Well, if you have eyes, you can see that the weather is complete crap today. There’s going to be tons of flooding, especially in the subway tunnels.
So, let us know in the comments section of this post if you experience any service delays while out and about today. We will post them all here. Everyone knows that the MTA site is stupidly slow when it comes to posting alerts, so we will have to rely on eachother.
The MTA has released renderings of potential subway entrances along the Second Avenue line. They look pretty cool. I’d settle for a boring industrial look if it meant spending less money on this project, but whatever.
Anyway, the subway line isn’t going to be done for what….10 or more years at least? So why would you mock up something as trendy as this so early in advance? Who knows that will be the style a decade from now?
Maybe by then, the abstract, idustrial look will be out. Or maybe there will be better technology that would allow a cooler look.
Anyway, should we be picking out the wall paper and paint colors just yet? Or would it be better to wait unil…ohhh…a year or two before the project is done?
Ok fine, SUBWAYblogger completely wussed out of going to the ceremony today. It ended up that it was inside the previously existing subway tunnel, so it was out of the rain.
It still sucked that they were requiring the press to arrive at 9am for a 10:30am event. That’s a little lame.
But I did get to watch it on NY1, so that was cool (and dry).
I wish I had thought of live blogging the ceremony like Jenn at Gothmist did. The rain must have washed away my creative juices 🙂 .
Example:
10:30: No groundbreaking ceremony yet. The MTA is already behind schedule on the 2nd Avenue Subway! Clearly a sign of things to come!
So over all, the ceremony wasn’t that exciting. Still would have been cool to be there to video tape it. Maybe I’ll attend when the first train runs down the line.
Tomorrow is the ground breaking for the 2nd Avenue Subway! No seriously, it’s really happening.
There’s no stopping it now. The shovels hit the dirt…again. That’s right, again.
Back in 1972, Gov. Nelson Rockefeller and Mayor John Lindsay participated in a ground breaking for preliminary construction of a Second Avenue subway. That tunnel was planned to run from 101st to 120th. They even had more ceremonies in 1974 and 1975.
However, in 1975, the MTA ran short of funds after already spending $1.3 billion. That’s billion with a “B.” All work on the project stopped. Mayor Abraham Beame ordered the tunnel to be sealed in 1975.
So there Gov. Spitzer and others will stand in the site of the reopened tunnel to participate in tomorrow’s ground breaking (or is it re-breaking?).
SUBWAYblogger hopes to be on hand to witness the historic moment in person.
Back in 2005, the MTA passed new regulation making it illegal to walk between train cars (using the end doors). The new rule was created mainly out of safety concerns. The MTA wanted to reduce the number of injuries and deaths resulting from people falling through to the tracks.
Recently, the transit cops have discovered a new love of this regulation. Basically, if an MTA cop spots you walking between train cars, they have the right to stop you. Usually, you’ll just get a ticket and be on your way. However, because they have stopped you for an offense, they have cause to give you a quick frisk while they have you in custody.
As a result, the transit cops keep finding guns and knives!
NYPD transit police have seized 296 knives and 13 handguns in the subway this year, compared with 116 knives and eight guns during the same stretch last year.
Realizing this new search strategy, the police have targeted crime hotspots. Areas of high crime on street level will now receive special attention under ground. Cops crack down on subway offenses under these areas, and pull tons of weapons out of the area.
More photos of a man, suspected by police to have been involved in the murder of James Polcica, have been released.
Police think that this guy may have followed Polcica out of a near by 7-11 store. There’s a $22,000 reward on the line.
How ’bout this for extravagant: Glass, floor to ceiling doors/walls that line the subway platform. Kinda like the glass doors at the AirTran stops or the monorail in Las Vegas. Ooo…I wanna go to Vegas.
In a nutshell, the doors and walls would provide a barrier between the tracks and the passengers on the platform. The idea actually sounds nice. They look kinda cool too. But unless the glass door company starts handing out free doors, it’s going to cost an ass load. Ohh, and it would only be for a few stops along the new 2nd Ave line.
So what’s the point? Well, they apparently help keep the platforms cooler by about 10 degrees!! That would be pretty sweet. Sure, shaving 10 degrees off of the already 105 temperature still leaves you with 95 sweaty degrees…but hey, at least it’s something.
Also, the doors keep trash off the tracks. Oh, and people too for that matter! It’s much harder to jump in front of a train when there’s no way to get out on the tracks.
Anyway, the MTA is looking into it. Sounds like a pipe dream though.
Got an interesting email tonight from a SUBWAYblogger reader. Apparently this guy has the whole “free subway” thing figured out.
Keep in mind, SUBWAYblogger has no idea if any of this guy’s facts are correct. Also, we don’t necessarily share all his views. But hey, we thought it seemed interesting, so we thought we’d publish it.
Dear Whomever,
My name is CXB and I’ve been pitching the no-brainer economics of FREE SUBWAYS for 15 years now. (Okay, I haven’t been dedicating very much time. Sorry.) Many of my “radical” ideas later came true, and this one will too if more people start discussing it and demanding it of the City Council and Bloomberg and Spitzer. (Giuliani proved me right when he made the Staten Island Ferry free.)
The irony is that I don’t ride the filthy, unpredictable trains. (I’m a cyclist.)
The other day, Lord Bloomberg even said FREE MASS TRANSIT would be the smartest thing, but he doesn’t have the guts/energy to do it.
But it’s a flawless plan. Perhaps you could spread the word, and you don’t even have to give me credit! Here’s a short examination / explanation:
FREE SUBWAYS
Impossible dream or intelligent fiscal innovation?
You be the judge!
“How are you going to pay for free subways?” is a silly question, obviously.
(It’s up there with, “but what will you do when you sail off the edge of the earth, Mr. Columbus?”)
FACT:
MAKING THE SUBWAYS FREE WILL NOT COST US A PENNY.
FACT:
MAKING THEM FREE WILL INSTEAD EARN US OVER $300,000,000 A YEAR.
FACT:
THE MTA IS REPLACING AN ASTRONOMICALLY EXPENSIVE SYSTEM OF FARE-COLLECTION (tokens, token clerks, token booths, token-taking turnstiles, etc.) WITH AN ASTRONOMICALLY EXPENSIVE SYSTEM OF FARE COLLECTION (metrocards, metrocard machines, metrocard-taking turnstiles, maintenance workers to fix / stock metrocard machines, people to sweep up the used metrocards, etc, etc,)!
FACT:
THERE ARE ONLY 2 WAYS TO FINANCE NYC’S SUBWAY SYSTEM:
Out of the pockets of citizens (daily) or
Out of the pockets of citizens (annually)
FACT:
The subway fare does NOT PAY FOR THE SUBWAY – ITS MOSTLY PAID FOR VIA ANNUAL TAX REVENUES. (The fare revenue covers less than 30% of operating costs. It’s mostly subsidized with tax dollars.)
FACT:
THE MTA SPENDS OVER $300,000,000 a year (!!!) TO COLLECT A FARE DAILY.
If we eliminate the fare altogether, we save 100% of that annual $300 million which they inefficiently waste collecting the fare. Comprende?
FACT:
THE STATEN ISLAND FERRY USED TO BE 50 CENTS AND NOW IT’S FREE.
(Which proves there’s a 100% chance we can implement my completely reasonable plan b/c it’s not a pipe dream.)
FACT:
We pay for 100% of NYC’s sidewalks & streets out of annual tax revenues.
Imagine if they decided to put toll booths on every avenue & street in Manhattan, to raise $ to pay for the roads! You’d say that’s totally insane and you’d be right. So why don’t you recognize the toll booth system underground is just as inefficient & insane? WASTE is WRONG (and government waste will be ILLEGAL when I’m mayor).
FACT:
It is MORE INTELLIGENT & EFFICIENT TO SOCIALIZE (ie, like single payer health care) most government services.
EX:
THE POLICE DEPARTMENT & THE FIRE DEPARTMENT PROVE EVERYDAY THAT SOCIALIZED SERVICES ARE MOST EFFICIENT. (Imagine if the NYPD started billing you once a month (or once a day like the MTA!!) for their services! They’d have to spend a hundred million extra dollars a year to set up a billing service & mail you a bill (like Con Ed & the phone companies do) wasting billions of dollars in tax money, manpower, and so on.
It would be absolutely MORONIC to bill millions of people each month (or each day as the MTA does) for the U.S. Military’s work protecting us!! (Note: the U.S. Military is a govt-run, MONOPOLY and everyone loves it that way—nobody wants to open it up to the “free market” b/c the free market is a lie and even Republicans know this, which is why they refuse to open PUBLIC SAFETY to it.)
Ohhh…..there’s waaaaaaaaaaaay more after the jump
Speaking of subway newspapers, SUBWAYblogger was in Metro yesterday! It was sort of a Time magazine “10 Questions” like piece. Paul Berger writes a regular feature called Blogarithms where he profiles New York City blogs. Isn’t it funny that there are so many blogs in NYC that you could make a living writing about them?!
The full article (Q&A) is available here for your reading pleasure. And be sure to check out Paul’s blog, Englishman in New York.
Wesley Autrey, America’s hero who jumped on the subway tracks to save a stranger, is suing a lawyerfor fraudulently having Autrey sign away the rights of his story.
…a lawyer and a man who represented himself as an entertainment executive tricked him into signing an “unconscionable” contract allowing them to exploit his name and personality.
The duo did things to harm Autreys reputation like asking a school to pay a speaker’s fee and demanding expenses from a magazine that interviewed him.
So, our bad for earlier making it sound likeAutrey was getting suit happy. It actually doeslook like these guys operate a shaddy business.
SUBWAYblogger 