This cut wasn't really necessary, please go back at least twenty years and check the development plans for this manufactured problem.

Once that is done start checking the involvement of you local politicians and their business affiliates. Sorry folks this stinks development at a real cheap price. Think I am kidding look at the trade marks, run the area down, make it in accessible, then condemn it, now sell it real,real cheap (oh! look for the crime rate to go up it helps in the sale of the property to the developers, makes them look like saviours). this is Not a thought out plan, just a plan of property manipulation under the guise of population shift for PROFITS.

hey can i get a cab going from the Jones beach concert to the train station....

im wearing a yankees cap and standing out front,

theres about 50,000 people here trying to call a cab also,

so look for me, im a white guy in a yankees cap my girl looks cute with her ed hardy hat and theres a guy in a creed tshirt talking to a guy in a knicks jersey next to me...how long, in 3 minutes, um ok thanks.

What drinks in the venue?! Its a freaking dry venue, the only booze you get is @ the pregame, screw that!

oh - they used to have drinks inside - I guess they got rid of them (I haven't been to a show there in a while)

That's the thing about Jones Beach: you rent a car, and it's a pain to get out there, but comparatively easy to get back. It's the opposite if you take the train. Even when they HAD the buses, if you didn't get on one of the first ones, you missed the corresponding train for that first set. Needless to say there was tons of bad behavior outside the venue: lots of line cutting, etc.

In the grand scheme of things, the best way to handle a trip to Jones Beach is: 1. rent a car with several friends to alleviate the expense; 2. leave early afternoon to avoid traffic; 3. spend a couple hours having drinks on the boardwalk - they are cheaper than in the venue anyway; 4. go enjoy the show; and 5. get back in your a few hours later and cruise on back to the city.

Also, now with Zipcar the costs are much more reasonable... so this is not the end of the world!

i guess i'll just have to drink and drive.

Venue is too big anyway.

Is the MTA allergic to money or something? If there's a large crowd that needs transit, wouldn't it make sense to put a bus out there -- even if just for the evening -- to profit from that crowd? Surely they'd make more money than they'd spend.

It'd seem that easy, but unfortunately transit systems don't work quite like that.

The whole point of these service cuts is to cut the amount of money they're putting out to provide service, which means staffing less people to do the job.

The people asked for it, now they're getting it.

I'm also willing to assume that they probably did the math behind sending that many buses from depot out to the island and found that it just isn't cost effective to do it for one off concerts like this.

The MTA has union guaranteed minimum OT shifts for MTA drivers. You can get paid and never show up, since the MTA is contractually obliged to hand that shift to a union member, whether there is work or not for it, on seniority of course. So why not send out the buses on OT, which they have to pay anyways to the drivers?

Yeah, but that's the point: no successful business would be so inflexible as to pass up an opportunity where income is almost certain to exceed cost, yet transit systems do. Now, there are a lot of reasons for that -- and I'm not blaming anyone at the MTA for being bound by a dysfunctional political system that often ties their hands. But nonetheless, it's fairly ridiculous.

You're right that it's possible that they did do the math and that it didn't work out -- I'd expect this sort of thing to almost certainly be profitable, but I could easily be wrong. But if I were a betting man, I'd bet that they didn't even think about it.

Only in America this happens. We don't care about public transportation everyone wants to ride in their Four By Four.