Opinion: The Slowing Down of The New York MTA – By Allan Raible

<!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> Do you know that feeling when you are already running late for work and you find yourself sitting on a platform waiting forever to just see those train lights coming toward you?  Do you know that frustration when you were once making good time in the morning until something unexpected happened and threw you off schedule?  Do you know what it is like to sit in a train for twenty minutes with no announcements explaining why you haven’t moved?  Do you ever wonder if there really is “train traffic ahead,” or if it is just a catch-phrase that is thrown about to make people not question being held hostage by public transportation?

Growing up in the eighties, it always seemed to me that the trains went rather quickly.  I remember hopping on an A train and rocketing to my destination.  Of course, back then, people were still smoking on the platforms and the trains were tagged to oblivion.  But at least the service was faster. 

As a commuter who relies on the subway as a means to get from here to there, I find it shocking how slowly the trains are running these days.  The MTA touts how they are working harder to serve us better, and I believe there are improvements being made, but I also feel like they use said construction as an excuse to slow down service.  It is so frustrating.  I don’t always believe those announcements.

Photo-illustration by Allan Raible

When I was little I dreamed of the future in New York being filled with hustle.  I dreamed of bullet-trains shooting us through tunnels in a faster way than ever before.  I didn’t dream about routinely worrying whether I was going to be stopped in between stations because of a “signal malfunction.”

What really makes things worse is the fact that the fare keeps seemingly exponentially getting higher.  In the seventies, the subway cost thirty-five cents. In the eighties, it was a dollar.  It is now $2.25.  If you can’t count on being anywhere on time (or without over-estimating your travel time) it still offers a dollar ride in value.  I swear something crooked is happening. 

Maybe it is that the tracks are old.  Maybe they are really working on everything.  But as a rider it gets extremely frustrating.  Maybe it is due to increased rider-ship.  Maybe due to a larger population there have to be more trains than before, thus clogging up the system.  These are all valid possibilities. 

Someday, I would like to get anywhere around the five boroughs in under an hour, door-to-door.  I don’t know if it will ever happen, but a rider can dream.  I know more express trains are reportedly on their way.  I’ll believe it when I see it!

It would also be nice to be able to travel on the weekends without being re-routed a dozen times, thus creating more delays and frustration. 

Of course, as angry as it makes me, New York probably has the best public transportation system in the country.  I still wish it was better.  

“The Escalator” – Short Fiction by Allan Raible

George Schneider was a hard-working man.  He had a corporate job with an ad agency.  It was nothing fancy.  He was mainly a copy-writer.  In his thirty-eight years, he hadn’t amounted to much.  In fact, the actual copy was being written by the newly-hired twenty-somethings.  George was merely a glorified proof-reader, cleaning up syntax and phrasing to make sure that little Johnny Suburban really believed that that cologne might make him score.  Yes… George was going nowhere.   The promises of tomorrow had never come to fruition. 

He was loved, though.  He had a wife, Stephanie and two daughters, Willa and Taft.  They had a nice house in the suburbs of New Jersey.  Stephanie was from money and so in spite of George’s lack of career propulsion, they could afford a good life. 

On one particular Wednesday afternoon, George was heading out of his office building.  As he boarded the escalator, a chill hit him.  Something strange was about to happen.  And so he held onto the railing as tightly as he could.  Just then, the railing stopped moving, but the escalator itself continued its trajectory downward.  George could feel the veins in his eyes beginning to burst as he tried to regain his composure.  He was fifteen steps up.  The fall would be messy and there was a clean, hard layer of greenish grey marble awaiting his soon clattering body.  He summoned all his might to keep himself upright, but as he moved his feet back and forth, he caught an edge of his left shoelace with his right foot.  It would soon be over.

Screams echoed through the hollow halls.  It was a horror like no one had ever seen.  Wasn’t a man in a Brooks Brothers suit being catapulted across a lobby a routine sight?  George was completely aware of his fate.  As he flew, he took a few milliseconds to remember his childhood, remember his first date with Stephanie and remember the short, but treasured time he had raising Willa and Taft.  As he was beginning to feel the air envelop his body, everything went dark and the last sound he heard was his wounded skeleton being served to the marble. 

As it hit George that he was in fact dead, he suddenly got alert again.  He opened his eyes to find he had actually dozed off in a business meeting.  Considering this a new lease on life, George vowed he was going to change his reality.  He walked into his boss’ office and asked for more responsibility and a raise.  He was not going to have the escalator be a metaphor for his aimless career. 

Upon said requests, George was told to pack up his things and leave.   And so, that’s how George discovered that in a round-about way he could in fact predict the future.  

He now works children’s parties as an (assistant) clown.  It’s quite sad, really.  But his family still loves him.  So, that’s good!