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Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

nytimes.com

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Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#31

Post by davidf18 »

jrockway wrote: post #7

I checked out their Twitter feed a couple days ago (had to reroute due to a broken rail at Wall St. and wanted to see a picture or something of the broken rail). I was amazed how polite and helpful they are to the most irate customers. It really does seem that the social media team calms down a lot of angry people. Meanwhile, I am surprised at how desynchronized their various data sources are. I check mta.info before…

I arrived a few minutes before the beginning of a tech Meetup and most of the people were already seated eating their pizza.

I apologized as I had to go around them and said, "Sorry, I'm running later than I wanted because of a broken subway rail at Wall Street."

Of course they understood. :-)

Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#33

Post by jon_richards »

cpeterso wrote: post #21
pluma wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most infuriating part for me with the local transport agency in Cologne (KVB) is the verbosity. They use a 90s style unbearably slow ticker display. So if you catch a glimpse at the wrong moment you're stuck reading all the unimportant garbage while trying to figure out whether the message is even relevant to you. This is especially bad with cancellations because it lists every major stop (with station name and t…

> They use a 90s style unbearably slow ticker display. So if you catch a glimpse at the wrong moment you're stuck reading all the unimportant garbage while trying to figure out whether the message is even relevant to you. BART in the SF Bay Area is the same. The tickers slooowly scroll through repeated public service announcements and ads before eventually showing the train ETAs and current time for five seconds. The…

The American subways I've been to seem to all suffer from the realization that you can put advertising anywhere you could put a map.

Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#34

Post by ardit33 »

I hate to say this, but the MTA/Subway in NYC has reached the level of service that you can expect from a third country system. The pain is even worse during the summer where all stations have a mix of scorching heat and humidity, and it feels almost like you are in a sauna.

The MTA doesn't just need more money, but a completely change in leadership as well, and putting new people that have higher expectations on the service, and that actually use it themselves.

Even simple thing like "scheduled maintenance" notices look like they were design for lawyers and not normal people.

The current management is totally dysfunctional, and yes Ny Gov. Cuomo is part of the problem. (and the boob wants to run for President). He is going to run down the country just as he is doing with the MTA.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/22/opinion/new-york-subway-a...

Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#35

Post by mjevans »

ardit33 wrote: post #34

I hate to say this, but the MTA/Subway in NYC has reached the level of service that you can expect from a third country system. The pain is even worse during the summer where all stations have a mix of scorching heat and humidity, and it feels almost like you are in a sauna. The MTA doesn't just need more money, but a completely change in leadership as well, and putting new people that have higher expectations on the…

It needs... robots.

Robots for all the things that a commuter doesn't directly interact with.

The humans belong in the human interface and can remain in the stations; MAYBE as actual patrols on the train looking to provide assistance and keep the peace (and also having access to get in to the control area in case an over-ride is required).

Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#37

Post by Sangermaine »

no_wizard wrote: post #2

I have friends who have and currently live in NYC and I know the MTA gets a lot of flak from them and sometimes for very good reason. I have to say though all things considered this is a shining example (to me) of something that is typically very opaque - government agency public relations- and giving it some honest try polish and actually trying to meet people where they are (e.g Twitter) Does this paper over all th…

Honest my ass:

>“I think people think it’s a lot worse than it is, this catastrophic mess all the time,” she said. “I’ve had to put a moratorium on talking about the trains with my boyfriend. We had to say no talking about the trains. He’s part of the public. They just see the bad parts. They don’t see the strides we’re making and how this information that we put out makes a difference. They’re caught up in the negative part.”

The "negative part" is the trains being late or stopping in the tunnels almost daily. The "negative part" is our lives being constantly disrupted by the MTA's unbelievably poor service. She's damn right we're "caught up in the negative part".

This is a bullshit spin operation. Fix the damn trains, don't hire some PR operative to tell us we're somehow delusional and we're not really having these problems.

Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#38

Post by Sangermaine »

jrockway wrote: post #7

I checked out their Twitter feed a couple days ago (had to reroute due to a broken rail at Wall St. and wanted to see a picture or something of the broken rail). I was amazed how polite and helpful they are to the most irate customers. It really does seem that the social media team calms down a lot of angry people. Meanwhile, I am surprised at how desynchronized their various data sources are. I check mta.info before…

>It really does seem that the social media team calms down a lot of angry people.

Great, they've mastered spin. People are angry for good reason. Don't calm them down, fix the damn trains, now. This is just more of the MTA's endless bullshit.

Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#39

Post by ng12 »

chimeracoder wrote: post #9

I live in NYC, and I follow transit news very rigorously. This article underplays the extent of the problem, which is that the information they give is just not actually correct . First of all, the MTA made a big deal about rolling out the subway countdown clocks across (almost) all the stations. Except, for the old BMT lines[0], the clocks are just... not actually accurate! They're literally just publishing the sche…

> Except, for the old BMT lines[0], the clocks are just... not actually accurate!

I can't say I agree. I've been a daily commuter on the ACE, 1, and NQR/BD trains since the introduction of the clocks and found them all to be wonderfully accurate.

Re: Don’t Hate Her, She’s Just the (Subway) Messenger

#40

Post by workinfunk »

JackCh wrote: post #28
pluma wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most infuriating part for me with the local transport agency in Cologne (KVB) is the verbosity. They use a 90s style unbearably slow ticker display. So if you catch a glimpse at the wrong moment you're stuck reading all the unimportant garbage while trying to figure out whether the message is even relevant to you. This is especially bad with cancellations because it lists every major stop (with station name and t…

The best display technology IMHO is the old electro-mechanical split-flap. They update pretty fast, and they make one hell of a racket when they do so everybody in the train station knows when something updated (this is a feature). They're sufficiently versatile to display information a train station needs to. They also have a certain aesthetic that simply cannot be touched by modern LCD/LED displays.

You must be one of those hipsters who lugs around a typewriter to cafes.

- They are very slow compared to digital. - They aren't versatile, they can't display arbitrary information. Each message has to be crafted individually and fit in among the rest. Which makes it nice for station lines since there are a small number that never change. Anything else? Not so much. - The noise is not intentional, it's more of a bug than a feature for sure. In a busy train station they change every minute or more so as an alerting mechanism it's near useless.

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