Have you purchased a tall, black coffee at a Starbucks in Manhattan recently? Of course not, you're slurping a sugared slurry with a caramel drizzle. But for those who do purchase the purest caffeine crutches in the city's best borough, you've seen the price jump from $1.91 after tax to $2.01. My God, since when was everything more expensive in Manhattan? more ›

Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, starts tonight at sundown. And suffice to say, it's a bit more serious than Rosh Hashanah—so there are no Muppets-related videos to get your toes tapping tonight. Instead, there are very serious subway and train difficulties awaiting you this weekend, as you contemplate all the wrongs you have perpetrated this year. more ›

The unprecedented, widespread MTA shutdown began as of two hours ago, because of the imminent arrival of Hurricane Irene. 1010Wins has been asking listeners: "What do you think: better safe than sorry, or total overreaction?" Two MTA insiders answered that question for us, one of whom came down critically on the MTA's plans: "This is the worst case of overreaction I've ever seen. Its going to be rainy and windy tomorrow." more ›

Last night, a fire broke out on the roof of the signal room at the West 8th Street station in Brooklyn. Which means that the F and Q are suspended near the stop (more about the service changes below) today for crews to start repairs, because the fire was extinguished too late for workers to start last night. more ›

In this instant classic video, a self-described "very well-educated person" chews out the train conductor for doing her job. It's such fun when very well-educated people throw tantrums! According to the person who uploaded the video to YouTube, the woman had been talking too loudly on the train when the conductor "politely asked her to keep it down and stop using profanity or to take it to the vestibule." This is where the video picks up, with the "educated" woman getting more and more irate over the perceived insult: more ›

If you need to take the LIRR to your Passover seder, like this woman ("Waiting for the jewtrain to Sederville. Aka the LIRR to Long Island."), hopefully you're already on the train. Because otherwise you're not getting there before sundown. The MTA announced, "Due to a track condition in one of the East River tunnels, LIRR is anticipating significant delays during the PM Rush. Customers who can are advised to take one of the extra Passover trains, the last scheduled to run at 3:48 PM." more ›

Meet Bloody Loco, one of the many colorful characters that make up this city. If you're lucky, maybe you'll run into him on the subway! Just make sure you recognize, ASAP, or else you'll become the co-star of both an improvisational piece of street theater, and a YouTube video. This all went down on the 7 train yesterday (Common Courtesy Day!). Some call it an epic intimidation fail... more ›

This has not been a very good few weeks for the Sanitation Department. Alleged blizzard work slowdowns, slow plowing, stuck plows, toppling gravestones, lingering garbage... and yesterday, two workers "crashed their garbage truck into a slow-moving freight train along the Brooklyn waterfront," according to the Daily News. more ›

Just after 1:30 a.m., there were reports of delays on the G train due to a police investigation at the Classon Avenue station. A reader told us, "I was riding a G train on the south bound side just after 1:30am when it came to a screeching halt halfway into the Classon Ave Station. Directly in front of me out the opposite window was a male sprawled out at the very edge and back end of the platform, his feet, legs and bottom half of his torso visible from the train window, his upper torso, legs, and head invisible from that vantage point." more ›

Should we really be patting Metro-North on the caboose for running their trains on time? According to the NY Post, the railroad (allegedly!) had a 100 percent on-time record on Tuesday, with "all 659 runs east of the Hudson and all 61 runs west of the Hudson running exactly on time." Great, right? But shouldn't this happen everyday... or at least several times a week? Or several times a month? Or year? As it stands, this hasn't happened since April 29th! If this is some new standard of excellence in service with the MTA, we're going to have to find a way to lower this bar even further. The Post may be giving you a "star," but we say try harder, Metro-North. more ›

Besides paying higher fares, NJ Transit riders will have this to look forward to: Higher parking lot fees. The agency wants to raise fees by approximately $1/day According to the Star-Ledger, "Agency officials...said fees at many of its 140 parking lots have not increased in more than five years, while utilities, insurance and other costs of maintaining them keep going up." A NJ Transit spokesperson said, "We do understand that these are tough economic times for our customers. [But] we want to be able to provide them with quality facilities, and we need to offset the expense of providing parking." more ›

[UPDATE BELOW] The Office of Emergency Management says that there's been a "minor train derailment" at Penn Station, and NJ Transit and Amtrak are experiencing delays this evening. Though the derailment isn't considered major, the delays are nothing to sneeze at; Fox 5 reports hour-long delays on NJ Transit Northeast Corridor/North Jersey Coastline trains leaving New York. The derailment happened this morning, when a Midtown Direct train went off the tracks as it was leaving the station. 300 people were on board, but there were no reported injuries. more ›

This weekend, the MTA is embarking on its "LIRR Modernization Project Brings State of the Art Technology to Centralized Signaling and Switch Control at Jamaica," which means there will be very limited service between Jamaica and Penn Station this weekend and the weekend of November 6-7. The MTA recommends, "As a result of the extremely limited service, the LIRR recommends that customers use the LIRR for essential business travel only during these two weekends. Customers traveling for recreational purposes during this period should consider travel on the Port Washington Branch or other travel alternatives." Or, as the Post puts it, "It's the LIRR-arrrgh!" (LOL) more ›

In August of 2009 a Long Island Railroad engineer was accused of letting a passenger operate the train for almost a half hour between Hicksville and Hunters Point Avenue in Queens. Both the passenger and the engineer were subsequently arrested, and today former train engineer Ronald Cabrera, 41, accepted a plea deal that will get him 50 hours of community service and a $500 fine. He pleaded guilty to official misconduct, a misdemeanor, and admitted that he let court stenographer William Kutsch into the train cab. Today Cabrera also revealed what possessed him to do such a stupid thing. more ›

Ooooh, how European. Metro-North Railroad is considering buying double-decker coaches for its Harlem and Hudson lines, according to the New York Times. The purchase would bring less crowded cars to the commuter lines, adding enough space for 1/3 more people to get on board. The price is right, too: the two-level trains cost just as much as the current single-story ones. more ›

Investigators are probing the case of the one-legged woman who was run over by 11 trains on the N tracks after falling between the cars. Arabell Lin's fall triggered the emergency switch, but the operator started the train up again after failing to find anything that flipped the switch. The 12-year veteran allegedly had two rules violations in the past 10 years. The MTA wouldn't say what they were, but admitted the operator didn't look long enough. Operators of 10 other trains failed to see Lin's body as well, leaving her body so mangled that cops relied on missing persons reports to identify her. more ›

A 19-year-old man from Ohio is in critical condition after a freight train on Metro-North tracks hit him at the Ossining station. According to the AP, "Metro-North said Christopher Newman was sitting on the train platform in Ossining, leaning forward with his legs dangling over the tracks on Saturday. He was struck in the head and is at Westchester Medical Center." more ›

The Target ad currently adorning to the 6 train certainly isn't the first time we've seen subway wrap ads (back in 2008 the History Channel took over the 42nd Street shuttle). However, NYC the Blog notes this is the "first ever full length train completely wrapped in advertising to run on the New York City subway system." Don't expect a new look once you step inside, though—the wrapping is just on the outside (as opposed the the Holland shuttle which gave the train's interior a makeover). more ›

Last night, a Metro North train struck and killed a person just south of the Marble Hill station at 225th Street in the Bronx. Metro North spokesman Dan Brucker tells us that at 10:41 p.m. a northbound train traveling 50 MPH hit a trespasser, who was pronounced dead at the scene. It's unclear what the the person, who has not been identified, was doing (laying on the tracks, running across them, etc.). more ›

When F and G service was disrupted on Wednesday due to a person on the tracks at Brooklyn's 7th Avenue station, it was due to a suicide attempt. The Brooklyn Paper reports that a 34-year-old Park Slope woman made the leap onto the tracks as an F train was entering the station, but it slowed significantly and even though she ended up under the train, she survived. They report that paramedics spent around 40 minutes trying to retrieve her from the tracks, and she only suffered a few deep cuts. There's a series of photos from the rescue here. more ›

Yesterday afternoon, a woman was fatally struck by a northbound 6 train at the 77th Street and Lexington Avenue station in Manhattan. Police now say that 48-year-old Rose Mary Mankos had jumped into the tracks to pick up her fallen bag. Witnesses were yelling at her to lie on on the track bed, but, the NY Times reports, "Panicked, the woman scrambled toward the platform and struggled to climb up, but was crushed as the train came charging into the station." more ›

Just before 4 p.m., word came in over the newswire that there was "a person under the train" at East 77th Street and Lexington; soon after it was noted the person was DOA. Now CityRoom reports that a girl was crushed to death between the 6 train and the platform. It's unclear at this time if her death was accidental—there are conflicting eyewitness reports. Some witnesses say she was playing with kids on the uptown platform when someone pushed her towards the tracks, while others say she jumped. The site has some gruesome details as well, noting "part of the girl’s head and arm were visible between the platform and a door of a car toward the front of the train. Passengers inside the car were screaming." more ›

After no small degree of dread was endured by those who rely on the G and F to get around Brooklyn, the big snow storm has come through with a reprieve this weekend. The MTA has announced that "due to inclement weather, all weekend subway work has been canceled. All lines will operate according to the usual weekend schedule." Shuttle buses were to have replaced the F train between Jay Street and Church Avenue, and the G line was to have been divided up into trains, single-track shuttle trains, and the F shuttle buses. But the best laid schemes of rats and MTA went askew, thanks to the snowacane. Even the 7 train's running between Manhattan and Long Island City! Oh MTA, you're going to spoil us! more ›