Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer wants answers after a recent spike in deaths, injuries

By Caroline Lewis

A man jumped onto the subway tracks as an R train came hurtling toward the platform at the Fourth Avenue-Ninth Street Station in Park Slope on Sunday morning. The man was taken to the hospital and remained in critical condition after his apparent suicide attempt, and the NYPD reported him dead the next day.

This was the sixth death on the tracks in January, and the news is beginning to feel eerily commonplace. The incident prompted Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer to renew last week’s call for the MTA to conduct an in-depth investigation into the cause of deaths in the subway and an analysis of the cost and effectiveness of measures that could be taken to prevent them.

“Another attempted suicide cannot become a commonplace occurrence in one of the largest transit systems in the world,” Stringer said.

A PSA that the MTA placed in subway cars informs riders that an average of 140 people get struck by trains each year. In 2012, 55 of those incidents resulted in death, up from 47 in 2011. Stringer claims that the upswing in subway deaths in December and January puts the city on track to reach 100 fatalities in 2013.

Suicide is the most common cause of death on the subway, but even within the last two months, the incidents have run the gamut from a man being pushed, to a woman falling, to a guy wandering around drunk on the tracks.

“The bad spike in being struck by trains is something that’s on the minds of hundreds of thousands of riders who would like to see something done about this tragic and frightening problem,” said Gene Russianoff of the Straphangers Campaign.

But given the varied nature of subway tragedies, including many that are intentional, how realistic is it to try to prevent them?

More frequent audio warnings, barriers on the platform’s edge, motion sensors on trains and better mental health services have all been mentioned as possible ways to prevent death and injury on the subway.

But Stringer, Russianoff and other transit safety advocates want to avoid jumping to conclusions about how to solve the problem, especially if the solution has a hefty price tag. In December, the MTA publicly considered the idea of placing sliding doors between the platform edge and the train tracks to prevent deaths and injuries, starting with the L train as a pilot program. The agency estimated that installing sliding doors system-wide would cost over $1 billion.

For now, transit safety advocates just want as much information as possible as to why people die on the subway and what safety measures have worked for public transit systems in other cities.
“Deaths and injuries in the subway worry everyone, and there’s very little information available about the best way to prevent them,” said John Raskin of the Riders Alliance.

Stringer specifically called on MTA Inspector General Barry Kluger to conduct the investigation. He responded to Stringer’s letter by saying that a state agency—not the MTA—will lead the investigation.

“As the MTA inspector general, I am coordinating our efforts regarding subway fatalities with the New York State Public Transportation Safety Board, which has primary responsibility for the investigation of accidents and fatalities on the facilities of the MTA, and of which I am a member,” Kluger said in an official statement.

Community Board 6 Chair Mark Thompson said that while the board hasn’t taken an official position on the rezoning proposal, they are generally supportive of it. The biggest problem, he said, is that the city wants to plow ahead with the plan before allowing adequate time to answer the community’s questions and figure out how a potential business boom in Midtown would affect other city systems. Thompson said the board is concerned that the city isn’t giving enough consideration to ancillary factors like sidewalk crowding, an influx of subway and bus passengers and the impact on the electric grid and sewer systems that would come along with a rapid upward expansion of Midtown office buildings.

The board will be sending a letter to City Council Member Dan Garodnick requesting a meeting and his assistance in getting the DCP to steady the pace as they continue, and is working in conjunction with Community Board 5, which shares their concerns.

Renewed Calls for Pedicab Restrictions
Upper East Side Council Member Dan Garodnick, chair of the consumer affairs committee, has consistently called for stricter regulations of the pedicab industry, citing the high number of complaints that his committee has received from customers who feel they were ripped off. The New York Post reported earlier this week that one visiting family from Texas was charged over $400 for a 10-block ride in Midtown recently—and that the charge was completely legal. Garodnick introduced a package of bills last year that passed the Council and now require pedicab drivers to clearly post their rates someone in their cab, but the city doesn’t place any restrictions on how much pedicabs can charge, and some are getting around the rule by posting their rates in tiny lettering and not directing their passengers’ attention to it. Now Garodnick, along with many in the pedicab industry who don’t want their profession given a bad name, are calling for additional laws that will require drivers to state the charges clearly at the beginning of a ride, instead of springing a huge bill on riders when they reach their destination.

Summer Streets on the East Side
If you’ve always dreamed of zip-lining through the streets of Manhattan, your dreams may soon be fulfilled. The Department of Transportation will continue the fifth annual Summer Streets program for the next two Saturdays, Aug. 11 and 18, on the East Side, closing down Park Avenue from Foley Square downtown all the way up to East 72nd Street from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. Cars will vanish and the avenue will be free to roam on foot, bike, scooter, rollerblades or hoverboard, with activities like the zip-line, a rock climbing wall and a picnic food stand area from Whole Foods at various rest stops along the way. There will also be interactive art projects and a fire hydrant sprinkler, perfect for parched kids. Complete info at nyc.gov/summerstreets.

A Comic Consolidation
The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art (MoCCA) announced this week that it will be consolidating its collections with that of the Society of Illustrators, located at 128 E. 63rd St. The two art institutions will merge their assets and become a single institution dedicated to celebrating illustration, comics and animation. The Society will continue to host the MoCCA Fest, an annual independent comics festival, and will dedicate one of their galleries to MoCCA’s permanent collection and draw from the collection for curated shows.
“The Society of Illustrators has a long, proud history of promoting the art and appreciation of all genres of illustration,” said Executive Director Anelle Miller in a statement. “We are honored to be able to spearhead the expansion and growth of the incredible foundation that MoCCA has created over the past 10 years.”

East Siders’ Ideas to Boost Second Ave.
While the businesses on Second Avenue near the subway construction have suffered in the past years, with foot traffic down by 30 percent in some spots, local residents say that they try their best to support those businesses and have ideas of how they can do even better, according to a survey conducted by Council Member Jessica Lappin’s office. Out of the 990 people who responded to the survey, 78 percent said that they shop in stores or dine in restaurants along Second Avenue. An overwhelmingly number—86 percent—also said that they’d be inclined to spend on the Avenue more frequently if merchants offered coupons or deals.

“Businesses have been hit hard by Second Avenue construction, so it’s wonderful that East Siders are supporting them,” Lappin said in a statement. “This survey also makes it clear that shoppers are looking for bargains. In this economy, who isn’t? So, going forward, this is something we can work on with Second Avenue merchants.”

The survey also found the best thing the MTA can do to help people who live around the Second Avenue construction is to provide better information for the community about what’s going on. Survey respondents chose that option 40 percent of the time, more than keeping the work spaces cleaner and being less noisy.

C Tops the List as the Worst Line in the City
Have a favorite subway line? So does the New York Public Interest Research Group, whose Straphangers Campaign released its annual State of the Subway report last week.

The Q line came out on top, with major points for a low breakdown rate, regular service, seat availability and cleanliness. Apparently, this line also has the best announcements in the system. It ranked relatively low, though, on the actual amount of scheduled service.
Probably to few New Yorkers’ surprise, the C line came in last. For the fourth year in a row, its notorious grimy cars, frequent breakdowns and infrequent appearances kept it at the bottom. It ranked second to last on in-car announcements.

by Paul Bisceglio

Have a favorite subway line? So does the New York Public Interest Research Group, whose Straphangers Campaign released its annual State of the Subway report last week.

The report ranks subway lines from best to worst by compiling MTA New York City Transit data from 2011 in six categories: amount of scheduled service, regularity of service, breakdown rate, chance of getting a seat, interior cleanliness and in-car announcements. The list includes 19 of the 20 major lines across the city — all except the G, for which reliable crowding data is unavailable, says the report.
The Q line came out on top, with major points for a low breakdown rate, regular service, seat availability and cleanliness. Apparently, this line also has the best announcements in the system. It ranked relatively low, though, on the amount of scheduled service.
Probably to few New Yorkers’ surprise, the C line came in last. For the fourth year in a row, its notoriously grimy cars, frequent breakdowns and infrequent appearances kept it at the bottom. It ranked second to last on in-car announcements, which tend to sound like the conductor is speaking cyborg from a mile away while gargling marbles.

The 7 took second place, despite having the worst announcements on record, and the J and Z’s clockwork-like regularity helped win it third. The 4 and 5 were third and second to last, respectively, both weighed down by heavy crowding.

The MTA released a tepid reply to the rankings, emphasizing that progress was being made across the board.

“While we appreciate the positive results of the Straphangers’ latest survey, those results do not tell the full story,” they said in an official response. “We believe that NYC Transit’s Key Performance Indicators methodology, reported monthly in the Committee Agenda, offers a fairer and more complete assessment of subway service and includes information gleaned from actual customer surveys taken from the passengers’ point of view.”

They also noted that service frequency for each individual line is affected by other lines that share the same track. “The Straphangers report would be more relevant if it viewed service by corridor rather than by individual train line,” they claimed.

Nevertheless, they acknowledge that there is work to be done. “Continuing our commitment to improving service, 300 new subway cars are currently on order for lettered line routes, and their arrival will help further modernize our car fleet by allowing us to retire C Line cars (R32s), which are the oldest in current operation.”

The new C line cars will not arrive until at least 2017, so it’s likely that the C is not at the end of its losing streak.

This year's winner (photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons).

Have a favorite subway line? So does the New York Public Interest Research Group, whose Straphangers Campaign released its annual State of the Subway report this week.

The report ranks subway lines from best to worst by compiling 2011 MTA New York City Transit data on  in six categories: amount of scheduled service, regularity of service, breakdown rate, chance of getting a seat, interior cleanness and in-car announcements. The list includes 19 of the 20 major lines across the city — all except the G, for which reliable crowding data is unavailable, says the report.

Here’s how things stacked up:

The Q line came out on top, with major points for a low breakdown rate, regular service, seat availability and cleanliness. Apparently it also has the best announcements in the system. It ranked relatively low, though, on the actual amount of scheduled service.

Probably to few New Yorkers’ surprise, the C line was last. For the fourth year in a row, its notorious grime, frequent breakdowns and infrequent appearances kept it at the bottom. It ranked second to last on in-car announcements, which tend to sound like the conductor is speaking cyborg from a mile away while gargling marbles.

The 7 took second place despite having the worst announcements on record, and the J & Z’s clock-like regularity helped win it third. The 4 and 5 were third-to-last and second-to-last respectively, both weighed down by heavy crowding.

MTA released a tepid reply to the rankings, and emphasized that progress was being made across the board.

“While we appreciate the positive results of the Straphanger’s latest survey, those results do not tell the full story,” said their official response. “We believe that NYC Transit’s Key Performance Indicators (KPI) methodology, reported monthly in the Committee Agenda, offer a fairer and more complete assessment of subway service and includes information gleaned from actual customer surveys taken from the passengers’ point of view.”

MTA also noted that service frequency for each individual line is affected by other lines that share the same track.  “The Straphanger’s report would be more relevant if it viewed service by corridor rather than by individual train line,” they claimed.

Nevertheless, they acknowledge that there is still work to be done: “continuing our commitment to improving service, 300 new subway cars are currently on order for lettered-line routes and their arrival will help further modernize our car fleet by allowing us to retire C Line cars (R32s), which are the oldest in current operation.”

The new C line cars will not arrive until at least 2017, so the C may not be at the end of its losing streak.

by Nick Gallinelli

Bansky Rat Mural - photo courtesy of Flickr Commons

We’ve all had the dream— where we’re standing in front of a large audience, larger than reasonably possible, and we’re stark naked. Fortunately for us, we’ve probably never actually experienced that dream in reality. Unfortunately for Ana Vargas, a 40-year-old New Yorker, she did (albeit in front of a much, much smaller audience) experience that in real life.

Vargas, while riding the A train on June 8, was accosted by a rat that crawled up her pants and forced her to divest her pants, exposing her underwear, and pride, to the entire train car.

“He was very big. I was shaking, but nothing was coming out . . . I had to pull my pants down in front of everyone on the train,” Vargas told the Daily News.

After the frisk, police and EMTs were quick to respond and met Vargas at the next station, Columbus Circle. They brought her to the hospital and treated her for scratches, and fortunately Vargas wasn’t severely hurt. The furtive rat ended up fleeing the scene, and the NYPD has surprisingly made no plan to track down the frisky critter.

In retrospect, there of course is a humorous hint to the story, but it does get one to think— at what risk are we of rodent attacks? How often does it even happen?

The answer: It’s not impossible, but not very likely.

Since the beginning of 2011 there have been three reported rat attacks on NY citizens, including Vargas’s.

1. January 2011 – CBS reported that a rat, trapped in a subway car, scurried along the floor looking for a way out when he latched on to a man’s leg and crawled up to his face. The man seemed to be unharmed despite clumsy defense tactics.
2. September 2011 –A woman waiting on a J train platform in the Brooklyn City-City Hall station when she suffered a rodent attack. This time, she wasn’t used as a ladder, but as a snack. A rat bit her foot, causing the woman to bleed, according to the Daily News.

Three attacks in 18 months doesn’t seem extreme, but there are a few other numbers that make the case a bit more creepy.

Throughout NYC’s history there have been a variety of different rat species. Decades ago there were up to five different types living both above and underground, but that number has been reduced to two. Brown rats and ship rats are the only species inhabiting New York currently. But that’s because the brown rat has violently extirpated the other species and is known to attack any other specie of rat at first sight. These rats, though often unseen, do indeed mingle among subway riders.

A study released by the Straphangers Campaign released in February found that rats were present in roughly 11% of underground subway stations, although it didn’t specify as to where (It also found exposed wiring in 28% of platforms).

These facts, overall, caused Reuters to name New York the U.S. city most vulnerable to rat attacks in 2007, specifically citing deteriorating infrastructure.

At least the Bronx Zoo seems to have its tigers under control.

There will be some good news for long-suffering bus riders: You will soon be able to use your cell or smart phone to tell how far your bus is from your stop in real time. A new “Bus Time” program goes Staten Island-wide in January 2012, and then around the city.

“Poetry in Motion,” the subway car ads featuring works from Shakespeare to Frost, will return from retirement. You may get stuck in a subway tunnel, but it will be a chance to catch up on Langston Hughes and Emily Dickinson.

For two years in a row, the Straphangers Campaign called the C train the worst subway line in the city in its annual report card.

The line stretches from the tip of northern Manhattan, through the Upper West Side and through the rest of the borough into Brooklyn, ending in the East New York neighborhood.

Compared to the subway system average of 21 train lines, the C train had a lower regular scheduled service, more delays from mechanical breakdowns and garbled subway car announcements. The survey also found that the C trains are dirty. One of the only benefits of the C train is that a rider is more likely to get a seat.

The scores were ranked with a MetroCard rating, in dollars and cents. The C train had a score of 55 cents.

Other Upper West Side train lines fared much better than the C line.

The local 1 train that runs up Broadway was rated the third highest line in the subway system. The express 2/3 trains that also run on Broadway scored a little lower.

The 2 train was considered less clean and slightly less reliable than the other lines. The 3 train was cleaner than the system average, but breaks down as often as the average subway line.

The local B train, which also runs up Central Park West, was tied for 15th place in the subway system ranking.

Overall the report found that this year, the subway system improved. Nearly all the train lines are cleaner, half had clearer subway announcements and 16 subway lines broke down less than last year.