Where's the Urgency? MTA Muddles Forward as Mayor, Governor Fail to Budget...
In the months leading up to October, when the mayor and governor finally agreed to fund the MTA's capital plan, the transportation authority was frantic, saying that it needed that money as soon as...
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What the L: Residents Outraged By Possibility of Canarsie Tube Closure
In the aftermath of Sandy, the MTA has been repairing subway tunnels under the East River — replacing tracks, signals, electrical components and other pieces of equipment that were fatally damaged when...
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Engineer in Fatal Amtrak Crash Has "Dream-Like...Foggy Memory"
Investigators at the National Transportation Safety Board have released over 2,000 pages of documentation about last May's crash, which killed eight passengers.Amtrak train number 188 derailed while...
View ArticleUber Price Cut Cuts Both Ways, Drivers Say
Over a hundred Uber drivers protested Monday afternoon after the company lowered the prices it charges passengers by 15 percent over the weekend.Drawn to the Uber offices in Long Island City through...
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Wait for It: A Year After Fatal Metro-North Crash, Grade Crossing Still the...
Six people were killed last Feb. 3 when a Metro-North train collided with an SUV at a road crossing in Valhalla, Westchester County. The incident is still under investigation by the National...
View ArticleAll Aboard, Amtrak! And that Means Cats and Dogs, Too.
Amtrak is expanding its pets-on-trains program beyond the Northeast and Illinois, which was where it began two years ago. Now, the passenger rail outfit is making it permanent on some routes, while...
View ArticleNJ Transit, Rail Unions on Collision Course Toward Possible Strike
Rail workers descended upon the Newark headquarters of NJ Transit Wednesday, using the public comment period of the agency's monthly board meeting to urge leaders to reach a deal before a March 13...
View Article8 Questions — and Answers — About the BQX Streetcar
Three de Blasio administration officials —Deputy Mayor Alicia Glen, Transportation Commissioner Polly Trottenberg and Maria Torres-Springer, president of the Economic Development Corporation — held a...
View ArticleLIRR's Snowstorm Postmortem: We Need Better Technology — And Communication...
Following the Jan. 23 blizzard — which caused a shutdown of the LIRR, followed by a bumpy resumption of service that confused and infuriated riders — the MTA promised to take a hard look at what...
View ArticleWhy is NYC MIA on the MTA Board?
The 20th floor board room of MTA's lower Manhattan headquarters is, to borrow from the Broadway musical "Hamilton", "the room where it happens." It's where the agency's board meets to make decisions...
View ArticleL Train Shutdown? Wait for It. Then 'Boom!'
How bad is the post-Sandy damage to the tunnel that carries the L train under the East River?"You have to demolish this tunnel," MTA president Tom Prendergast told state lawmakers during a joint...
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Calatrava Hub's Value Is in Architecture, not Transportation
In the days after the 9/11 attacks, President George W. Bush promised $20 billion in aid to help the city rebuild. A sizable portion of it — $4.5 billion — was devoted to transportation. As...
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A Critic Looks at Calatrava's PATH Station
To see whether the new World Trade Center Transportation Hub was worth the $4 billion it cost to build it, WNYC Host Richard Hake sought a professional's opinion: he took a tour of the station the day...
View ArticleFacing Possible NJ Transit Strike, Some Suburbs Get Ready
When NJ Transit announced its contingency plans last week, many were underwhelmed: the agency said five park-and-ride stations and beefed-up bus service could only accommodate about 40,000 rail...
View ArticleA Tale of Two Looming Transit Strikes
Five days before NJ Transit rail workers could go out on strike, Gov. Chris Christie left the state to vacation with his wife to celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary."It's not the job of the...
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NYC to Install a Record Number of Protected Bike Lanes This Year
New York City will be getting over 15 miles of physically protected bike lanes in 2016 — more than any year previously, officials said.The de Blasio administration also promised to install around 50...
View ArticleAs Work Week Ends, Stress Begins for NJ Transit Riders
Thousands of NJ Transit train commuters headed home Friday afternoon, uncertain how they will get to work Monday if rail workers go on strike over the weekend."I'm praying and I'm trusting God that...
View ArticleNJ Transit, Unions Reach Last-Minute Deal to Avert Strike
Union officials and NJ Transit negotiators announced they had reached a tentative contract deal, averting what could have been its first strike since 1983. "You can all smile now," Stephen Burkert, a...
View ArticleNJ Transit Deal: Let the Union Voting Begin
NJ Transit may have reached a tentative deal with its 4,200 rail workers last Friday, but that's only the first step of a long process.The contract covers 11 unions*, and they all must vote to ratify...
View ArticleThe Thrill is Gone: NYC's Newest Subway Station Is Leaking
The 34th Street-Hudson Yards station opened to great fanfare last September. The first new subway station in over 25 years, it's meant to do great things — namely, anchor the city's redevelopment of...
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MTA to Run Out of Capital Program Money by June 30
For the past 18 months, the MTA's 2015-2019 capital program has wandered in the wilderness, waiting for a state board to approve it and the legislature and the governor to fund it. Until those hurdles...
View ArticlePort Authority's Grand Compromise Yields New Bus Terminal, and Tensions
Usually, political horse trading goes on behind closed doors. But at the Port Authority's most recent board meeting, it was on full display, in all its tension-infused glory.New York Gov. Cuomo has...
View ArticleNJ to Port Authority: We're Going to Make Sure Bus Terminal Gets Built
Last week, the New Jersey side of the Port scored a win when it convinced the board to include a new bus terminal in its capital plan. But since then, doubts have cropped up. The new terminal has no...
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NJ Transit Names New Executive Director
In a special meeting Wednesday, NJ Transit's board unanimously appointed former Amtrak official William Crosbie to be its next executive director.William Crosbie, the new exective director of NJ...
View ArticleFor New York City Straphangers, Wait Times Are Getting Longer
For New York City subway riders impatiently craning over the platform edge to look for an oncoming train, it’s not your imagination — the amount of time you spend waiting between trains is growing...
View ArticleNJ Transit's Deficit Shrinks, Even as Transportation Funding Uncertainty Grows
At a hearing in Trenton Wednesday, NJ Transit's interim executive director downplayed its latest deficit numbers."NJ Transit has historically finished plus or minus over the years," said Dennis Martin....
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NYC Subway, We Love You, But You're Letting Us Down
According to the MTA's just-released analysis of 2015 subway ridership, the city's subway system is experiencing a boom it hasn't seen since the post-war era.Last year, the system served up 1.763...
View ArticleTwo NJ Transit Rail Unions Reject Contract
Last month, NJ Transit struck a deal with a union coalition representing 4,200 rail workers, reaching a tentative agreement with just over 24 hours before a strike deadline.Since then, the 11 unions...
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Come L or High Water: Sandy Damage Leaves MTA With Tough Choice
As subway-riding New Yorkers know, the system was dealt a huge blow during Sandy, when nine subway tunnels flooded with salt water."By far, the worst-damaged tunnel was Canarsie," said MTA president...
View ArticleFinally: The MTA Has an Approved Capital Program
The MTA's 2015-2019 capital program has finally gotten a green light.The program took effect Tuesday, 30 days after the MTA formally submitted it to a state review board. Gov. Andrew Cuomo hailed the...
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No, Albany Still Hasn't Approved NYC's MTA Nominees
Eleven months ago, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio named three people to fill the city's vacancies on the MTA board: David Jones of the Community Service Society; City Council member Ydanis...
View ArticleConstruction on a New LaGuardia to Begin This Week
Governor Cuomo on Wednesday said the financing for a new LaGuardia Airport has been nailed down — and the Port Authority and the private consortium known as LaGuardia Gateway Partners have entered into...
View ArticleNew York City's MTA Nominees Take Next Step Forward — Finally
It's been a year-long process, but it looks like Mayor Bill de Blasio's picks for the MTA board might be seeing the light at the end of the nomination tunnel.On Tuesday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo formally...
View ArticleIt's Deja Vu All Over Again as NJ Transit Faces Possible Rail Strike
Back in March, with a little over one day to go before a threatened walkout, New Jersey Transit struck a tentative agreement with its rail unions. The deal: a 21 percent retroactive salary increase in...
View ArticleCuomo Nominates MTA Board Member With Potential Conflicts
One of the individuals New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo nominated to the MTA board of directors this week recently won a multi-million dollar contract with the agency, raising objections from good government...
View ArticleNew Board Members Head to MTA — Minus Two Names
Following WNYC and other reports about a potential conflict of interest, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has withdrawn one of his nominees for the MTA board.Earlier this month, Cuomo nominated Infor CEO Charles...
View Article213 Breakdowns and Counting: NJ Transit's Tale of Woe
It's the nation's largest statewide transit agency. It provides nearly a million rides each weekday to people living in the country's most densely populated state. But instead of having a sustainable...
View ArticleNew Jersey's Transportation Funding Impasse Imperils Jobs
New Jersey's fiscal year ended last week without any resolution over how to replenish the state's Transportation Trust Fund, a publicly funded pool of money that pays for repairs to roads, bridges and...
View ArticleThe Heir to the MetroCard Inches Closer to the Turnstile
Earlier this year, the MTA issued a request for proposals for a new fare payment system.As the agency envisions it, the replacement to the MetroCard — which itself began taking over from the token in...
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Riders, 'Voting With Their Metrocards,' Are Abandoning NYC Buses
New York City has been losing bus riders for years. Now a coalition of transit advocates is offering up a blueprint to help turn that trend around."Our buses are traveling at an average of 7 miles per...
View ArticleYou Think the Port Authority's Ready to Build a New Bus Terminal? Not so fast.
For years, plans for a new Port Authority Bus Terminal nudged along as slowly as a coach making its way through the Lincoln Tunnel, largely unnoticed by the city's political class. That changed...
View ArticleHot Train, Summer in the City
If you ride several different subway lines, you might have noticed a recent trend: one subway car model seems to have more busted A/C units than any other type."The majority of the hot cars that we've...
View ArticleThe 'Corner of Death' — and 99 Other NYC Intersections — Get Left-Turn...
On the eastern fringes of Soho, where Kenmare Street runs into Lafayette, things are...complicated. There's a lot of truck traffic, and vehicles make left turns at relatively high speeds."This...
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AT LAST: MTA Pilots Countdown Clocks on Lettered Subway Lines
Numbered subway lines (known as the IRT to New Yorkers of a certain age) have had countdown clocks for years. But the lettered lines have lagged behind. That's because of how the subways were built....
View ArticleHot Subway Cars Keep on Rolling
Car 1662 was flagged as problematic by a passenger on July 14th. But that wouldn't be the last time.@NYCTSubway On yet another 6 train this morning without a/c. Car 1662, Brooklyn Bridge bound,...
View ArticleNYC Sets Bike Lane Record, But Struggles to Keep Cars Out
Earlier this week, the city announced it would exceed its original target and install a record-setting 18 miles of protected bike lanes this year, rather than the 15 it had originally planned.“No...
View ArticleSurprise! MTA on the Hook for More Penn Station Money
When Gov. Andrew Cuomo released further details of his plans to revamp Penn Station and transform the post office building across the street into a grand train hall, two points caught some transit...
View ArticleNJ Transit to Resume Some Hoboken Service Monday
Starting on Monday, some New Jersey Transit trains will operate out of Hoboken again — 11 days after a fatal train crash damaged the terminal and caused a partial roof collapse.The agency says it will...
View ArticleNew Hudson River Tunnel Goes Express on Approvals
Federal officials say that progress is being made on the plans to build new rail tunnels under the Hudson River.Lawmakers from New York and New Jersey say that the project has received a special...
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W Train Returns After Six Long Years
November will see the return of the W train, which fell victim to budget cuts six years ago. On the 7th, it will ride again — from Astoria, Queens to Lower Manhattan.The W train is replacing the Queens...
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