The Lying Lies of the MTA

Living in New York City as a non-millionaire means learning to navigate the public transportation system in some form or another. And this means having to constantly adjust one’s weekend plans to account for service disruptions.

But while the Metropolitan Transit Authority that runs our trains and busses asks for passengers to plan ahead, it doesn’t inform its own employees or even provide accurate information during service disruptions. In fact it actively spreads misinformation during service disruptions, which makes things worse for everyone.

Example: More than once now I have seen MTA subway conductors tell people to transfer to the J train at the Fulton Street station during weekend service disruptions, when the J train doesn’t run to Fulton Street on weekends even when there aren’t service disruptions.

“You can’t take the J train from Fulton Street on the weekends,” I told one conductor on a Brooklyn-bound F train after he told people to take the J from Fulton Street. He had even misspoke once and told people to take the J train from Jay Street in Brooklyn, and the J train goes nowhere near that stop.

“I’ve been doing this 30 years! You’re going to tell me how it is?!” was his reply.

Also, the automatic subway announcements that inform passengers as to what trains they can transfer to at the given stations are not changed during service disruptions, and feed misinformation to passengers. And regular signs will lie to you also. For years, the signs at the 34^th St. A, C, E station tell passengers to use the center platform for “All A train service” when the A train usually stops on the local platforms between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m.

Don’t expect this to get better any time soon. MTA workers are now working without a contract and their union leaders are in a pissing contest with the city. The MTA is always short on money as well and is constantly cutting service and raising fares.

So make sure you get confirmation from multiple sources of information before you take the MTA’s word on anything.

It still makes more sense to ride the subways and busses, because driving in the city can be a real nightmare, but public transit is quickly catching up in terms of aggravation.

A Long Walk to White Castle

Since yesterday was Sunday and I had some free time, I decided to treat myself to some delicious White Castle cheeseburgers and take a walk to the nearest White Castle, or at least the nearest White Castle in a good neighborhood, and walk to the one on the corner of Bell Boulevard and Northern Boulevard here in Northern Queens.

Each way was a three-or-four mile walk, and the long walk would assuage some of the guilt of eating the delicious White Castle burgers. I’ve been sick with a cold and so I haven’t been to the gym lately.

Queens can be a confusing jumble of streets, and I thought it would be better to take the back streets and learn my way around rather than simply walk down Northern Boulevard. I had driven down Northern Boulevard before so I had seen everything there was to see there between my street and the restaurant.

Along the route I often came across plots of land where once had stood a tasteful one-family home but was not occupied by a garish, oversized home replete with faux opulence that housed one or two or even more families. These “McMansions” are a blight everywhere they pop up and New York hasn’t yet found a solution to stopping them. It’s evidence that people are self deluded. If you live in Bayside, Queens, you are not an Italian count or, famous fashion designer, or oil magnate, and your attempts to make your house resemble a Mediterranean villa come to nothing when you live within walking distance of a White Castle. These McMansion owners only make themselves look foolish and their neighborhoods look ugly, but most seem not to care.

Some would argue that anyone who would walk four miles to a White Castle has no right to dictate taste, but you’re wrong. The White Castle at Bell and Northern Boulevards in Queens is in a commercial district and does not stand out as an ugly duckling among its neighbors. On the contrary, it’s a beacon of majesty among the more humdrum establishments.

I don’t know what there is to be done about the McMansion epidemic sweeping New York and the nation. Zoning laws can only do so much. The housing bust of 2008 slowed their construction to a certain degree, but once the housing market returns, what is to stop them from coming back? You can’t legislate taste and decency. It’s a sign that our ever-fracturing country may be slipping into the twilight of mediocrity.

Here’s hoping that future generations will care more about their cities and neighbors.

Riding the Bus Like a Schmuck

Life and luck have recently caused me to move from Inwood, the northernmost neighborhood of Manhattan, to Flushing, in the northern reaches of Queens. I like my new neighborhood well enough, but I no longer live a quick walk to the subway. To get all the way home, I now have to take a bus.

No one would rightfully choose to take a bus when they can take a subway instead. With a bus, you get all the aggravation of being stuck in traffic with of the unpleasantness of public transportation. Subways also take your money before the train arrives. With a bus, you get to stand in line while old ladies fumble for Metrocards or exact change. Buses also make many more stops.

There's also an unspoken aversion to taking the bus among New Yorkers. Even those who proudly boast they don't own a car and enjoy a smug self-righteousness about not polluting the Earth don't want to be on a bus. A city bus has no cultural cache. Trains, trolleys and ferries still have some scraps of glamor stuck to their fetid bones.

And in New York, bus riders get the shaft in many ways. Subway transfers are unlimited but bus transfers are not. There is no citywide bus map like there is a citywide subway map. City bus maps are only available by borough. And the bus lines are not depicted in consistent colors among the various borough bus maps, making it even tougher to navigate.

There are also many bus lines, particularly in the outer boroughs that are privately owned and appear on no official bus maps. The entire transit system is rigged against the outer boroughs, with subway lines almost all leading to and from Manhattan. If the other boroughs were similarly served, this would garner no complaint.

The New York transit store sells t-shirts emblazoned with your favorite subway line. I know of no such t-shirts for buses.

There are schedules posted at the bus stops that may be helpful to read but can also be quite maddening, as they are often not kept to and you can find yourself waiting about an hour or more for a bus in the late night/early morning hours. Some buses just quit running altogether for several hours, and their schedules will just show empty time slots where arrival times should be. Buses will also sometimes be on a “Limited” schedule, which means it makes fewer stops and the driver will drive right by your stop and possibly leave you far from where you need to go.

Bus passengers do have a smaller percentage of confused tourists. Most people who ride the city buses are locals who know where they are going or soon will. An elite order has formed among the riders of the special express buses. These are coach buses with nicer seats that make fewer stops and go greater distances. They cost $5.50 instead of the regular fare of $2.25, and these bus riders form their own subculture of regulars and tend to line up reliably. These are mostly commuters from the outer boroughs and suburbs who act with the experienced precision found only in seasoned commuters.

I am unavoidably among the cadres of working-class New Yorkers who find themselves on a bus every day. In my case it's either the Q44 or the Q20 (A or B, either stops in front of my building) or in some cases the Q34 in the mornings. I've decided to take a perverse pride in this. See you on the bus.

Happy New Year, Now Go Outside

It’s now 2012, and I’ll make a bold prediction that most of the world will survive to see 2013. I’m not going to give much credence to catastrophic predictions from an ancient people who played soccer with severed heads.

I have the usual litany of New Year’s resolutions that I won’t bore you with, but share one that I suggest you adopt, which is to enjoy being a tourist in your own city or town. Go walking in places you don’t normally see or walk to because they are close by or you don’t think there’s much there. You’ll be surprised at what you find.

Today I went for a walk in my new neighborhood of Flushing, Queens. In addition to discovering more obscure roads and lanes that share names and numbers with nearby streets and avenues, I came across some interesting parks and memorials.

The first was a small park connected to Flushing Memorial Field, most of which is now dedicated to Flushing High School’s athletic fields. My fiancé told me that the park is usually full of angry old men and as a future angry old man I appreciate that there will be some public green space for me. The small park has a few rows of benches and grass and a memorial plaque that is relatively unassuming. The plaque was dedicated in 1935 to Flushing residents who died in the First World War. I noticed that there were two people named Frederick Nix listed next to one another and found that odd. A quick Internet search when I got home told me that both were Army Privates who died of pneumonia in October of 1918. Frederick A. Nix, from 289 Barclay St., Flushing, was with the Army’s 43^rd Company. Frederick J. Nix, of 130 Washington St., Flushing, was with the Army’s 3^rd Company. Both died less than one month before the war’s end.

Walking down Francis Lewis Boulevard, we came across a faded street sign at a small, triangular island where Clintonville Street and 163^rd Street meet the boulevard. Upon closer inspection, I was able to decipher that this was Cpl. Larry Muss Square. I walked around the small mini-park looking for some information on who Corporal Muss was. Cpl. Larry Muss was a Queens native who was serving in the Army Air Corps during World War II. He served as a gunner on a B-29 fighter plane that crashed shortly after takeoff on a training mission at a base in Cuba in February of 1945, taking the lives of Muss and six other crew members. The local chapter of Jewish War Veterans of the United States, Post 145, is named for Muss.

There will be plenty of things this year for you to not care about. We’ll see our share of manufactured outrage on both the left and the right as the presidential election goes along. Our celebrity-obsessed culture will generate more ridiculous non-news that people win inexplicably give a shit about. Make an effort to take some time to learn something about the world immediately around you. You will learn interesting things and be glad you did.