The only blog written from the NYC Subway system

Did anyone else see signs, literally put up on easels, at your subway station advertising the new EasyPay Express Metrocards?
At Columbus Circle, they had a bunch of them printed up and set up at the main entrance.
In case you don’t know already, the MTA has set up a Metrocard that automatically refills itself when the [...]

Ain’t this a b*tch.  I went to buy a MetroCard today.  Everything was going as normal until it came time for the stupid machine to spit out my new card.
I heard the noise of it trying to spit the card out, but nothing happened.  Then all of a sudden it asked if I wanted a [...]

Heat (or lack of AC): Can’t we poke some holes in the ceiling of the train lines to allow more ventilation?  Is it that hard to do?  And I’m sure there’s a way to do it and keep the rain out at the same time.
Security: Well, there isn’t any.  Random cops sometimes standing around talking [...]

Anyone have the new automatically refilling MetroCards that the MTA released a few weeks ago?
It works like an EZPass almost.  You fill it up with $40, then when the balance gets low, it automatically refills itself (aka charges your credit card).
Sounds convenient if you are a pay-as-you-go rider.
As you know, SUBWAYblogger is a monthly unlimited [...]

Thanks though!
Wouldn’t you know it.  Just as the MTBA up north digs into their own issues with computer geeks hacking the CharlieCard, it turns out we have our own homegrown hackers right here in NYC.
I had written a post wishing the MIT students would come down here and beat up on the Metrocard system, but [...]

I could have sworn I just saw that the Metrocard machines were down again.  As I walked into my station, I pass a whole wall of Metrocard machines.  All of them said “CASH ONLY” across the top.
There were a lot of confused looking people too.
Did anyone have any problems on the way home tonight?

Well, the Metrocard drama seems to have continued today, and still no explanations.
Paul J. Fleuranges, the chief spokesman for New York City Transit, the arm of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority that runs the subways and buses, declined to speculate on the cause of the breakdown, but said “it was a systemwide outage affecting all or [...]

Did you try to buy a new Metrocard this morning between 8:30AM and 10:30AM?  Hope you didn’t try to pay with a credit card, because the machines weren’t taking them.
For unknown reasons, dozens if not hundreds of Metrocard machines stopped taking electronic payments.  Not a big deal if you were going for a $2.00 ride.
However, [...]