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Hempstead Branch Service Reminder

Posted by
on June 21st, 2008 at 4:19 am

Last Sunday, I wrote an entry about the major LIRR Queents Interlocking project that will many service changes for riders this summer throughout the Long Island Rail Road System. This entry is just to serve as a reminder of the major change in service this weekend which features the complete suspension of service on the Hempstead Branch in both directions. The MTA issued a press release to remind customers:

MTA Long Island Rail Road reminds Hempstead Branch customers that train service will be shut down this weekend, June 21 and June 22, to allow workers to install a new signal system and new switches at a key switching point called Queens Interlocking.

Bus service will replace trains between Hempstead and Jamaica on Saturday, June 21 and Sunday, June 22 and customers should expect up to 35 minutes of additional travel time if they use stations at Hempstead, Country Life Press, Garden City, Nassau Boulevard, Stewart Manor, Floral Park, Bellerose, Queens Village and Hollis.

Trains will stop running at 12:23 AM Saturday. Service will not resume until 11:59 PM Sunday. Customers should pick up a copy the gold-colored Hempstead Special Branch Timetable dated June 21-22 which details replacement bus service for the two-day period.

Customers can also minimize delays by using stations on other LIRR branches such as Mineola, Merillon Avenue, New Hyde Park and West Hempstead where all trains will be operating on regular weekend schedules.

“We’re have tried very hard to minimize the inconvenience the project will cause,” said LIRR President Helena Williams. “But the ultimate benefit to our customers will be a smoother and faster ride through Queens Interlocking and a reduction in maintenance-related track outages.”

The work on the Hempstead Branch is part of the LIRR’s Queens Interlocking Switch and Signal Improvement Program, a $60 million project that began Monday, June 16, and is scheduled for completion on September 1.

The upgrade will replace the current signal system with microprocessor technology and the current track switches with high-speed crossovers at an important LIRR switching point between Queens Village and Bellerose.

For additional travel information, customers can contact the LIRR’s 24-hour Travel Information Center in Suffolk County at 631-231-LIRR, in Nassau County at 516-822-LIRR or in New York City at 718-217-LIRR. The Travel Information Center’s TDD telephone number for the hearing impaired is 718-558-3022. Customers can also consult the LIRR’s website at www.mta.info.

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Clear Display Of Nepotism

Posted by
on June 21st, 2008 at 4:00 am

The last post I made on this blog before I disappeared in January for a few months was about a bus reroute which clearly benefited the then newly appointed MTA Chairman Dale Hemmerdinger. Now months later, the bus reroute situation has come back into the spotlight. Here is the report from AMNY’s Matthew Sweeney:

A handful of shopping malls get mentioned on MTA bus maps, like Gateway Center Mall and the Staten Island Mall, but only one belongs to the son of MTA Chairman H. Dale Hemmerdinger.

During a hearing on bus routes Thursday, Councilman John Liu, who heads the council transportation committee, suggested that the Shops at Atlas Park in Glendale, Queens, gets preferential bus service because of the father-son connection.

The mall opened in the spring of 2006 with one bus line, the Q29. Since then, the Q54, was rerouted to stop there. Another route, the Q45, is expected to begin serving the mall in September, pending NYC Transit’s approval next week.

“It’s amazing how this request for the Shops at Atlas Park sped through,” Liu said.

If this is not a clear display of nepotism, i don’t know what is. This is just another example of someone in the higher ranks of the MTA abusing their power to either their own or someone they care about/owe a favor to’s beneit.

xoxo Transit Blogger

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MTA Board Polling On Free Perks

Posted by
on June 21st, 2008 at 3:27 am

This past Thursday, writers from Newsday contacted the 22 members who make up the MTA Board. The purpose of this contact was to conduct a poll on whether or not they favor the proposed restriction of use on  their free systemwide passes. Here is the report with the results courtesy of Newsday:

Newsday called the Metropolitan Transportation Authority board’s 22 members Thursday, asking if they favor a policy that restricts their use of free system wide passes. The change would allow the members to use the passes only while on official MTA business and would take away lifetime passes from former board members.

Of the 22 board members, six are nonvoting.

In favor of the restriction:

Chairman H. Dale .Hemmerdinger

Vice Chairman David S. Mack

John H. Banks III

Jeffrey A. Kay

Nancy Shevell

Against the restriction:

James L. McGovern (nonvoting)

James L. Sedore Jr.

Could not be reached:

Vice Chairman Andrew M. Saul

Andrew Albert (nonvoting)

James F. Blair (nonvoting)

Doreen M. Frasca

Mark D. Lebow

Mark Page

Norman I. Seabrook

Ed Watt (nonvoting)

Carl V. Wortendyke

Would not comment:

Donald Cecil

Susan G. Metzger

Vincent Tessitore (nonvoting)

Undecided:

Norman E. Brown (nonvoting)

Mitchell H. Pally

Francis H. Powers

Norman E. Brown

Quote: “You tell me what the rules are and I’ll play by them.”

James L. McGovern

Quote: “This was a nice way to just say a little thank you, and it doesn’t cost the ridership much at all.”

Mitch H. Pally

Quote: “I think the board should continue to have them, assuming they’re not illegal.”

James L. Sedore Jr.

Quote: “I am going to vote against giving the passes up. … I think for the most part, we work very hard.”

Francis H. Powers

Quote: “There is nothing illegal about what we did and what was done.”

This upcoming board meeting will sure have a lot on the agenda.

xoxo Transit Blogger

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Editorial Blasts MTA Board Over Free Perks

Posted by
on June 21st, 2008 at 3:11 am

Continuing with the theme of late, the MTA Board free perks scandal, the Daily News featured an editorial in Friday’s edition that blasted the MTA Board over their free perk use. Here is the editorial courtesy of the Daily News:

Who was that nattering on at Metropolitan Transportation Authority headquarters the other day? Queen (“We are not amused”) Victoria? Oops, our mistake. It was MTA Vice Chairman David (“The board is not happy”) Mack.

Pray tell, why was the board unhappy? Because of chairman Dale Hemmerdinger’s decision that free E-ZPasses and transit and rail passes would be rescinded for ex-board members and that current members could use them just for official business.

He ruled after the board was shamed by Daily News exposés and threatened with court action by state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.

It is to formally vote on the matter next week. A revolt was brewing, until its leader Mack, an ultra-wealthy Long Island real estate developer, opened his mouth and uttered intemperate comments about mass transit and its workers. Oops, his mistake.

Mack yesterday expressed “regret” for yapping off and said he will support perk reform.

Quite a change from: “Why should I ride [the LIRR] and inconvenience myself when I can ride in a car?”

Besides, Mack had intoned, when he rides in a car, he performs a priceless service, keeping his laserlike eyes out for traffic/transit problems.

“We’re invaluable,” he had declared of MTA board members. Why? Because when board members complain, they get action. Unlike the public.

“If you saw something and called it in, it goes right there,” he said, referring to a trash can.

But you suspected that.

Embarrassed and scolded by no less than the governor, Mack said, “I plan to vote next week in support of changing our policies so that free passes for our transportation systems are used only by current board members, who are on official MTA business.”

Let that bring an end to a sense of entitlement among MTA officials, an end to obsessing over perks and pay.

They belong on subways, buses and trains with, to use Mack’s word, “normal” people, experiencing crowding, delays and smells at full fare.

Let them wait on line to find the MetroCard machine is on the blink.

Let them ride like cattle on the Lexington Ave. or E trains.

Let them experience the Long Island Railroad men’s rooms.

And let them focus on what’s most important right now: They must find the money so “normal” people don’t get hit next year with a fare hike.

The sentiment that the MTA needs to focus on finding the money it needs is shared by millions!

xoxo Transit Blogger

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Even More Free Perk Usage Details

Posted by
on June 21st, 2008 at 2:46 am

While preparing to write an entry on a completely different topic, I came across Daily News Transit Reporter Pete Donohue’s report on the usage value of the E-Z Pass tags used by MTA Board Members. To say the numbers are disturbing would be a huge understatement. Here is Pete’s report courtesy of the Daily News:

Current and former MTA board members took more than $30,000 worth of free bridge and tunnel trips – in just one year, the Daily News has learned.

Nearly four dozen transit bigwigs, some of whom left the Metropolitan Transportation Authority board decades ago, racked up 7,513 in free bridge and tunnel trips from November 2006 to November 2007, according to E-Z Pass records obtained by The News.

They were among those granted free E-ZPasses for unsalaried work on the authority board, a perk the MTA will end if a resolution is adopted by the board next week.

During the tug of war over the passes, which extends to commuter trains, subways and buses, some board members argued that having free access is a small “thank-you” for their unsalaried public service.

The E-ZPass records, provided by the MTA in response to a Freedom of Information Law request submitted by The News, begin to put a price tag to those taxpayer-funded gifts.

The most frequent user of a free E-ZPasses for that time period was former board member Warren Dolny, who was Rockland County’s representative on the board from 1989 to 1996.

MTA toll gates opened for Dolny without charge 918 times.

MTA Bridges and Tunnels says the average toll across the system is about $4.

The records don’t show which bridges or tunnels were used during the jaunts, just the number of “nonrevenue E-ZPass transactions.”

Second on the list is bus driver Ed Watt, a current nonvoting board member. Watt also is secretary treasurer of Transport Workers Union Local 100. He took 839 free trips.

“Ed’s full-time job is conducting MTA business, and that’s what he uses his E-ZPass for,” a union spokesman said.

Former board member Richard Nasti came in third at 674 trips. Current board members and fellow multimillionaires David Mack and Donald Cecil came in fourth and fifth, respectively, with 585 and 570 freebie drives.

I’m so disgusted by this!

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