Leftover Metrocard Change Infuriates Some
Senate Report: Bush Missed Chance To Catch Bin Laden
2nd Avenue Subway Cooling System Will "Blight" UES
Tiger Woods' Alleged Mistress Lost Fiance On 9/11
NY Anti-Smoking Campaign Budget to be Slashed
The Mayor spoke out against the MTA's proposed fare hikes, saying the city didn't have any money. The Post reports he asked the MTA to "justify why it can't do more with less," emphasizing that "we just don't have the money to subsidize mass transit, and, of course, no straphanger - including me - wants to pay more." Now, Gothamist understands that the Mayor would be against the fare hike, he's up for re-election, he wants to make nice with constituents. But we wonder if the MTA wouldn't have already tried to see if they could make do with less. And then we realized, wait, we're talking about the MTA, a prickly, bureaucratic agency, so who knows, there could be a shallow puddle of some cash somewhere (though, given that a lot of subway watchdog groups aren't even faulting the MTA anymore, the MTA probably has gone down that road). Gothamist thinks the Mayor should appoint a task force - like a bailout team - to get to the bottom of the MTA's finances. And if there's already one, appoint another one.
An interesting idea from State Senator David Paterson is to get the federal government to send funds for the subway, given security concerns in a post-Madrid subway bombing world amid talk of over 160 token booths closing. The Daily News, whose pet cause has been the token booth closings (here's their list of proposed token booth closings - scroll down), points out that Governor Pataki isn't totally averse to public transportation measures: "He pressed a decade ago for $50,000 in taxpayer money to build a tunnel so golfers at the Mount Kisco Country Club could drive their carts from one stretch of the course to the other without having to cross a two-lane road."
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
tweet this
post to facebook
bloomberg should have said "we don't need no fairhike let that mother fucker burn..."
that would have appealed to the younger voters.
Good thing we had that surplus from the convention that's going to be used to "help improve the quality of life for City residents".
I know for one, I'd much rather have a Jackie Robinson-Pee Wee Reese statue in Brooklyn than to potentially have better subway service. That would improve the quality of my life tremendously.
Wasn't that a great deal in the 1990s? With rising discounts and the fare held constant, the actual fare kept going down, and tax dollars going to the MTA were also reduced, even as wages for TA employees rose with inflation. This was possible because a) Pataki, Bruno and Silver are saints, heros and geniuses, or b) they were running up debts and deferring pension obligations to a diminished future?
The answer, of course, is "b." And if any of you think that federal deficit won't hurt you someday also, consult the MTA before voting on November 2. On generational equity, the federal government is following where the State of New York went before.
this morning as i was walking on dekalb toward the train, a woman approached and asked , in a very sheepish way, if i was heading to the subway. I said yes, she asked if i had a swipe to share. I did, so we walked the rest of the way together. The fare is already too high for most low-income new yorkers and most of us middle income folks are really feeling the pinch, too. They can't raise the fare again. How are people who earn minumum wage supposed to get to work? This is so wrong!