Rolando Pujol, a managing editor at amNewYork, has been a contributor to Tracker since its inception in February 2006. His areas of interest include New York City history as well as architecture and preservation. Before joining amNewYork, he was an assistant city editor at Newsday.
Marlene Naanes is the transportation reporter for amNewYork. She has also written for the South Florida Sun-Sentinel and Newsday, among other publications. Marlene takes the C line to the office and other trains, buses, pedicabs and taxis to report her stories. She can be contacted at mnaanes@am-ny.com.
On a recent F-train ride towards Brooklyn, I saw one man along with two kids entertaining the passengers with a tightly choreographed hip-hop dance routine.
I'm guessing one the kids was 10 and the other 5 of 6. They were incredibly acrobatic, doing flips and tumbles down the aisle.
But there was a scary moment when the older man pulled up the youngest kid to flip him over his head. The kid hit the ceiling with a loud thud, sparking a gasp from many passengers.
Amazingly, the kid shook it off like a paper cut and immediately did this really cool psuedo-somersault thing. I think I pulled a muscle just by watching it.
--Pete Catapano
Much of the reporting on the MTA board and committee meetings last week focused on the protracted labor dispute.
But one little noticed footnote was how the holiday bonus fares hurt the MTA’s bottom line more than expected. In November alone, the discounts — which started Thanksgiving Day — cost $7.5 million.
The MTA predicted it would lose only $5.4 million in November. December figures won’t be released until next month, but this indicates the controversial discounts hit the farebox hard.
Union leaders were dead set against the MTA spending its $1 billion surplus on holiday discounts without first giving raises to the workers.
And if the December and January figures likewise show the discounts to be more costly than predicted expect more howling from the union on what it calls the MTA’s misplaced priorities.
--Chuck Bennett
The MTA's Web site is not just for English readers any more. A new feature, provided by World Lingo, translates the entire site into a dozen different languages. (See flags at bottom of homepage).
The choices are; French, German, Italian, Porguguese, Japanese, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Greek, Korean, simplified Chinese and traditional Chinese.
Anyone for Swahili?
--Vera Haller
Was the post-strike transit contract doomed from the beginning?
That’s union president Roger Toussaint’s theory.
During an interview with WNBC’s Gabe Pressman broadcast Sunday, Toussaint said the contract never had a chance between the dissidents within his own union and Gov. Pataki’s opposition.
In fact, he implied MTA chairman Peter Kalikow was probably relieved that his own members rejected the contract.
"The voting down of this contract may have well been what the MTA intended and hoped for, rather than having the MTA board go through the embarrassing prospect of vetoing the contract," he said.
Pataki repeatedly blasted a "sweetener" in the rejected contract that would award as many as 20,000 union workers with pension refunds worth $135 million.
The seven board members appointed by Pataki were then in the uncomfortable position of either disobeying the governor and approving the contract or rejecting the contract their own chairman presented.
"What I’m saying is the MTA may well have wanted and intended for this result to occur, the contract being voted down," Toussaint said.
On Jan 20, the contract was rejected — by just seven votes out of 22,000 ballots — largely over new health insurance contributions.
-- Chuck Bennett
Roger Toussaint, the president of the Transport Workers Union Local 100, called a meeting of all 43 executive board members Tuesday at union headquarters.
The embattled union chief has to unify his own board before figuring out how to wrangle a new contract that his members will accept out of the MTA.
Meanwhile, the MTA is praying the Public Employment Relation Boards in Albany grants its request for binding arbitration. It is expected to announce its decision by Friday.
Adding to the drama, the so-called "dissidents" within the transit union who led the campaign to vote down the post-strike contract, are holding a town hall meeting of their own Thursday.
-- Chuck Bennett
What makes a '5' train a '5' train? Is it the route it travels, or the '5' displayed on its front car? I'd go with the former.
The '5,' after all, doesn't apply to the actual, physical train. (I'm guessing each car has its own serial number, though I confess I've never mustered the nerve to lie down on the track and check.)
The '5' applies to a path: snaking through Brooklyn, piercing Manhattan at its southern tip, then climbing up the east side before leaning right in the Bronx.
Why, then, does our transit system continue to confuse us (or at least me) by putting '5's where they don't belong? Every so often, a so-called '5' train comes rumbling through the west side of Manhattan on tracks reserved for the '1,' '2' and '3' (R.I.P. '9').
"The '5' train is running on the Seventh Avenue line," a garbled voice announces. I think what they're trying to say is this: The '2' isn't running, so this car will take a different route — the '5' route — in Brooklyn and the Bronx.
But I still say a '5' is not a '5' when it's on the Upper West Side. Why not change the number on that front car's digital screen to reflect the detour to the land of '2'? Then announce that this train is a '2' now, but will suffer an identity crisis and become a '5' at Grand Concourse.
When a '5' train leaves the east side, the '5' should stay behind, too.
-- David Abramowicz
Newsday subway columnist Ray Sanchez provided a fascinating look today at union prez Roger Toussaint's inner circle and his autocratic style of managing the union. Check it out.
-- Chuck Bennett
The test run of new swipeless "smart cards" on the Lexington line to one day replaced MetroCards is the big transit news of the day.
Just tapping a credit card or key chain will unlock the turnstile if all goes according to plan. And the technology is there to one day merge the smart cards with New Jersey Transit, PATH, Metro-North and the Long Island Rail Road.
"If it’s like a key chain, that would be cool," said Chris Ricketts, 31, a promoter for Sal's Comedy Hole in the West Village.
He complained that about once a month when swiping his unlimited MetroCard he erroneously gets the "Just used" message and unsympathetic station agents just tell him to wait the 10 or 15 minutes for the card to reset.
"I get pissed off being told to wait 15 minutes. I have places to go," he said.
Separately, in The Daily News, Pete Donohue reports on fisticuffs within the transit union during the tense weeks before its contract expired. What a bully, a 6’3" "burly" so-called dissident union allegedly roughed up a 5’5" 180 pound ally of union prez Roger Toussaint.
-- Chuck Bennett
AP and the Syracuse Post-Standard reports Bombardier Transportation is closing its factory in Auburn. While the company’s Plattsburgh facility will still make subway cars for New York City Transit, its not a good sign for the embattled Canadian company. About 160 people will lose their jobs.
The Auburn plant made “bogies” the undercarriage frames that were used in wheels, braking and propulsion systems.
-- Chuck Bennett
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