers on OS/2. It was the best system at the time.

[1] https://w3.usa.siemens.com/mobility/us/en/Documents/F1-F60%2...

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#146

Post by dankohn1 »

spike021 wrote: post #40

I find this situation incredibly interesting as an outsider. I live in the SF Bay Area where we have a Muni "subway", if you can even call it reminiscent of one and BART. They're both absolutely awful, between not having good/expansive coverage/timely service. A plethora of issues plague both. Both times I visited NYC this year I took the subway everywhere. Out of probably 40-50 subway rides, only a handful were dela…

There are two basic issues with the NYC subway:

1. Due to lack of good management and a number of structural issues, building in NYC costs about 5 to 10x more per km than other built-up cities. (E.g., $2.2 B per km in NYC vs. $230 M in Paris.) Source: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/1/1/14112776/ne...

2. There is insufficient funding available, due largely to the fact that the subway is controlled by the state (not the city), which has prevented congestion pricing to be implemented. It finally seems like the crisis may cause congestion pricing to pass, which will provide a major new dedicated funding source. The plan " rel="nofollow">http://iheartmoveny.org/> is quite good and will also dramatically reduce traffic congestion.

However, until costs are controlled, we will only be able to improve our current service, not do the major expansion that large transit deserts in and around the city need.

Now compare to Beijing, which is simultaneously building "20 different subway lines, measuring a total distance of 354.8 kilometers." That will probably cost $35 B but would cost $781 B in NYC. https://www.thebeijinger.com/blog/2017/07/29/beijing-metro-u...

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#147

Post by sandworm101 »

majormajor wrote: post #86
betterunix2 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are wrong. Luxury real estate in NYC is dependent on the transit system, and gentrification tends to follow subway lines. The value of a NYC apartment is related to the proximity to a subway stop. This is why, for example, the new 2nd Ave. subway line ends where it ends -- the next planned stop is in a neighborhood that has not been gentrified, while the existing stops serve several luxury developments.

I think you and the person you're replying to are using vastly different definitions of luxury real estate. Add a few zeros. :)

Yes. Most of NYC real estate only exists to support the real luxury units, the top 1-5% with massive profit margins. A great many units are actually built at a loss to support the construction of the penthouses. Such not-luxury units only exist as a result of zoning. Google "poor door" to see the extreme physical manifestation.

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#148

Post by phil21 »

smelendez wrote: post #56
js8 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's interesting. In Prague, subway (which is IMHO superior to NY subway in some ways) is closed every day from midnight till 5 am (roughly, I think it is extended by an hour during weekends). Instead, we have night trams and buses, so the downtime is not a big deal. Maybe a change of culture would be helpful?

That's what most US cities do, too. Chicago has some all-night rail service, but it's mostly just buses, for instance. But in NYC, an advisory group suggested that recently, and people hated the idea. The problem is traffic can be heavy even after hours, especially on the weekends, so buses would be a lot slower. Lots of people rely on the subway at all hours of the night.

> Chicago has some all-night rail service, but it's mostly just buses, for instance.

Anyone that can tends to avoid (e.g. prefers to live off the red/blue line) the lines that do not operate 24x7. Not providing universal service means you lose peak time ridership as well, as witnessed by ridership numbers on those lines.

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#149

Post by jsjohnst »

spike021 wrote: post #40

I find this situation incredibly interesting as an outsider. I live in the SF Bay Area where we have a Muni "subway", if you can even call it reminiscent of one and BART. They're both absolutely awful, between not having good/expansive coverage/timely service. A plethora of issues plague both. Both times I visited NYC this year I took the subway everywhere. Out of probably 40-50 subway rides, only a handful were dela…

> Out of probably 40-50 subway rides, only a handful were delayed either in-tunnel or while I was waiting in the station

You must not have had to come from Brooklyn to Manhattan during commute hours. Daily (or multiples times a day even) occurrence in that case. I’ll still gladly take MTA over Muni/BART any day, but NYC could definitely learn a thing or two from Hong Kong or even London’s subway systems.

Re: What Would It Take to Fix New York’s Subway?

#150

Post by jsjohnst »

Joeri wrote: post #95
chimeracoder wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I found NYC's subway a pleasant improvement. Yet I keep seeing articles about how it needs to be fixed. Decades of underinvestment means that it's not as good today as it was ten years ago, or as good ten years ago as it was a few decades before that. That said, even with all its problems, the NY metro area still has far better and more extensive public transportation than any other metro area in the country. Over…

Yet I have heard horror stories of how it was so run down in the 70's and 80's that people were afraid to even take it at all. Isn't this a case of people glorifying the past? Are there objective metrics that demonstrate service quality has degraded (reduced train frequency, reduced amount of seats, etc...)?

I didn’t live in NYC during that era, but from my understanding it was a personal safety issue (gangs), not a mechanical safety issue.

I can emphatically state that five years ago, there was much less over crowding, more frequent trains, and less delays.

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