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Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum issued a report saying that on average, one out of every four Metrocard swipes fails. Besides causing failed swipe groin and/or torso injuries (depending what kind of turnstile you swipe), it seems that more than half of the Metrocard swipes in poor neighborhoods fail. Gotbaum's office created the study using information from the MTA, which makes Gothamist wonder if the stats for failed swiping are actually much higher. We'd like to know how often the swipe readers are cleaned/serviced, because there are some stations, like entrance to the B/D/F/Q at southwest corner of Houston and Lafayette, where the lone turnstile is so dirty and busted that it takes about 15 swipes for an evening commuter to enter the station.
Do you have any tips for better swiping? The art of the swipe is somewhat integrated into our lives, according to the Times. Gothamist on bending your Metrocard and Ask Gothamist on how many swipes is too many.
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I've learned that the trick is to stop, swipe and go. The swipe-as-you-go manuever is an advanced one, and usually too advanced for tourists or people carrying a lot of crap on their person.
If this is an average, then that must mean that there are many people standing at the turnstile swiping like 500 times before they get in. Probably has more to do with ineptitude than unclean card readers. I commute to work and ride the subway on weekends too, and I hardly ever get a failed swipe, like maybe 1 a month tops, and I always do the swipe-as-I-go technique. Oh poor MetroTards with sore groins; maybe the MTA should offer you a swiping-class through the Learning Annex or something.
My personal average seems to be one "swipe again" for every two times I swipe. I thought it was just me!
I almost never get a failed swipe. The trick is to swipe at the same speed as a normal walking pace. Same thing goes for the cage-rotary-style turnstiles--unfortunately, people tend to slow down when approaching those, which cause more card errors. You DON'T have to wait for the cage turnstile to come to a rest to start swiping! Just walk up to it and swipe with full confidence in yourself. I promise you it won't eat your fare. Save us all some time.
Do they count tourists who swipe the card upside-down or backwards, and can't figure out what they're doing wrong? This always happens to me when I get on the E train at the WTC/PATH station: I get stuck behind a gaggle of tourists, each one swiping over and over again, staring stupidly at the turnstile wondering why it won't let them through.
Personally, I get one or two bad swipes a month at the 86th St. station on the 4/5/6 lines. The past few times it's happened, the next thing I get is "JUST USED," so I have to visit the angry lady in the booth and get her to let me through the service gate. That's why I don't use the swipe-and-go method: I value my groin too much to tempt injury.
i get bad swipes ALL THE TIME. and yes I keep my metrocard in a clean place and swipe it at the proper speed.
I do the swipe and go, but every now and then get the "swipe again", usually at specific stops. The ones I can think of are at the southwest end of Union Square and the south end of W 4th.
As stated above, I bet this figure is skewed by all the tourists and morons who have no clue what they are doing. I almost never get a failed swipe, and I've had to coach at least 5 people in the last month on swiping techniques. "Too slow. Too slow again. Faster! Here, just let me do it for you."
It is the same problem as the cleanliness of stations. I recently moved to Bensonhurst D train 79th street station. The stairways are cleaned perhaps once every two weeks and I am sure the same holds true for the card readers.
The claim that all stations are treated the same regards cleanliness is ludicrous. I suppose it may have to do with riders complaining? The affluent riders probably contact the MTA more frequently and effectively and have the means to do so via the internet or email.
What is that line from the Great Gatsby?
Another bad entrance is the northwest corner of 96th and Broadway. Most mornings at least 1 of the turnstiles is broken ("No Entry"), but even the supposedly in-order ones have given me the endless "Swipe again at this turnstile" treatment on more than one occasion. No matter how highly you esteem your own metrocard-swiping skills, it's foolish to deny that dirty/broken machines aren't a major part of the problem. (Also, the cage turnstiles just suck, no matter what condition they're in.)
77th street on lex, especially downtown, often has problems, where whole batches of the machines will stop working, regardless of how well you swipe. some days the ratio is 20 : 1.
The Brooklyn bound C/E stop on Spring Street is terrible for this. There's usually huge lines of people swiping cards over and over again during rush hour as they attempt to gain entrance. To make matters worse, they've just closed the attendant booth there, just to kick us in the teeth even more. I frequently see people giving up and walking down to Canal Street instead.
i, too, never get a failed swipe. but i do wait for the cage-rotary-turnstile to stop before swiping now because i've been burned twice by overzealous turnstile pushers ahead of me who manage to use up my early swipe.
Swiping is so 20th Century. Would the initial cost of installing proximity cards not be outweighed by the savings in maintenance? Plus you can leave the card in your wallet or bag. Hong Kong has a great system on the subway which can be used with buses, minibuses, 7-Eleven and Starbucks (!). I'm sure the MTA could make some extra dosh through tie-ins like that to pay for an improved system.
Next up: platform doors to keep litter and people off the tracks.
Agreed eatch. Japan also has proximity cards for their JR railways and they work like a charm. You never have to wave them more then once and you can keep them in the wallet all the time.
But they actually charge you 500 yen for each card. A good way to prevent people littering with Metrocards in NYC...
This was interesting since just this morning I was unable to get through the north turnstile on the D's 71st St station (Brooklyn)and missed a train while walking down to the other end to get the booth operator to let me in. This is the third time in the last four times I've tried that turnstile that it's screwed up. If there wasn't a person in the booth I'd be screwed, because it considers the card "Just Used" even though it never lets me in.
Ace mentioned the 79th St. Station is bad too, so I'm guessing they aren't paying a lot of attention to the southern end of the D line.
Oddly, though, the Broadway/Laffayette turnstile you mention I've never had a problem with -- and that's the stop I use to get home from work.
They need to get some kind of system going that's similar to EZ Pass. Strap a censor to your forehead each morning which the turnstile can automatically read and let you in. Although if that goes wrong you may find people walking backwards and forwards before the censor reading thingy in an attempt to get through. At least that would be a more amusing spectacle.
I'd love it if they installed proximity cards, and I'd gladly pay a reasonable fee for one.
But why the hell did MTA install swiping turnstiles instead of the kind you insert, like the Metrocard readers on buses?
It's amazing how the Greenpoint community comes together, young and old, of every nationality when the Nassau card swiper ceases to function properly (Brooklyn bound Norman entrance, you know the one). I don't know if it's a matter of cleanliness, since every other card randomly can't swipe. This is especially frustrating combined with the 4 car train that often requires a sprint down the platform (note to MTA: if you don't want riders running on the platform, give us a fucking normal length train!). So, when one can swipe successfully whereas the other can't, we are always "piggybacking" the other in the same swipe. Very neighborly indeed!
incumbent betsy gotbaum is a tool if she thinks this amazing revelation is going to save her sorry candidacy in the race for public advocate. gotbaum is a fair-weather friend to the straphanging public. norman siegel, though . . . now he's cool.
But why the hell did MTA install swiping turnstiles instead of the kind you insert, like the Metrocard readers on buses?
Perceived speed - the MTA engineers thought that the swipe system would be faster than the dip readers used on buses, thus allowing a higher volume of users/hour. Of course, multi-swiping negates any speed advantage that swiping would have over the dip readers.
I really wish we had a system like PATH or DC Metro, where the dip reader takes the ticket and then spits it out in the middle of the turnstile. This allows you to advance forward a bit, cutting down waiting times and making it almost as fast as a swipe reader (that is, one that actually works with one swipe).
I think that the problem with swipe readers is two-fold: (1) the readers are not cleaned as often as necessary, and (2) the casual subway user is fairly clueless on proper use.
Cgee: I was in Atlanta and I used their system which is the same as DC's -- for one whole day, about four or five rides -- and it read my card maybe once.
I rarely to never have swiping problems. I had to reswipe once in three years in Avenue U in Brooklyn and in City Hall but I see people at the same turnstiles with problems. In other words -- it's their fault, not the turnstiles'.