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Monday = Taxi Strike Round 2

Posted by
on October 19th, 2007 at 6:21 pm

As you all know, I’ve been on top of the whole NYC/TLC vs Taxi Drivers war since August. The war will reach another major point this Monday when round 2 of The Taxi Workers Alliance strike takes place. The city has once again announced strike pricing which kicks in at 5 a.m. which coincides with the beginning of round 2 of the strike. The city’s strike pricing plan is the same as it was during round 1 of the strike. In case you forgot what the plan was, here are the details:

  1. $20 flat fare between Manhattan & LaGuardia Airport
  2. $30 flat fare between Manhattan & JFK Airport
  3. $10 per person per fare zone
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Taxi Strike
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Upcoming MTA Chairman Hesitant To Support Fare Hike

Posted by
on October 19th, 2007 at 5:35 pm

Add H. Dale Hemmerdinger to the list of influential people who do not support the MTA’s proposed fare hike! Who is he you ask? Well he is Gov. Elliot Spitzer’s appointee to replace Peter Kalikow as MTA Chairman. Here are some comments that he said at his recent confirmation in front of a state senate committee:

“The last thing I would want to do would be to vote for a fare increase. But if that’s required to keep the system running and to keep it running efficiently, affordably and safely, I will do that – with great reluctance.”

He was asked if he would postpone the scheduled December fare hike vote until April. The request to do this comes from legislators who think they can raise enough funds with a passed budget to offset the need for a fare hike. Unfortunately he did not commit either way saying “I don’t know enough to make that pledge.” He acknowledged that he is not totally up to date with all the nuances that make up the proposed fare hike. He vows to study all the alternatives & base his decision on the research he does.

Lets just hope that Mr. Hemmerdinger keeps his word as he could be key to preventing the much maligned proposed fare hike!

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Fare Hike
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LIRR Keeps Promise

Posted by
on October 19th, 2007 at 5:08 pm

Yesterday the Long Island Railroad started to deliver on its promise to communicate better with its customers. The agency unveiled five 60″ monitors at Penn Station. The purpose of the monitors is to keep riders informed of announcements, updates, & breaking news which was previously announced over loudspeaker. The monitors will also mirror information posted on the MTA’s website. There are plans for a 6th monitor to be installed later this month.

Some have already come up & expressed their satisfaction with the significant upgrade. Here are some comments:

Long Island Railroad Commuter Council President Gerald Bringmann – “I think it’s great. Our biggest complaint with these guys has been communication, or lack thereof. It’s nice to know there’s a good use for a 60-inch screen other than watching football.”

19 year old Glen Cove resident Rob Vogt – “You miss announcements all the time because you can’t hear anything in Penn Station.”

Long Island Railroad President Helena Williams chimed in with these comments:

“We wanted to do something that we consider a really important goal, which is to improve the customer service. Customers are better served by hearing and seeing information.”

The cost of installing these monitors throughout Penn Station totaled almost $100,000. According to LIRR President Helena Williams, the agency hopes to install these same monitors at their 2nd & 3rd busies stations, Jamaica & Flatbush/Atlantic Aves. respectively.

I say this was $100,000 well spent!

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1

Jamaica Bottleneck Editorial

Posted by
on October 19th, 2007 at 4:36 pm

I just stumbled upon a short editorial written in the Newsday relating to the Jamaica bottleneck that the Long Island Railroad plans to fix. No writer was listed but here is the short editorial anyway:

Jamaica sprint

Anybody who has crawled ever so slowly into the LIRR’s Jamaica station – especially after a speedy express from, say, Huntington – will happily greet the news: This quick-trip killer is going to be removed (although it will take six years to do it). One way to deal with our energy problem is to get more commuters onto trains and out of their cars. But that will only happen if commuters know they can make better time on the train.

No Hitching

Once those LIRR passengers get into the city, they should be sure to stay safe on the subways – by riding inside the cars. A 23-year-old was killed this week after he attempted to hitch a ride on the outside of a C train. It was the second subway-surfing incident in as many months to get attention, though there are likely many other daredevils who tempt fate this way. The MTA is right to keep up its efforts to cut down the practice.

 

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Opinions, System Conditions
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LIRR To Spend Millions To Fix The Bottleneck

Posted by
on October 19th, 2007 at 4:22 pm

What bottleneck am I talking about? The Jamaica bottleneck! The bottleneck includes the Jamaica station & the tracks entering & exiting the station. The Jamaica station is the Long Island Railroad’s second busiest station after Penn Station. The station serves 10 of the agency’s 11 branches. However it is woefully lacking a proper structure to handle the service it receives.

The basic layout to the Jamaica Station has not changed since it was built in 1913. Trains entering & leaving the station have to slow down to as much as 15mph while moving from one track to another. The current setup worries the Long Island Railroad as it might cause issues with their plans to send trains to Grand Central as part of the East Side Access plan.

The setup also frustrates many commuters & these facts have not been lost on Long Island Railroad President Helena Williams. She had this to say; “It’s the throat, and that’s the problem – the throat is too narrow. The level of frustration we get from our customers in regard to that slow crawl through Jamaica is something we need to address.”

The Long Island Rail Road Commuter’s Council Chairman Gerard Bringmann had this to say:

“Ten of our 11 branches run through Jamaica, yet it’s a bottleneck. Even though it’s the hub, it’s a bottleneck and really slows things down.”

The agency’s plan includes the following:

  1. Seek company submissions for a two year study to come up with ideas to fix the Jamaica bottleneck at an approximate cost of $7.2 million dollars
  2. Start a design phase that would last 18 months & cost approximately $15 – $30 million dollars
  3. Construction costs that could total anywhere from $200 – $350 million dollars & be complete by 2014

A Queens resident who posts on The Rider Diaries had this to say about the report:

“Great. bring even MORE construction to downtown Queens. not that WE benefit from it or anything. But i suppose it helps for all those ppl working on the east side? cuts out that transfer from the E/V to the 6 (while the 6 does come often enough during rush hour, to wait for a train for one stop to GCT – obnoxious) ”

I support anything that will get rid of the annoying crawling that occurs entering & leaving that station. I’ve been on many trains that took over 10 minutes to get in & out of that station. When you usually go through Jamaica, you swear that an extra 20 minutes was added on to your commute. The crawling is truly that bad! 2014 can’t come soon enough for commuters!

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