MNRR has published plans to improve service in future. Find this a slick release. One item is that traffic has more than double since its inception to 86M+ Passemgers. Would be interesting to compare population figures for the service areas. _
http://web.mta.info/mnr/pdf/WayAhead_vWeb1.pdf
I don't think that the population of the service area (which does not include New Jersey or Long Island) has doubled so the increase in ridership is impressive.
blue streak 1One item is that traffic has more than double since its inception to 86M+ Passemgers. Would be interesting to compare population figures for the service areas.
Or how many people will ride air-conditioned modern MUs instead of Ping-Pongs, rusty old duplex MUs, or the gamut of old commuter cars with rattan, fans, multicolored opaque windows and the like... when the alternative is hours in traffic and delays, lots of computerized tolls, and garage bills larger than Manhattan apartment rents used to be...
"Of course he pays more to park his car, his car is bigger than your apartment." With apologies to Jonathan Silverman (Weekend at Bernie')
CSSHEGEWISCH"Of course he pays more to park his car, his car is bigger than your apartment."
Even in the Eighties, it might be $100 or more extra to park a large car. More still if it had to be accessible during the day, or on less than a couple hours' notice.
That was one advantage of having staff-garage parking rights: you could park a Lincoln easily at any hour, a block off the East River Drive, and retrieve it for the 11-minute drive back to Englewood in the wee hours, where your cats would greet you on your heavily wooded 2 acres that cost you less than a measly 2-bedroom per month. I never quite understood the point of actually being foolish enough to rent in Manhattan, let alone "owning" a condo there. Now, I'll grant you that it would have been nice to have 10-minute-headway bus service to my neighborhood between 2am and 6am, when both NJT and Red and Tan did not run things (but I could leave for Princeton all the way to 4!) but during the day it was a block to the bus to 41st, and five to the bus to the GWB terminal.
Ah, the marks of a misspent youth...
Living in Manhattan has its advantages. Every necessity, groceries, taylor, laundry, bank, post office, is within walking distance. All the cultural and sports events you could want with convenient public transportation. Some of this free, like some concerts in churches and synagogues, high-quality amature theatre, and teen-ages at sports. Want a car for a excursion? Sensibly use public transportatiin to an airport and rent a car and return it there. I grew up on the West Side, half a block from Central Park West on W. 85th Street. At 17+, Sep. 1949, went off to Cambridge, MA to MIT, not to return to living in NYCity until May 1970. Then lived at the corner of E. 16th and 3rd until moving to Israel in July 1996, a neighborhood known as Grammercy. I don't regret my New York days at all, but am very glad that a combination of work and railfanning got me to spend more than a few days in many other parts of North America, all 48 contiguous states and most of the Canadian Provinces, including British Columbia, Nefoundland, and Prince Edward Island. I am sure I would have loved living Colorado, with its marvelous scenery and skiing, or in San Francisco, where every commute would have been a railfan excursion, and I don't in any way regret the more than three years total I spent in the Chicago area. Everyplace has its virtues and drawbacks.
One secret of successful living in Manhattan, I am convinced, is not to own a car.
I live a life similar to what you describe, Mr. Klepper. I live above a shoe store on a commercial street, Roncesvalles Avenue. Next door is a butcher, there are greengrocers a block away, drug stores, grocery stores, coffee shops, news stands, restaurants and bars. I own a car that I use mainly for work that takes me out of town or to bring my empties back to the beer store. In town I take the streetcar that stops across the street. I've never liked to live the life (and I have) where every human need except breathing involves burning gasoline. Yes, there are advantages.
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