Help me here NYC can do major repairs without shuting down lines but DC and elsewhere have to shut down the entire system?

[daveklepper]

A close friend who has better connections with the actual Subway bosses than I have, proposed a different solution.  He favored keeping one tunnel open, like I do, but his reduced service It involved taking west of Union Square on 14th Street out of service, running a basic say every quarter hour service most of the time, but then fleeting only westbound trains during the morning rush with no eastbound service and doing the reverse in the evening rush.  The two trackis west of Unions Square (yes there is a sizzors crossover arangement a U. Sq.) would store the fleet during the mid-day for the evfening rush hour.   He was tole it was a workable plan but the quality of empoloyees would not be up to it.

I disagree with that last statement, and think his plan is not workable, because the rush hour is long enough that some trains do make two trips during the rush on the L, and so a car shortage would result.  And the problem of what replaces the 14th service itself remains, with 14th Street having very heavy traffic during rush hours and the M14 bus thus very slow.  The objection raised against his plan could be waged against mine, but I am ready with an answer, Specifically, time table accuracy and response to events depends primarily on the people at the model boards at the Command Center, and they had better well be qualified to use the signal and switch controls properly to implement my plan or the TA and the City have worse problems than Sandy!

[kgbw49]

Isn't WMATA the only transit agency run by the Federal Government?

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

kgbw49

Isn't WMATA the only transit agency run by the Federal Government?

 

 

That's more of a function of geography than politics since the District of Columbia is not part of any state.

[RME]

kgbw49

Isn't WMATA the only transit agency run by the Federal Government?

I didn't think it was.

http://www.wmata.com/about_metro/board_of_directors/ and other pages appear to indicate that the entity that runs it is separate from a United States Government agency (accountable to any branch of the Government directly, that is); the Feds even appoint only 1/3 of the directors.  In fact I had thought that one of the ongoing threats being made about the "safety" problems on the Metro was that some government agency or other was going to 'take over' and administer carefully-unspecified parts of the operation 'until safety was restored' (or the cows come home, or the double-toothpicks freeze over...)

I do not remember whether there is an equal Federal-level intervention being thought about for Atlanta, and I'm too lazy to go back and check posts here (which is where I got that hazy memory in the first place). 

Elsewhere there has, I think, been more than usual care to keep Federal control out of transit, to the extent where states form compacts to provide transit that might otherwise 'legitimately qualify' as interstate commerce (it certainly is more legitimate than the basis for concern with passengers in 'interstate commerce' that prompted the Heart of Atlanta opinions!)

[daveklepper]

Updating on my suggestions to NYCTA on the 14th Street tunnel reconstruction.   Received an informative critique, and on that basis have modified to suggest the C and not the E to Canarsie, with the E running to Euclid instead of the C.  Also, instead of dividng the truncated L into three parts, have three truncated "fleeted" L trains closely spaced every 15 minutes.  The big question is whether cab signals and ATC can be installed in time between W4 and East New York via the Williamsburg Bridge and the Broadway elevated.   Will see if anything good comes of my suggestions.