Plan To End Free Student Metrocards Sparks Outrage

doesn't the families of mta workers get free rides, what about the mta workers themselves? I'm a student myself and i go to a very good school that i wouldn't be able to go to if i couldn't get my free metro card. The neighborhood i live in has a school across the street from where i live but it's not good enough. I'd have to settle for less and go to a bummy school just because the doe or the mta, or whoever it is , there just being cheaap!!!! my parents pay taxes for a reason, better yet adults pay taxes for a reason don't you think ??!

why cant they cut something else? i ride the train everyday esp G!!!!!!! my school is around there! i dont think its possbile to go to school if your family has more than 1 kid! also, this is unfair ....they spend it trying to build some new stations for no reason and now theyre broke its esp. gov's fault too!!!!!Soon kids will be learning to jump turnstiles!!!!!!! and those police are gonna be needed :] aka => more $$$$$$ nedeed!

The MTA Are Nothing But Criminals. Doing Anything To Get More Money In Their Pockets. And Leaving Every Commuter

Broke With No Money Left. What A Shame?

SUBWAY FAIR

The subway always beats driving,

And believe me I'm not crackers;

When any train breaks down,

You're not billed 400 smackers

perhaps if the city acknowledged the MTA's DECADES of WILD corruption and embezzlement from the top down (i'm talking WILD, kids) NYC's more than 8 million residents wouldn't have to suffer for the sins of a few.

but that's the way our world is.

Ratner is allowed to pay $10 million, instead of the $100 million he signed to pay for MTA land, which is less than the $200+ million value of the land.

The MTA is "desperate" for funds sending for "Doomsday" yet they make no effort to collect from a Billionair, wonder why?

http://umbrooklynborn.blogspot.com/2009/12/photowednesday-121609-pay-your-fair.html

single ride fare should be $5. Problem solved.

$5?????? do you expect use kids to walk to school lik 15 mi???? how much would you spend a yr and what if parents have 4 kids? itl add up!!!!!! even for adults too=> poverty

This isn't the worst idea. I was in Osaka in 1997, and to take the train cross-town it cost $16. One way.

But if we do that, I sure as hell want congestion pricing on all water crossings, with all money earmarked for life to NYC public transportation. We need 60% of a Robert Moses for NYC transit.

Well, bring on Congestion Pricing. They all finally got their wish.

Fewer teenagers on the subway? I'll have a slice of that.

Let the Schools send the MTA some money for moving their students about the surface of the earth. It's more efficient than running more school buses.

Just tell Bloomberg it'll be good for Goldman - that'll get him to fall in line.

They are not going to cut student MetroCards. What they want to do is outrage people so that when they introduce the "real" service cuts they will seem more acceptable.

Good catch,

I don't work in PR/Communications, but, if I did, this is the approach I'd take.

Re: service cuts

Does anyone know what are the planned cuts for the Z,M?

I don't ride the train much, but, I'd want to know if the M would still go to the financial district from Queens? It'd be a biatch to have to switch to the 4,5 from Brooklyn Bridge (or do the J/Z end there-sorta, but the Z is ending for good? I'm so confused).

Whenever I see stories like this, I always think to myself (and make sure to remind everyone else around me), "Thank You Sheldon Silver." (re: killing congestion pricing.) Sigh, can we get that guy out of office already?

"Sigh, can we get that guy out of office already?"

It's easy for you to do. Move into his district, organize the voters and win. The last time two candidates tried it in 2008, Shelly got 62% of the vote. His constituents seem to like him.

But I am sure an anonymous internet blogger can succeed in overcoming the wishes of the vast majority of the electorate.

We'll they could always go the school lunch route

low income households - free

middle income households - half fare

upper income households - full fare

Good idea, but are the administrative costs worth it? Maybe.

Sounds good in theory, but I don't know many upper income households that send their children to NYC public schools.

Many well off parents send their kids to public school in gentrified neighborhoods(PS 126 in parkslope comes to mind), magnet highschools like stuy, bronx sci, brooklyn tech, and specialized schools like fashion highschool.

The DOE can share their lunch program database with the MTA.

MTA could also hire a programmer who has a good knowledge of the googlemaps api and correlate school distance, travel data, parental income to cut down on the number of metrocards handed out. Then again this would make two much sense for the MTA to do. They would probably hire a team of 30 unionized programmers instead of one good one who could code a frontend for this during their lunch hour.

Thats for the DOE to do, not the MTA.

thanks tsk, tsk. evidiot you're a dolt, but here's the info so other people know that the mta cuts are being made so the can build a baskteball ball court and more condos in brooklyn.

http://atlanticyardsreport.blogspot.com/2007/06/privately-financed-court-documents.html

the $4 billion project: more than half would come either directly from the government or from government-assisted resources:

--$637.2 million in tax-free bonds to finance the arena

--$100 million from New York City (city expenditures are now $205 million)

--$100 million from New York State

--$1.4 billion in tax-free bonds

Funny, that says nothing about the state and city money being taken away from the MTA's funding to go to this project. And so we're clear that I read your comment in full, you said, "the mta cuts are being made so the can build a baskteball ball court and more condos in brooklyn."

Look, I'm against this project, too, and I think it's a boondoggle, but to try to blame a bad real estate deal for why students aren't getting free Metrocards anyone is distracting from the main point: the state and the city have reduced their funding the mass transit, and it's the lifeblood of our economy.

fine evidiot, the city is to blame. I agree they have their priorties wrong giving money to develop more condos but not for the trains. the mta is also to blame though...they went along with the city and undersold that property to ratner. I like to blame them both, the city and the mta, but fine the city deserves more blame then the mta. fine. you win. merry xmas.

Yep, cutting student Metrocards is the worst idea I've heard yet from the MTA. It's going to be especially bad for kids who live in bad or distant neighborhoods with no good schools nearby. It would also logically require a great deal of re-zoning. I grew up in district 2 downtown but went to middle school on the Upper East Side - which is still part of district 2, despite it being a much longer commute away compared to schools on the UWS (district 3).

I'm willing to take cut train service on week nights and even more in-station advertising if it means that kids don't have to pay to get to school. $1.10+ twice a day is still a lot of money for most kids and their families.

Whatever. Half price is good enough. I remember when I got a full Metrocard when I was in JHS and I didn't even need it.

"a 10 percent salary cut for non-union workers"

Seriously? That's ridiculous.

If the DOE won't pay the school bus contractors, they will stop working when the bill is past due. If the DOE won't pay the power bill (do they? I hear the MTA gets power 80% off), school gets the power cut. If the DOE won't increase teacher salaries, they stop working. So why on earth should the MTA give free rides to students?

For those of you bitching at the MTA's cash burning and those that want congestion pricing, remember the MTA's bridges bonds got payed off decades ago. MTA was made to use bridge tolls to subsidize subways and busses. You make congestion pricing, 10 years later the MTA will have found new ways to waste the money, and they will be broke again. As the union arbitrator says, MTA has infinite income, since taxpayers can always pay more taxes, and fares can always go up. Its not like the MTA has any competitors to keep prices down. MTA has no reason to be thrifty. Phantom shifts to meet minimum overtime available to unions, "safety" rules that means 5 guys talking about the weather, 1 guy hammering. If a supervisor tells them to work faster, the union workers say its unsafe to work faster and they are going to make a shitstorm with OSHA and their union rep. Its amazing train and bus drivers get half pay for 7 hours a day during the break between morning and evening rush.

Lets not start with RRs and contractors and consultants and executive pay. MTA wouldn't know profit if it hit them in the face.

This isn't the MTA being heartless. This is the city and the state not keeping up their end of the bargain.

In the past ten years, the cost to the MTA of free student fares has nearly tripled. This isn't because the fare has tripled - it's because the MTA voluntarily took on the cost of free student rides when the city and state pulled back.

Compared to 2000, when the MTA, city, and state were sharing the cost of student rides almost equally, the MTA now covers more than three-quarters of the cost - the city actually chips in fewer dollars than they did ten years ago, and the state now contributes nothing.

But no, go ahead, keep making the MTA everyone's favorite punching bag and keep electing the same bozos to public office who are really responsible for this.

Completely on the mark.

Didn't mayor Bloomberg run a campaign on "better transit for NYC NOW" ? Where is he in all of this??

The MTA has been shortchanged for years, the city contributes almost nothing to the agency, and the State cuts back every year. Yet, we complain when our rinky-dink system breaks down, or the costs go up.

For years we've been putting band-aids on a deep wound, and then turning our backs, and wishing the problem goes away.

Blaming the MTA is usually the easiest and most expedient thing to do. Mayor Bloomberg's fault? nope. Paterson, State Senate? Never.

You know whats HILARIOUS? the state and city gave many more times what the mta needs now to build an basketball stadium in brooklyn. the mta themselves UNDERSOLD the property to be sure Ratner got the land. now they dont have money?

The city and state didn't give anybody at the MTA anything. The MTA already owned the land. And the MTA isn't building the stadium, either - a developer is. Go back to freeing Palestine and leave bitching about the MTA to the people who have a clue.

If you're going to come down on someone so harshly, you may as well read what they wrote. Free didn't say the city/state gave anything to the MTA; he didn't specify who the city and state gave money to.

But go ahead, keep getting crass and snobby with people whose comments you haven't even read. Well, scratch that, you obviously read it. Read it but didn't understand it. Seems like you were so anxious to fire off at someone that you twisted their words. Stay classy.

You're right, but unlike most of the assholes on here, I'll admit when I'm wrong. I was wrong. I misread it. I'm sorry.

The future looks very grim for the MTA. Something has to change with the way the MTA makes its money.

yeah!!! i agree ...they can find something else to cut and tax those lieeing polititians lik bloomberg!!!!