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That's really silly and a sign of how overblown this story has become (in some contexts). You would have been fine. When a system like the NYC Subway gets 20% w
by dionidium 8y ago
That's really silly and a sign of how overblown this story has become (in some contexts). You would have been fine. When a system like the NYC Subway gets 20% worse for everyday commuters, that's a really big deal and something those commuters are going to talk about a lot. But a NYC Subway that's 20% worse than it was 10 years ago is still a massive, complex, incredible, useful machine, no matter how much New Yorkers complain about it.
And, so, should they complain? Yeah! There's nothing wrong with expecting more from the MTA. But these stories are generating comments like yours here and that's absurd.
- ricardoreis 8y agoA NYC Subway that's 20% worse than it was 10 years ago By what metric?
- BorgHunter 8y agoOn-time performance has dropped dramatically in the past ten years. In the following article, look for the graph titled, "On-time performance by line, 2007 to 2017". https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/28/nyregion/subway-delays-overcrowding.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/28/nyregion/subw...
- ricardoreis 8y agoThanks very much for the link. But eyeballing that chart suggests an average deterioration significantly worse than 20 percent.
- dionidium 8y agoDelays, primarily. Overcrowding, secondarily.
- ricardoreis 8y agoNumbers, please. (That's what "metric" means, btw).
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- throwaway427 8y agoNumbers may not tell the whole story, obviously: https://outline.com/KLsxf3 https://outline.com/KLsxf3
- dionidium 8y agoYes, and it shouldn't take more than a couple minutes of thinking about the issues to realize that most of the commentary on the topic makes very little sense. Experiential measurements aren't so easily calculated, I'd say. Just a few examples: - Would you rather have a train that arrives one minute late every single day, for a 0% on-time record, or a train that arrives on time 3 out of every 5 times and then is 20 minutes late the other two? How many articles on the subway distinguish between the two types of lateness? It matters a lot. - You might read that Atlanta's MARTA, for example, has a better on-time performance record than the NYC Subway. Well, that's great, but it's also got rush-hour scheduled headways of 10 minutes, scheduled off-peak headways of 20 minutes or more, and no service entirely at many stations after 9PM (no trains run at all after 2AM). So something that's "late" in New York City still comes before the scheduled train in Atlanta (when the trains there come at all). [0] - The NYC Subway also has 10 times as many stations as MARTA and 17 times as many miles of track. They say the best camera is the one you have on you. Something like that applies here, too. What's the on-time record for a train that doesn't exist? MARTA is a random comparison, but it's not uncommon for writers of screeds about the subway to offer up comparisons to other systems devoid of any of the kind of context I provide above. So, you know: 1) comparisons are difficult; 2) especially if you want to capture what it's actually like to use transit in the cities you're comparing. All of which is to support my original contention that this story has been decontextualized by surly commuters and the idea that a tourist couldn't rely on the subway to get to a concert is nonsense. [0] https://www.itsmarta.com/railline-schedules.aspx https://www.itsmarta.com/railline-schedules.aspx
- majewsky 8y agoI know you're describing pathological examples to make your point, but: > Would you rather have a train that arrives one minute late every single day, for a 0% on-time record At this point, the operator should just update the schedule to reflect actual travel speed.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]