If there's one recurring rant I have on this blog, it's my displeasure with our city's transit system. It's a nightmare. More than that, it's a joke. Here we are, the greatest and most amazing city on earth, and yet getting around this town is exhausting -- and expensive. The MTA is an incompetent disaster, and it's always raising fares and cutting services because they keep saying they have no money and that the system is old, and yada yada yada, that's why buses and trains in this city such. But then, every so often, we learn that the MTA is hiding 
money and keeping two sets of books and engaging in all sorts of financial chicanery and that they really aren't quite as broke as they claim to be. The MTA is truly a weird, strange, mysterious organzation.
And for a system that's always supposedly broke, they're always doing track work that causes all sorts of service changes. They did a whole bunch this weekend and it was drove everyone crazy.
Let me tell you what happened to me last Thursday. I got on the N train downtown on my way home from work. Usually takes me straight home to Astoria. But not this time. At 42nd street we get kicked off -- train out of service because the signals on the express lane have failed.
We wait 10 minutes for a W train on the local track. When it arrives, we're told that the signals have also failed at Queensboro Plaza -- and that we'll have to take the 7 train to Queensboro, then transfer to the N/W there.
So w we take the 7 train -- which takes forever and is totally packed because it's carrying all this excess capacity -- and, at Queensboro Plaza, we're kicked off the train again! We're told that the signals have failed at Astoria Boulevard too!
So there I am, with over a mile seperating me from my home, and there are no cabs, the buses are jammed and running sporadically, and I have no choice but to walk all the way home.
All. The. Way. Home.
It was awful. Excrutiating. And on top of that, I had to go shopping before I could get home, so by the time I got home I was totally exhaustied, very dirty from having to walk so much, and really angry that a 45-minute trip took twice as long. But considering what a joke the MTA is, I'm suprised this doesn't happen every day.
So my message to the MTA: clean up your act! There should never be any signal failures or things like that. You move around the greatest city in the world -- be worthy of your mission and stop being a joke.
money and keeping two sets of books and engaging in all sorts of financial chicanery and that they really aren't quite as broke as they claim to be. The MTA is truly a weird, strange, mysterious organzation.And for a system that's always supposedly broke, they're always doing track work that causes all sorts of service changes. They did a whole bunch this weekend and it was drove everyone crazy.
Let me tell you what happened to me last Thursday. I got on the N train downtown on my way home from work. Usually takes me straight home to Astoria. But not this time. At 42nd street we get kicked off -- train out of service because the signals on the express lane have failed.
We wait 10 minutes for a W train on the local track. When it arrives, we're told that the signals have also failed at Queensboro Plaza -- and that we'll have to take the 7 train to Queensboro, then transfer to the N/W there.
So w we take the 7 train -- which takes forever and is totally packed because it's carrying all this excess capacity -- and, at Queensboro Plaza, we're kicked off the train again! We're told that the signals have failed at Astoria Boulevard too!
So there I am, with over a mile seperating me from my home, and there are no cabs, the buses are jammed and running sporadically, and I have no choice but to walk all the way home.
All. The. Way. Home.
It was awful. Excrutiating. And on top of that, I had to go shopping before I could get home, so by the time I got home I was totally exhaustied, very dirty from having to walk so much, and really angry that a 45-minute trip took twice as long. But considering what a joke the MTA is, I'm suprised this doesn't happen every day.
So my message to the MTA: clean up your act! There should never be any signal failures or things like that. You move around the greatest city in the world -- be worthy of your mission and stop being a joke.
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