Should The MTA Subsidize Late-Night Cab Rides?

Why give Uber money out of the public transit budget? [View this email in your browser]( Late-Night Transit Service Is Lacking. Are Subsidized Ubers The Answer? Plus: The MTA still hasn't provided Andy Byford's October resignation letter. Subway surfing incidents are up. And our partners at ProPublica covered the challenge of being a fully-employed New Yorker who can't rely on public transit. By [James Ramsay](mailto:james@wnyc.org?subject=We%20the%20Commuters) [a bus stop in Queens late at night, when service tends to be sparse] Heath Brandon/Flickr My first job out of college was at a falafel shop that catered to a late-night munchie crowd, which meant my shift ended around 1:30 a.m., when public transit service was light. My apartment at the time was six miles away. Some of my co-workers lived even farther, along more convoluted bus routes. And I remember at the time thinking, it would be awesome if a cab fare didn't amount to half of what we just made in one shift. Now, it seems the MTA is answering that prayer. Sort of. Under an upcoming pilot program, the MTA would subsidize app-based cab rides for late-night shift workers who live in outer boroughs, more than half a mile from the nearest subway station. This wouldn't be a door-to-door trip — just a cab ride to the subway. It's also unclear how much the subsidy would cover. But with the city's number of non-9-to-5 workers on the rise — especially in the health care and hospitality industries — are individual, subsidized car rides actually a reasonable way to move people around? "I’ve long said we need to change our transit network to support the growing number of New Yorkers who don’t travel into Manhattan on the old 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. schedule, but putting people in cabs so they can wait for trains and buses that hardly ever show up during off-peak hours is not the answer," said New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer. He's arguing that we should instead allow late-night commuters from places like the Bronx and Eastern Queens use Metro-North and the Long Island Rail Road for the cost of a MetroCard swipe. Nights and weekend service was already expected to get worse as construction associated with the MTA's capital plan gets underway. If a subsidized cab program proves popular, there's fear that the transit agency could make further cuts to bus and subway service. Additionally, there are basic concerns about taking public money and giving it to private-sector ride-hailing companies, which effectively compete with the MTA for users. "There are obviously choices to be made, and this seems like an odd choice," said Jon Orcutt, a former transportation department official. "Do we need to be essentially subsidizing taxi trips in New York out of the transit budget?" [The City]( reports that the MTA plans to pick a company to partner with by March, and launch the pilot program in June. — [Reporting by Jake Offenhartz]( People With Disabilities Work. Does Access-A-Ride? [An Access-a-Ride van idles on a city street]( Jen Chung/Gothamist I moved to New York in 2013, and several months later, I found myself watching the clock in my apartment as I waited for a city social worker to arrive. She was late, and I was anxious to get back to my job at a private investigation firm. Twenty minutes later, the social worker arrived. "You work?" she asked when I told her I’d scheduled our appointment for my lunch break. She’d presumed that I wasn’t employed, and that my schedule was flexible. I use a wheelchair, and the meeting was to determine if I qualified for any government benefits related to my disability. One of the items we discussed was Access-A-Ride, the transit service that provides disabled people with an alternative to the subways, which are largely inaccessible to people in wheelchairs. For the price of a subway ride, a wheelchair accessible van would pick me up at my apartment and drop me at my destination anywhere within the city’s five boroughs. So far, so good. But then she explained the fine print. I would have to schedule my ride one to two days in advance. My pick-up time could be an hour earlier or an hour later than requested. The driver would have a 30-minute window in which to pick me up before he would be considered late. I, on the other hand, had to be outside to meet my van within five minutes of its arrival, or I would be counted as a no-show. And since the rides were shared, it could take a long time to get where I was going. She told me some users call it "Stress-A-Ride." I looked at the social worker, bewildered. The program she was touting seemed to make a similar assumption to the one she had made about me — that I didn’t have a job. In New York City, the employment rate for people with disabilities is 35%, versus 74% for those without disabilities. A big reason for that: Our mass transit system doesn't accommodate people with disabilities who need to do more than make the occasional doctor's visit. Claire Perlman, a research reporter at ProPublica, [wrote about her experience]( as a disabled New Yorker trying to go to work, go to museums, and get drinks with friends, all without being able to rely on public transportation. Hear Perlman and fellow (employed) wheelchair user [Katherine Valdez]( share more about their experiences [on today's Brian Lehrer Show](. This Week's News From Gothamist And WNYC [NYC Transit Chief Andy Byford and Gov. Andrew Cuomo shake hands and smile, back when there was not animosity between the two.] Gov. Cuomo's Flickr The MTA has still not released the resignation letter Andy Byford submitted last October, before he changed his mind and stayed a little longer. Despite multiple requests for the document under the Freedom Of Information Law, the MTA keeps saying it [needs "additional time" to find this piece of paper](. It's believed that the concealed resignation letter, unlike the vague explanations now given for the former NYC Transit chief's resignation, could contain more information about why he quit. A community board on the Upper West Side decided this week to have the city consider using curb space for something other than free parking. Following several hours of heated debate Tuesday night, Community Board 7 voted to let the Department of Transportation study alternative uses of curbside space. Though overnight on-street parking was forbidden until the 1950s, [there are now 3 million parking spaces on city streets](. Concerns over car emissions — and growing enthusiasm for bike and bus lanes — have prompted many to question how our street space is allocated. NJ Transit had a meltdown Monday night, stranding at least one train outside Penn Station for four (!) hours. One rider commented on Facebook that his train left Secaucus Junction shortly after 6 p.m., was held for an hour outside of Secaucus, returned to Secaucus because a passenger had a medical emergency, and then finally went to Manhattan — only to [idle in the tunnel outside Penn for hours](. "[NJ Transit] believed all trains were resolved and ours was in the yard," the passenger wrote, after calling an NJ Transit representative. "They don't even know where trains are." The agency has disputed his account, saying it knew where the train was, but that an Amtrak power issue caused the delays. The MTA's habit of skipping preventative maintenance inspections caused last year's infamous 5th Avenue/53rd Street escalator collapse, according to the agency's own inspector general. The IG's report does note that the MTA has taken some steps to revamp its escalator maintenance program following the incident — and has agreed to improve training and reporting systems. The MTA says [the average subway escalator is broken down for at least one month per year](. Hundreds of people took to Grand Central and other locations last Friday to protest policing in the subway system demand free public transit. A loosely-knit coalition of groups known as Fuck The Police organized the demonstrations, which were [partly in response to Gov. Cuomo's decision to hire 500 more transit cops](. By the end of the night, several protesters had been arrested. Do you chat with strangers on the subway? Wendy Feuer, the founding director of the MTA's Arts for Transit, has started a project with her daughter Claire called the Subway Social Club. The goal: to create "an environment that celebrates conversation between strangers," by [passing out pins that identify you as someone who wants to chat on the train](. What Else We're Reading There were 461 reported incidents of people riding on top of or outside a subway car in 2019, which marks a 15% increase from the previous year. There was only one reported death — that of a 14-year-old boy who died subway surfing in Queens last November — but transit officials said the phenomenon was likely deadlier than the stats indicate. They also said the bump in incidents was largely driven by the one 23-year-old Brooklyn man who allegedly pulled the emergency brake on dozens of trains. ([The City]( The City Council canceled a hearing on the controversial plan for an AirTrain to LaGuardia. Many transit experts and elected officials have cried foul over the plan, which would cost $2 billion and require travelers leaving Manhattan to go out past the airport and then double-back. The City Council was scheduled to have a hearing about the AirTrain late last month, but Council Speaker Corey Johnson canceled it, perhaps at the behest of Queens Council Member Francisco Moya, whose district includes the airport, and who sees the AirTrain as a benefit to airport workers. Speaker Johnson's office disputed this version of events. ([Streetsblog]( An Australian tourist who fell onto the PATH tracks and had to get both legs partially amputated is now suing the Port Authority and the MTA for negligence. The 23-year-old woman says she tripped and fell onto the 14th Street tracks at 4 a.m. on January 11th, got run over by one train, and then a PATH train hit her again 20 minutes later, forcing her to get both legs amputated below the knee. She's now trying to sue, arguing that the train conductors should've seen her and stopped, and that train technology meant to detect objects on the tracks failed. ([NY Post]( Update: The Subway Now Has A Totally Official* New Mascot [An homage to the classic "Dewey Beats Truman" photo, celebrating the victory of Pizza Rat as the new subway mascot] Matt Lubchansky Last week, Gothamist and illustrator [Matt Lubchansky]( came up with sketches for [12 possible subway mascots]( that could be used to improve relations between the MTA and its users, and provide a happy, and/or adorable, and/or unforgettable face to make our transit system more relatable. After several rounds of voting on Twitter — and a flawless and completely trustworthy process of reporting those votes — we can now announce who the winner. All hail The Original Pizza Rat™, our new subway mascot. [An image of The Original Pizza Rat, a mascot based on...the famous pizza rat] Matt Lubchansky *It's not an official mascot; we did this on our own for fun. Weekend Service Changes: Night of February 7th – Early Morning on February 10th This is a partial list of major service disruptions scheduled for the weekend. For a complete list of the MTA's Weekender updates, [check here](. train Service between Dyckman St and 137 St in Manhattan will be replaced by and trains and free shuttle buses. Brooklyn Bridge-bound trains will skip Longwood Av, E 149 St, E 143 St, Cypress Av and Brook Av in the Bronx. train service between Euclid Av, Brooklyn and Lefferts Blvd, Queens will be replaced by free shuttle buses. Downtown trains will skip 23 St and Spring St in Manhattan. Jamaica-bound trains will skip Smith-9 Sts, Carroll St and Bergen St in Brooklyn. train service between Atlantic Av-Barclays Ctr and Kings Hwy in Brooklyn will be replaced by free shuttle buses. [Check here]( for complete details about the Long Island Rail Road. For NJ Transit, [check here]( for the latest service advisories. Upcoming Meetings and Events Thursday, February 6th Queens Bus Network Redesign Workshop Rockaway YMCA Community Conversation — 7:00 p.m. [Check here]( for more information on all the Queens Bus Network Redesign meetings, including details on the five sessions being held next week. Monday, February 24th Joint Metro-North & LIRR Committee Meeting — 8:30 a.m. NYC Transit / MTA Bus Committee Meeting — 10:00 a.m. Wednesday, February 26th MTA Board Meeting — 9:00 a.m. Registration for two-minute public speaking slots opens 15 minutes before the start time for official MTA committee meetings. To speak before an MTA board meeting, you must register 30 minutes early. All meetings are held in the MTA's Board Room at 2 Broadway, on the 20th Floor. James Ramsay was quickly fired from that falafel shop (long story). 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