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The Sun has some hilarious quotes about the new "real time" information signs the MTA has put up in L train stations. Our favorite is from designer Christian Rudder, who said, "If it were conceivable to walk when the wait was going to be long, I might leave. But in Brooklyn, there's no other option, so what's the point of even knowing?" Ha!
Other riders were underwhelmed, too, perhaps hoping for something more flashy and less 1990s-era. And Straphangers Campaign attorney Gene Russianoff notes that the real time boards, as useful as they are, are "kind of the icing on a rotten cake," because the signs are part of an overhaul that includes more automated trains (which means less conductors). That's true, with the MTA, the glass is always half empty.
While we know that the system is just being tested (apparently they won't be on today, for further testing), does anyone know what the numbers after "Brooklyn" mean? And our readers had some thoughts about the signs a few days ago.
Photograph of the time sign by thelexiphane on Flickr
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RE: the numbers after the destination
While info is on the screen, it gets refreshed every few seconds. The numbers after the destination are a temporary thing to let the techies know that the updates are actually happening (and which update the system is currently displaying)
They were on this morning at 1st ave, and they were accurate too. Well, it was blinking '0 min' as the train was pulling in, heh.
Perhaps the numbers (Brooklyn 4) are the number of cars the approaching train has. That's how it works in DC.
lovely! the mta is catching up to the rest of the world. london has this system and it's great. it gives you a piece of mind to know when the next train is coming. the worst is being on the platform for 20 minutes not knowing WHEN a train is ever going to come again (G train).
Don't you mean with the MTA the glass is only three quarters empty because the other quarter is in the second set of books? On a serious note, what is wrong with the MTA? I've travelled extensively and have taken mass transit nearly every place I've been and New York is the absolute worst of all of them. It was kinda scary being shoehorned into the Tokyo subway at rush hour but I'd take that any day over the stations that smell of bodily fluids and trains that run according to their own schedule. Surprisingly, the best was in Cairo (plenty of seats, a near-OCD train schedule) though I was the only Westerner riding it and I was stared at the entire time.
I agree with "Train" - that it is in reference to the number of cars on the next approaching train.
'fewer conductors
It's kinda funny that its on the L line, when its so quick into Manhattan (unless you're in Canarsie or something). It should be on the R in Brooklyn, where it takes soooo looooong for the train to come.
1990s? digital signs displaying when the next trains are due to arrive happened in tokyo and hong kong, oh, circa 1982. the nyc subway system blows by international standards. maybe the mta should organize a trip to hong kong, so its workers can see firsthand how a subway system is supposed to operate. whatever, this is at least a step in the right direction.
this being the only day of the year I enjoy riding the subways for numerous reasons, I in no way look to defend the useless workers of the mta...but keep one thing in mind when comparing our system to all those wonderful examples. we run 24/7 365 days a year, serving more riders in a day than they do in a week - it's a difficult task to re-build something in motion, that's why all the work takes place at night and weekends.
It's not just cutting edge Japan and rapidly modernizing China that has this feature in their metro systems: even old school Madrid has them.
Ditto. The NY subway system is disgusting and a disgrace.
Although some of Hong Kong's mass transit system is older, the subway dates to 1979. A comparison with New York is hardly fair. It has 53 stations and 56 miles of track. Hong Kong and the Washington DC Metro have far more in common. New york has more in common with London.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTR
I don't get some of you people. You consider other cities more "modernized" because they have signs counting down train schedules...yet they don't have a 24 hour subway that we, shall I say, take for granted (yes I shall!).
At two NYC establishments cops take food without paying for it. First, At Riese fast food places in Penn Station MTA and NYPD cops order food. When the clerk tells them the price,they stare them down, the clerk (and assistant managers) are intimidated, and the cops walk away with the food without paying.
Since the fast food places are open 24 hours and there are a lot of cops around Penn Station the total amount of money here may come to several hundred dollars a day.
Second, at the Grand Hyatt on 42nd street, groups of cops, sometimes as many as 1/2 dozen, walk into the employees cafeteria (free for employees), eat, and walk out without paying.
This corruption is an invisible tax for which other customers must pay.
They are doing it first on the L and then the 7 trains. i imagine that it's because they are the two lines without any express trains. start simple. work your way up.
They have these in Paris as well, and you'd be surprised how helpful they are. Information dispells anxiety. Because we have the only 24 hour subway (a fact for which I give thanks daily) it is even more useful to have these signs.
I - and I'm sure many other subway riders would concur - would much prefer a clean, efficient subway system running from, say, 6am-2am to having that extra 4 hours of "service."
The MTA should use that time to perform track maintenance, clean the godawful trains and stations, and allow the obviously overtaxed and fatigued TWU staff to catch up on sleep. At home off the clock and not in the booths, I mean.
For comments 3 & 6 -- it's not the number of cars. Here's how it displays:
- current time and date
- upcoming trains (with 1 appended)
- upcoming trains (with 2 appended)
- upcoming trains (with 3 appended)
- upcoming trains (with 4 appended)
repeat
Seriously, I think maybe only the G Line and maybe the Shuttle trains run 4 cars long. The rest are much longer.
For reals, it's a screen update test indicator.
anonymass - The thousands of people who take the train in the wee hours of the morning to get to/from work would disagree with you. Not everyone runs on your schedule.
RE: Car lengths
Most lines run 10-cars long. The L runs 8, as does the C. The 7 is the longest, running 11 cars long. (It's the only one that runs an odd number, incidentally.)
Not entirely sure about the Shuttle, but it is the shortest. I think 4 sounds right...I thought the G ran 8 or 10, but the comment above says 4. Not gonna lie -- I've only been on the G twice, and once was a mistake.
I'm told I'm not missing anything.
On other subway systems, the London underground is worse than the NY subway system, even though the displays on how long you have to wait for the train are welcome. Its unbelievably expensive, more unreliable than the MTA (I know thats hard to believe), and the cars are clausterphobic. The routes also seem to have been designed on the premise that eveyone should change trains one or two times before getting to their designation. And its not close to being a 24 hour operation. It would be comparable if it weren't for the fares.
Otherwise, I agree other non-US systems leave NYC in the dust.
...fyi for Brian, the 7 train does run both local and express service.
-h
I would agree London is worse. Boston's T is FAR worse than the NYC subway. The Chicago 'L' is also craptastic. I have high hopes for the new MTA CEO, who has both experience and seems like he actually gives a damn about the staff and the system's riders.
Boston's T is NOT worse than New York. New York is smellier and danker and noisier. I'd take the every Red Line station in Boston over every station in New York.
I - and I'm sure many other subway riders would concur - would much prefer a clean, efficient subway system running from, say, 6am-2am to having that extra 4 hours of "service."
Fantastic idea. Close the subway before the bars. Then we can be just like Boston and have Cabs soak people. I think you're pretty much alone in this
Boston's T is NOT worse than New York. New York is smellier and danker and noisier. I'd take the every Red Line station in Boston over every station in New York.
Wow, one whole line is clean and efficient. Try taking the Green Line in Boston some time... the one that stops at traffic lights. It's super efficient to wait in line to pay the driver $1.25 because the system doesn't even support Metrocards (excuse me, Charlie Cards) yet. Also, notice sometime how much of Boston the T actually covers. It's not much. And god forbid you have to catch a TWO CAR green line train on the day of a Sox game. Oh, and be sure you're not at an outer station between midnight and 2 am, because your "last train" just might not come. Then, you get to take a $40 cab home.
The only people who would think the T is more efficient than the NYC Subway are either mentally deranged or have not spent much time in Boston.
Everyone wants improvements. No one wants the trains shut down. This is basically what it comes down to.
I agree the Red Line in Boston is pretty good but then it's by far the best of them, except it sounds like a wind tunnel inside the train in tunnels. The Orange and Blue take forever to arrive and those trains are truly old-school.
The Green Line though... oh, the Green line... it is the worst freaking excuse for a train I have ever used and I used to live in Boston. It bunches up like nothing I've ever seen. Nobody seems to know why it stops at every few seconds at red lights in the middle of empty tunnels when you waited 20 minutes for the train in the first place. It is PACKED during rush hour like no NYC train I've ever been on.
Stop-go-stop-go... screeeeeeeech... weird groaning noise, lurch, stop, go halfway into station, come to a halt... go a few more feet, stop, few more feet, world's loudest announcement says doors are opening on the wrong side, doors open... and the misery continues.
The London Underground has no air conditioning. (They just have de-humidifiers).
Call me crazy, but I prefer air conditioning over digital signs.
fun for subway nuts: http://metro.b3co.com/
*Yawn*
Why not put the next train indication OUTSIDE THE STATION on those otherwise useless ad TVs they've put up everywhere. Plenty of times you'd rather pass your wait upstairs smoking, talking on the phone, or hanging out at a bagel place or something.
Better yet, make the data available from the internets. How sweet would it be to leave your office or home EXACTLY on time rather than having just missed a train?
how do the cops get away with eating and not paying?
I agree, put one outside, the problem would then be, people would all wait outside for the train to come and then do a MAD dash inside for the train falling down the stairs, breaking their necks and suing.
I lived in DC for almost 6 years, and trust me... I don't miss taking "The Metro." It's cleaner than NYC's subway, but that's only because you have Metro police officers handcuffing, searching and arresting 12 year-old girls for bringing french fries into the station as well as people who eat candybars BEFORE entering the stations.
Yeah, they have real-time displays, but it's less reliable and more expensive than MTA. Not to mention the fact that it closes early, and has very poor coverage. I lived in Glover Park (just north of Georgetown), and was forced to take the bus to work every day, never knowing if the 8:15AM, 8:30AM or 8:45AM busses would arrive in time, or if all three would show up at the same time (around 9:00AM).
I'll take dirty over useless anytime.
I lived in DC for almost 6 years, and trust me... I don't miss taking "The Metro." It's cleaner than NYC's subway, but that's only because you have Metro police officers handcuffing, searching and arresting 12 year-old girls for bringing french fries into the station as well as people who eat candybars BEFORE entering the stations.
Yeah, they have real-time displays, but it's less reliable and more expensive than MTA. Not to mention the fact that it closes early, and has very poor coverage. I lived in Glover Park (just north of Georgetown), and was forced to take the bus to work every day, never knowing if the 8:15AM, 8:30AM or 8:45AM busses would arrive in time, or if all three would show up at the same time (around 9:00AM).
I'll take dirty over useless anytime.
(Sorry for posting twice... the links didn't work on the first one)
#17:
Fantastic, do you know how that would cripple the city? There are an extremely large number of people working night jobs here, and most of us rely on public transportation to get home. Take away those trains/buses, and the TV industry, the sports industry, sanitation all grind to a halt and the entire bar/nightlife scene dries up instantly.
What makes New York so great is the fact that transportation isn't confined to a traditional 9-5 schedule. The ridership on the MTA between 2 and 5am might not be as intense as the daytime, but make no mistake, trains aren't ever empty.
I for one, can't wait until they get these signs installed on all lines. It'll be great to have instant confirmation that I've just missed an N, and now have a 20 minute wait before I can go home to sleep.
When criticizing the New York Subway in comparison to transit systems around the world, it is important to put the NYC subway in its proper context and consider a few things:
1) Regardless of how the quality of the subway affects you, it is still incredibly efficient (one of the most efficient in the world, as good or better than sysems that were built much more recently (i.e. Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Madrid) - especially impressive considering that it was engineered over 100 years ago. NYC has the only subway that offers express and local (4-track) services throughout most of the system - which is also what allows much of the overnight and weekend work to continue without completely shutting down the line, as is necessary on two-track lines (unfortunately, L riders did have to deal with full shutdowns since it is one of the few two-track lines in the system - my sympathies). This has been a significant problem in these other cities whose entire systems are comprised of two-track lines - London being the most recent city to deal with this problem in its rehabilitation plans of the Tube, which like the NYC subway is also quite old.
2) Although mismanagement by the MTA is certainly partly to blame for the system's neglect, much of the responsibility is attributed The NYC fiscal crisis of the 1970s that, regardless of the MTA's ability to manage the subways, completely erased the possibility of keeping the system in good working condition. We are paying the price now in making improvements, such as these new information screens, that should have been done 20-30 years ago but were made implausible given the dire financial situation during that time.
3) Based on these two points, I find it hard to believe that anybody would be critical of this advancement - yes, it certainly should've happened years ago, but much of the
4) People who complain about the state or general appearance of the New York City subway should also consider that the 4-track system is implausible to build today in any city, and will probably never exist again on an underground transit system - it increases the overall cost of construction tremendously, which is the reason why it could not be possible for the upcoming Second Avenue Subway project. That's a reason to embrace the NYC subway, cause they just don't build 'em like that anymore.
Another note on the subway's grittiness: Much of the system is still in a state of bad repair, and they are making progress towards renovating the system. It is a slow process, but at least it's finally underway. Like many people, I would obviously prefer if they could completely rebuild the stations (similar to the South Ferry terminal) to make it a more open and airy to increase the comfort level and create more space for the huge crowds, but that's clearly a ridiculously high expectation. The only way that you will see a system like the ones in Asia or Europe is if there is some huge leap in technology that would dramatically decrease energy consumption while providing safe, ultra high speed service underground. When this happens, slowly a new "second system" (not too dissimilar to the failed proposal of 1929 that crashed at the onset of the Great Depression) will emerge beneath the original - I personally see the Second Avenue Subway as part of an entirely new system that will emerge in the next century or two.
New York has THE "working man's subway" - it ain't pretty, but it gets you where you're going and covers most of the city in a way that no other system can compare. That, my friends, is a luxury that is far superior to a system that closes at 1 a.m. and offers no versatility in how it is used (i.e. express and local service). For this entire system to run 24/7 and be just as clean and sterile as other systems is simply impossible - it's a trade off that benefits New Yorkers. Any new technology such as the information screens and train automation are a welcome addition that will make this engineering marvel of the 20th Century function even more efficiently.
Oh yeah, one more thing:
Boston sucks.