A Good Samaritan is in critical condition after getting hit by a Staten Island Railroad train while trying to help an inebriated man climb up out of the tracks early Sunday morning. Steven Santiago, 39, spotted the stupid drunk man on the tracks at New Dorp around 1:30 a.m. and decided his life was worth saving, so he climbed down to try to help. The intoxicated man had apparently gone down onto the tracks to retrieve his shoe, and then couldn't get back up. MTA spokesman Kevin Ortiz tells the Staten Island Advance, "This good Samaritan apparently went down to assist him, and unfortunately was struck by a train." more ›

A man was struck and killed by a northbound 6 train this morning at 8:46 a.m. in the Bleecker Street station. The FDNY and the MTA had no other information regarding the victim, and service has been suspended on the 4/5/6 trains between Grand Central and Wall Street pending an investigation. more ›

Two teenagers were killed by a New Jersey Transit train as it passed over a railroad bridge over Route 46 in Wayne last night. Three unidentified boys were on the trestle on the Montclair-Boonton line when the train came through just after 9:45 p.m., on its way to a maintenance yard. The boys saw the train coming and started running, a police source tells NJ.com, but only one survived: a 15-year-old who jumped from the tracks to an embankment. more ›

No derailments this time, but once again NJ Transit and Amtrak trains between New York and New Jersey are having some serious troubles. The problem this go round? They ain't got no power in the tunnels! Which means that Some people are not having a good commute at all. more ›

Among the juiciest details released after the successful US operation to kill Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden last weekend was the mention that the military took hard drives from the compound—"10 hard drives, 5 computers and more than 100 storage devices which includes discs, DVDs and thumb drives." Investigators have been poring through those files, and have now revealed that Al Qaeda had been considering attacking the US rail system on the 10th anniversary of 9/11. more ›

Transit nerds, you are going to love this. The MTA has posted this time lapse video on YouTube, saying: "The Corona Subway Yard in Queens is home to the 7 subway fleet. Each weekday morning between 5 a.m. and 8 a.m., 27 trains leave Corona Yard to provide service to the Flushing Line's 450,000 customers. The 27 trains join five already in service to provide 32 trains during the peak hours." more ›

Surprise: there's a big difference between the kind of efficiency commuter rails are reporting and the delays commuters are experiencing. Though New Jersey Transit and Metro North Rail Road claim almost 96% of trains were on time last year, the Times discovered the numbers were vastly skewed by trains that ran on time during off-peak hours. During rush hours, they found almost 25% of NJT trains coming into Manhattan were running late, and LIRR customers traveling from Huntington to Manhattan arrive late one out of every ten trips. But if a train is always late doesn't that become the new "on time"? more ›

Knowledge is power, and commuters cooling their heels on subway platforms in Brooklyn are a little more empowered today, because real-time train arrival countdown clocks or message screens have became self-aware operational. As we speak, countdown clocks installed in several stations along the 2 3 lines in Brooklyn are now letting people know how much longer they'll be seething. (These are the Bergen Street, Eastern Parkway-Brooklyn Museum, Nostrand Avenue and Kingston Avenue stations.) And the MTA isn't stopping the countdown to ecstasy there! more ›

Are the NYPD stepping on the toes of MTA officers? The NY Post reports that the NYPD has started sending some of their officers to police commuter trains as part of their anti-terror efforts — a move that has upset the MTA. more ›

Yesterday Governor Paterson announced a $10.7 billion plan that would improve freight and passenger rail service between NYC and various points upstate. The state hopes to vie for federal funds that would help double the number of intercity rail passengers along New York’s three major corridors (New York City to Albany, Albany to Niagara Falls and Albany to Montreal), increase freight service, and improve train performance—and this would, hopefully, reduce reliance on air and auto travel. Senator Schumer said, “From Albany to Rochester and from Poughkeepsie to Plattsburgh, we must update and reinvent our rail network to unclog the transportation arteries cutting off potential economic growth Upstate." However, hopes for a "high speed train" don't quite mean a bullet train: The Post explains, "At full development, Paterson envisions a train system that peaks out at 150 mph" ("Currently, the top speed on most tracks is 70 mph"). more ›

Yesterday afternoon, downed wires in a train tunnel caused hours of delays for trains in the Northeast Corridor yesterday. The downed wires stopped a passenger train from entering the tunnels, and then the domino effect: Amtrak trains from Boston were backed up on their way to NYC, while trains from Philadelphia to NYC only made it to Newark. The outage occurred around 8:30AM and service was restored around 2:30PM, after affecting at least 50,000 riders... more ›