Pet Peeves: The MTA

Ok, Let me first remind all of you, we are in what they are calling a recession but what I personally think is this century's depression.

Look at that kid. Do you know now how I feel more or less? Or not yet?

Well, I am sure most of you know what public transit systems are like. In most cities, there is public transportation. If you come from a small town, or just a town, or a rural state, then you just might be used to driving all day. Anywho, as you guys already know, I live in NYC. We cant all have cars. Imagine how this city would look if EVERY ONE PERSON had a car. We wouldnt have room to walk. But we have public transit who we call the MTA. First off, let me tell you that I am really fighting the urge to curse them out right now with much vulgarity in my voice. I am trying to keep my inside voice inside my blog right now. I am. Really.

So this leads to tell you guys about their current BS. Let me give you a layout of the system so you are aware of how many people and how many areas in NYC this system serves.

Now this picture is slightly distorted. I have no idea why but its the subway map that they put on our crappy trains. Wait... I'll get to describing our rat-infested subway system soon. I just have to pace myself...



SO As you can see... It serves most of the city.
The blankish area to the very right is Nassau County. They have MTA-run buses but no trains besides the LIRR. The blankish area near the top is the Bronx and Westchester border line. Metro-North is the train that takes care of that area and the people living there. Most people who use that line are people who refuse to drive into the city.

Otherwise, within city limits, that would be where the buses come to play to give service to those areas that arent reached by trains.


See how many buses pass by? NOW lets explain what sucks about the MTA.














MTA suckage:
1. Rat-infested system. In my 15+ years of taking buses and trains in this system, I have seen rats that climb seats, stairs, even do gymnastics and pole-dancing. I am NOT kidding you at all. I wish I was kidding.

2. Wait times. The wait times are ridiculous. My train line is a heavy used train line. And its always breaking down. It was just rated the worst train of the line. Honestly, compared to other lines, I dont think its THAT BAD to be called the worst. I usually use the A/C line to go to work, school or hangout. The L line is the one that is closest to me and this year it is the 2nd best line. I dont understand how that is possible when the trains on that line are always dangerously packed and with the gentrification of the areas it serves, its only going to get a lot more packed. This line serves about 6 towns(Canarsie, Brownsville, ENY/Bed-Stuy, Bushwick, Williamsburg and then 5 stops in Manhattan along 14th St.)  and it has about 25 stops. This line can take you from Canarsie to 8th Ave in about 45 minutes. That's how far it is and the train runs often from 4-6 min during the day, 2-3 min during rush hour, and 18, 24 or 36 min apart during overnight or during the day's slow hours. Do you see how far apart these trains come on the 2nd best line of the system? Are you friggin serious? If this is the standards for the 2nd best, imagine the worst. The C train, doesnt run on the weekends or over nights. It runs from the top of Manhattan to ENY in Brooklyn. Its one of the blue lines in the train map above. This damn train has waits of 10, 15 min during the rush hours and takes up to 30 or 40 any other time. This train CAN and many times WILL get packed which leads me to my next point.

3. Over-crowding. I dont think I ever mentioned that as a freshman I went to college in New Rochelle. New Rochelle is in Westchester somewhere beyond the Bronx. When I had my pass for Metro-North, I would take the L train(the grey line) to the 4/5/6 line(the green line) in Union Sq. for 1 stop to Grand Central to take the Metro North. Sometimes this platform gets so packed with people that people stand on the top level upstairs in order to make their way little by little to the train downstairs. This is actually a pic of Union Sq in which I found on Google. Like seriously this is nothing compared to how it gets on the other side of this train station on the 4/5/6 Uptown line. This is merely an exmple of how it looks. It seriously gets 10x worse on the other side. In this case, this is a combo of the city being crowded and the MTA not providing enough service.

4. Flooding. I wasnt even going to touch this but when I saw this pic on Google reminded me of my horrible experience last week. UGH. I told you guys it takes the L train 45 minutes from Canarsie to 8th Ave. Yeah, that is only possible when its not rush hour! A ride that would take me 30 minutes (I'm on Halsey Ave which is halfway into Manhattan from Canarsie, (15 stops multiplied by 2 min per stop=30 minutes, btw.), took me one hour and a 45 minutes. Yes, 115 min!!! I was late to my class which is nothing new for that damn class (I hadnt made it to that class on time NOT AT ALL this semester! Ive resolved to stop taking classes before 12:30PM) So the flooding on the tracks didnt allow this train station to be open and in my case, the flooding last week delayed my train. PLUS the flooding wasnt even on the tracks for me... It was on the platform!!!

I took these photos that day because I couldnt believe how bad it got.

Now that you guys feel my pain and know what we NYers go through, lets explain what the MTA does. They charge $2.25 per ride. Lets round that off to $2. Supposedly there are 6 million fares that go are counted per day. $6M times $2 = $12M (and dont forget all those quarters!!) So lets say $15M total. This is daily... Now I would like to know where the hell all this money goes! How can a company be in so much deficit and always rebudgeting when their system sucks so much and we dont see these so called improvements they make. I didnt even go into their bus issues. All I mentioned were the trains. Imagine if I were to start on the buses, Id never finish this already long blog. So the MTA is talking about cutting out lines that are barely used but necessary. They are talking about eliminating bus lines. Great. They are talking about reducing the frequency of already bad service. They are talking about another increase in fares. Theyre saying away with the student metrocards. Seriously, its a recession, parents can barely make ends meet and you're going to make students pay their way to school? Well... guess I should expect higher crime rates, higher dropout rates, what kid wants to go to school now. (The only pro I can think to this is less fat and obese children cause you know there will be more kids walking to school. Poor things... Get over it! Thats not the point to this blog) And I didnt even mention the money they make from Metro-North, LIRR or the Bridges/Tunnels. How much worse can this service get? You know what I need?

I need to prepare to get myself a car or move out this city. At least with a car, Ill get home nice and warm in my own company. Yes, parking will be a butt, insurance is high, and gas is a bitch, but I'd rather put up with myself than the MTA's bitchassness.

Here are some articles on the latest news about the Doomsday plan:

NY Times

ABC Local