Graphic explaining trend of train delays from the MTA's capital plan presentation The MTA unveiled its 2008-2013 Capital Plan, which explained almost $30 billion will be needed to improve mass transit and complete projects like the Second Avenue Subway, the East Side Access plan and more by 2030 (many of those projects will also be delayed). Though the current MTA capital plan doesn't expire until next year, the MTA presented this plan because the......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a stabbing at Coney Island Hospital in Brooklyn, another stabbing at 131st St. and 9th Ave. in Queens, and a third stabbing on West 167th St. in the Bronx. Three men sprayed mace in the face of a Diamond District jeweler at 1 p.m. last Wednesday in the Rockefeller Center subway station and grabbed his bag containing three spools of gold wire worth $115,000. Subwayblogger.com looks at MSNBC's list......

As recently discussed here and there, a group of scientists have tried to predict how more frequent flooding--induced by global climate change--could affect New York City. An interesting facet of this conceptual floodmap from the Union of Concerned Scientists is the way it uncannily traces the boundaries of 400 years' worth of landfill on both East and West sides of lower Manhattan. In the 1600s, the East River lapped the edge of Pearl Street,......

A construction area collapse in Brooklyn yesterday cost a worker his life. The man was waterproofing the foundation of the Leif Ericson Day School in Dyker Heights while standing aside a trench dug next to the building. According to WCBS news, the trench was said to measure two to three feet wide, 15 feet long and eight feet deep. The construction worker, who hasn't been named, appears to have fallen into the trench as it......

A dispatch from the field - the Ditmars Boulevard field, that is - from Dan Dickinson, who says that there is no N service into Manhattan from Queens. Why? A broken rail at Lexington! Now the MTA's service advisory is up, and it's a doozy:Due to a rail condition at the Lexington Avenue-59th Street Station: There is no service on the W train between the Astoria-Ditmars Boulevard Station and the Whitehall Street-South Ferry Station.......

Remember the old wall, some of which is now on display at Castle Clinton, the MTA found while excavating for the new South Ferry terminal? One of the archaeologists hired to document the seawall fractured her pelvis, lost two teeth and broke a toe when the trench collapsed, burying most of her in soil. The archaeologist, Alison Boles, filed a lawsuit against the MTA last week. The Post quotes her as saying "It's a very......

For those who plan on commuting to or from the Upper East Side many years from now, you have something to look forward to - oh, and those of you living along Second Avenue, you might be annoyed - the MTA is getting ready to award a tunneling contract for the Second Avenue Subway's first phase this year, with digging actually starting in 2008, which means there's still time to relocate! Phase 1 of the......

Or, as in the amNew York cover story, it's G for "Good Grief," but we think it's also G for "Gosh Darn It" or "Godawful" or "Give Me a Freaking Break." The article lists a litany of the sadness that is the G line: - Only 4 cars - "Only runs its full route after sunset and on weekends" - Lots of track work on the weekends, further screwing up service - Smells like sewageAnd......

The MTA is so sneaky. We were so excited to read the Daily News story about cooler subway platforms. But there's a catch: The stations that will have these special cooling units are ones that are being renovated or will be built in the future. Well, of course we'd hope that any new subway platforms for have better ventilation instead of making subway platforms a sauna of terrible smells (we're shocked we haven't heard......

As if the insane heat and humidity isn't enough, there are signal problems at Times Square that are affecting the 1, 2 and 3 lines. The 1 has been suspended between 137th Street and South Ferry and the 2 is running on the 5 line between 149th Street/Grand Concourse in The Bronx and Nevins Street in Brooklyn. The 3 is in even worse shape as it's not running at all. Gothamist is getting reports that......

Politics is definitely a weird thing when Peter Kalikow gets another term as MTA Chairman. Stupid State Senate, for reconfirming him! Kalikow wants to see some big projects finished (the 7 line extension, LIRR connection to Grand Central, South Ferry station's rebulid, the Fulton Street Transit Center, and the Second Avenue subway), and told the State Senate:I work for the people of the State of New York. That's who I believe are my bosses -......

There's something marvelous about the many new colonial walls the MTA is discovering in Battery Park (a third one was just found!). You learn more about the city's past...and it provides the great metaphor for the agency, as the Transport Workers Union is looking to convene a second vote on the contract it rejected last month. But more about the wall: Through the MTA's attempts to enhance the South Ferry subway station and build......

Gothamist LOVES the story about the wall from the 1700s, possibly the 1600s, (probably from Dutch colonial times!) being found as the MTA was trying to excavate for a new subway tunnel. The MTA now has to wait for for archaelogists to examine the wall and the area around it, to determine how old it might be, which means the expanded station for South Ferry may have to wait even longer. The wall is......

Gothamist must applaud the local papers are getting to the heart of the matter when it comes to the Republican National Convention delegates. The Daily News led their story about a Kentucky delegate couple with "Frank and Cathy Anderson were flashed by a pervert downtown, pegged as marks by a subway hustler in midtown and treated to culinary delights uptown." The flashing occured at the South Ferry subway station, with Anderson saying, "I wouldn't mind......

Representative Vito Fossella (left), a Republican from Staten Island, said that he'll "derail" plans for the Second Avenue Subway unless Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D, below right) helps push through plans to build a new South Ferry subway station, a plan Silver opposes since it would affect a temporary September 11 memorial and disrupt parts of Battery Park. Fossella says, "I will withdraw my objection to funding the Second Ave. subway line only when those......

The U.S. Department of Transportation has given NYC $2.85 billion for the renovation of 3 transit sites. When Secretary of Transportation Norman Minetta was asked where the money is, he said, "It's in the mail," with Mayor Bloomberg showing his expertise in billion dollar transactions by further explaining, "The federal government doesn't drive up a truck into the back and out pours bills." But that would be cooler. It turned out that $750 million......