Proposal to fix NYC’s subway and broader transit system expected to cost $19B
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
For instance, modern/improved signaling and train control technology will allow you to run rolling stock at greater speeds with more frequency, requiring less on-track maintenance. In other systems, undergoing recent upgrades (for example) you can run a train every 3 minutes as opposed to 6. As a commuter knowing you only have to wait a max (n)minutes as opposed to max 2(n) can be the difference between deciding to take a train or using some other means of transport, especially if you can shave a few minutes off your commute as well.
It gives the operators much more control over how they design services and run their business. It's a key enabler.
Agreed. In my mind, the most important step to make is to increase frequency to the point where passengers think of trains in terms of frequency of arrivals, not by a specific timetable.
At longer wait times, you plan around getting to the station early, hoping the train isn't late, hoping it's not too overcrowded, etc., each of which is a mental barrier to taking the train.
At shorter wait times, all of these concerns disappear because "oh well, there's another one in 3 minutes".
If I have to leave home 15–20 minutes earlier just because it is _very_ likely that the train gets stuck in a tunnel due to signal malfunctions, or crawls from one stop to the next, I might as well use alternative means (i.e., a car).
Every major city hires economists, often from universities, to do cost/benefit analysis of major capital projects. To say the focus is always on cost is nonsense. I've had to do cost-benefit analysis work before on earmarks. One of my professors did cost/benefit in Nashville for bringing the Titans to town in the late 90s. He recommended against it, in fact I think most economists on the board did...but they ignored it because cost is more often ignored or understated (by politicians,) contrary to your post. Look at the "big dig" in Boston for instance, or the California high speed rail, both exploded over 5x their expected budget.
Those are just examples, there are many others. I am willing to bet this number is a low ball, especially when contractors, regulators, etc get involved.
I think this is what he's getting at.
To be clear I was referring to how the greater public are informed on such matters by the media / politicians.
I'm well aware of the projects you mention. I'm a consultant on capital program / project governance but not sure I understand the relevance, I wasn't really talking about the validity of estimates at any stage, just the focus on them.
If you're interested in how we can avoid this happening, I can't talk to the US, but in other jurisdictions governments and authorities (and some private sector giants) are slowly adopting more mature governance approaches. Implementing a Benefits Realization methodology [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benefits_realisation_managemen...] in their Portfolio for instance, Alliance contracting procurement models and Integrated Project Delivery to more fairly apportion risk and accountability. I'm cautiously optimistic.
When originally approved in 2008 the estimate was $40 billion.[1] The 2018 estimate for both phases is, I think, roughly $100 - $120 billion (low and high).[2] That's 2.5x - 3x.[3] These numbers are actually in line with opposition figures[4], and for other reasons it's reasonable to expect these are solid upper limits unless people continue to sabotage the project.
It's also worth pointing out that $120 billion is still significantly less than estimated costs for the alternative of expanding the highways and airports--$156-186 billion.[5] Note that those alternative costs are likely optimistic like the original HSR costs, particularly airport expansion and urban highway expansion.
One of the biggest reasons for the cost inflation is the political opposition. Some of the construction contracts have actually come in significantly under budget.[6] The real killer so far is land acquisition.[7] The authority is effectively trying to bribe farmers with huge payouts (clearly beyond market prices) in order to mitigate political pressure in Sacramento. All the political and legal fighting causes expensive delays. (Time is very costly in construction because there are fixed costs in keeping labor and equipment mobilized, plus huge costs in having to re-orchestrate schedules. Lots of interdependent moving parts.) But political pressure wouldn't be so strong if discourse was more honest and less tribal.
The opposition is creating a self-fulfilling prophecy, particularly with the hyperbole and sabotage. By all means fight for transparency, but civic responsibility means we all need to check ourselves.
[1] https://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/California_Propositio...
[2] https://sf.curbed.com/2018/1/29/16946576/san-jose-mercury-hi... and http://www.hsr.ca.gov/docs/about/business_plans/Draft_2018_B...
[3] I think both numbers are year-of-expenditure, which means each sub-project is separately inflation adjusted to the midpoint year of scheduled construction.
[4] https://reason.org/wp-content/uploads/files/california_high_...
[5] http://www.hsr.ca.gov/docs/about/business_plans/BPlan_2012Co...
[6] http://www.cahsrblog.com/2013/04/chsra-selects-tutor-perini-...
[7] https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/01/17/worst-case-scenario-h...
That's only 20 trains per hour. London's Victoria Line now runs at up to 36 trains per hour, a train every 100 seconds.
(Something I think about while waiting 20 minutes for a BaRT on a weekend.)
These scheduled service levels tend not to pan out because of dwell times causing trains to get stuck in stations. CBTC helps mitigate this by allowing trains to run much closer, so the dwell time in stations is less of a limiting factor, and the busier frequency also allows platform overcrowding to be less severe.
The 4/5 actually seems to achieve 3-minute spacing consistently, though.
The major issue is that all the merging and interlining of services introduces many conflict points; most subway systems try to limit the branching of services on any given track pair, and very few have reverse-branching, the combination of branches into trunks in the outer parts of the system (like the E/F, the 2/5, the A/B/C/D, the B/Q, the D/N, etc.)
The Lexington Line actually ran 30TPH at one point between the 4/5, but this has decreased because overcrowding has gotten so severe that it is now holding up trains as people struggle to enter and exit overcrowded cars. Prior to the opening of the Second Avenue Subway, the Lexington Avenue Line carried more than the transit systems of San Francisco, Chicago, and Boston combined. http://web.mta.info/capital/sas_docs/feis.htm
And have thinking about pushing it even further for quite a while now.
https://www.londonreconnections.com/2017/ninety-second-railw...
The reason the focus is on cost is that New York transit has a long history of spending far more than it needs to, due to rampant corruption[0].
If you look at this like an investment, then you also need to do the same sort of due diligence you would with any other investment, including asking why the costs are outrageously out of proportion with what they should be.
[0] https://nytimes.com/2017/12/28/nyregion/new-york-subway-cons...
Do a search on "new york city political corruption" to see a selection of the scandals.
Did you know that the NYC subways were originally built and run by two private companies that competed with each other? Did you know that the city froze their rates for two decades then took them over when they were no longer making desired improvements (wonder why)?
Even if a subway wouldn’t be profitable to a private company, it can still be “profitable” to the government if it encourages more population and more businesses paying more in taxes. It doesn’t have to be profitable based solely on ticket prices.
There used to be a lot of private sector public transit in NYC. Today there is none. That was not an inevitability!
Many cities around the world have extensive private sector public transit. E.g., Buenos Aires has privately-run public transit buses with amazing coverage of the city and surroundings. NYC's bus system is garbage by comparison to Buenos Aires'. The difference is that NYC's bus system is run by the city, while Buenos Aires' is run by private companies.
(It's always interesting to see what parts of the economy get socialized in different countries/cities. The public transit system was the easiest part of the private sector to socialize in the U.S., so that's what got socialized early. Elsewhere (e.g., in the UK) it was trains, telcos, medicine, etc. This allows us to compare results. It's never pretty, what results from socialization.)
Public transit in the U.S., and in NYC in particular, was very much a private sector function way back when. It seems unbelievable today that the private sector could build subways, but why should it be unbelievable? $19B is a lot of money for NYC, but it's a pittance compared to the capitalization of Apple or Amazon, or Elon Musk's ventures -- if only the private sector could do it, it absolutely would build a better transit system.
But the lesson has been learned: if you build something that cannot be moved, you will be highly vulnerable to takeover by the state.
Recall that the Baltimore Colts left the city in a hurry right before the governor of Maryland signed a bill appropriating the team...
You can't take a subway system with you should the city decide they want to own it instead of you, and you'll never be compensated the true value of the system you built no matter what the applicable Constitution(s) says.
Even if the private sector were now invited to invest in NYC public transit, without an ironclad guarantee that they won't get taken to the cleaners later, why should they?
But the point stands: if they were allowed to and not threatened with eventual state takeover, the private sector bloody well would invest in public transit, and it would do a far, far superior job by comparison to the state. We know that the private sector has, does, and will invest in public transit when they are allowed to and in locations where they reasonably believe their property will not be taken by the state.
If you wonder why Buenos Aires doesn't have a private sector subway system, the answer is obvious: the capital investment required for that is so much higher than for a bus system, that a private owner would stand to lose a lot more from a state takeover of their subway line than of their bus line, therefore no sane investor would invest in Bs.As.' subways. The same applies to NYC, except that in NYC the private sector is not allowed to run buses either...
You seem to have accepted the liberal mantra that some massive projects can only be run by the state. This is very, very wrong. How much evidence do we need before you and everyone else figure this out? Why would one believe that SpaceX is viable as a private company but subways are not? Elon Musk absolutely does not think this way. Yes, yes, Musk sure likes public subsidies, but I don't believe they are necessary for his ventures, and would much prefer that he not rely on them in any case, but even with subsidies his model is far superior to the state running those ventures outright.
Aaaannd we’re done here.
Actually, in Argentina the use of long distance rail for mass passenger transit is increasing for the first time in years after the systems were nationalized.
Feel free to disregard what I've written if I, too, have accepted the liberal mantra. Issuing such a diagnosis poisons the discussion into an argument unnecessarily and suggests you're chanting a mantra of your own. Some of your examples are wildly picked and distant from the subject at hand, or downright confusing: What nationalized "telcos" in the UK are we comparing notes with? Can we use the highly regulated Korean ISP market as a substitute? Does it really support this point to crow that the US healthcare system is superior to socialized alternatives in European countries?
My use of "liberal mantra" as to one specific idea, is not an ad hominem, nor does it mean that I'm not a liberal, for example, or that I don't like liberals. It just means that that particular idea is typically championed by liberals (which I believe is true). I don't see what's offensive about that.
As to long distance rail, it's not public transit, but sure, let's discuss it. I've no idea what's going on in Argentina with long distance rail. One possibility is that the roads suck, so rail looks good by comparison -- I just wouldn't know. Long distance rail has a lot of competition (cars, planes) -- it doesn't look like a long-term winner to me, but if so, that would be true regardless of which sector is to invest in rail.
The UK nationalized the telephone system around the time of WWI, IIRC.
I did pick wildly: because I was illustrating that different countries/localities tend to make different choices as to what to socialize, and not much evidence is needed to see that this at least appears to be true. I listed some examples, but did not make an extensive study. I suspect local politics, and the ease or difficulty (socially, culturally, politically, practically) of taking over some industry or another are the main factors in the choice of what to socialize.
It really is astounding (to me) that in the U.S. it was public transit that was socialized -- everywhere you go in the U.S., the trains and buses are all state-run -- but much else was not socialized (e.g., healthcare). Telecommunications in the U.S. was -for a few decades- regulated to the point that it was not greatly different from being state-run, but healthcare, for example, was not, and neither was automobile manufacturing, and not even electric utilities (with few exceptions, such as the TVA). And it is astounding to me that Buenos Aires didn't socialize buses -- I don't know why, but perhaps it was because lots of nationalizations that happened in Argentina targeted foreign-owned businesses (always popular targets), while the bus operators must have been politically connected.
Also, I did not even remotely "crow that the US healthcare system is superior to socialized alternatives in European countries". I do think the private sector does better than the public sector at such things, but that doesn't mean that every instance of one sector doing some thing goes accordingly -- it's a generalization. Stop putting words in my writing. It seems that you feel attacked, but I don't know why -- maybe attacking an idea you hold is like attacking you? But it shouldn't be.
It was a fascinating few months of problem solving and troubleshooting. I have fond memories of sitting at a folding table on the 7th Ave platform during a cold week in January.
That said, I don't envy those still working on this project. There are so many problem -- old signaling hardware that breaks down frequently and has to be manufactured by the MTA because no one produces the parts anymore, slower train speeds, track fires, train malfunctions, passenger-related delays... the list goes on and on. I hope they're able work it all out because I really enjoyed riding and working on the subways, even if only for a couple of months.
1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMjSi0ftLjA
2 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-wideband
3 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications-based_train_con...
The current situation is what happens when you don't fund a replacement for several decades.
The New York subway system was built in spurts up to about the 1950s. This means that large sections of it, tens of miles long, become due for renewal at the same time. Contrast this to MTR, which opened short segments in several phases.
There was also a period stretching probably from 1930-1980 where maintenance on New York's subway was completely deferred. No maintenance or replacement was done for the signals at all. So a lot of what has been happening up until now is not only meant to replace stuff that is due for replacement, but stuff that has been overdue for replacement for decades. It takes a lot of time on a 24/7 railway's schedule to fix such a large backlog. And they usually only refresh the backlog with stuff that is both compatible with the entire existing fleet, which is thousands and thousands of train cars.
Coincidentally, since MTR was first developed in the '70s, those signals are due for replacement right about now. From what I have heard MTR is starting to have a much higher rate of failure than previously, which would make sense if the signals are getting old.
I'm a subway commuter, I really love the subway system, and my emotions want to invest in it. And we should plan big. I think the greater NYC area could double or triple in population as the world grows and be more stimulating and productive than it's ever been. I guess my honest question is whether the subways are a prerequisite for that outcome, or if more WeWorks, satellite offices, telecommuting and suburban financial centers are more sane.
There is much value in providing the means for citizens to enjoy the breadth of opportunities their city provides, rather than making it difficult for them to leave their immediate neighbourhood.
There's an economic advantage to this to. In London we recently (last year?) made parts of the underground 24/7. It's estimated that this is going to add £138m to the London economy annually [1].
Public transport investment is almost always hugely beneficial to the area in many different ways.
[1]https://tfl.gov.uk/info-for/media/press-releases/2017/august...
Widespread corruption drives up costs for all MTA projects. https://nytimes.com/2017/12/28/nyregion/new-york-subway-cons...
Why? Because, gee, it'd really be a shame if some of these buildings happened to fall down and go boom, on account of some kind of cave in... Wouldn't want that to happen, would we?
That means we gotta go real slow, and be real careful, but hey, if you think youse can do it faster, hey why not grab a shovel and help us dig some of these ditches. They ain't gonna dig themselves, is they?
Oh, oh, sorry, I didn't realize you was wearing your expensive clothes on account ah some kinda hot date tonight! By all means! Don't let us holds youse up!
We'll just goes back down into the catacombs and dig another dungeon for ya. No problem, boss!
Figure that with your belief that NYC could handle more, let's say 2.5 times that, to get 20 million riders of the system.
$100 billion / 20 million riders = $5000 in capital expense to upgrade the system. That's a lot of riders going on a lot of subway rides to recoup that!
Without the subway New York would, quite literally, be unlivable. The following scenes were from the traffic pandemonium that resulted after Hurricane Sandy closed all subway crossings of the East River:
Waiting in line for a replacement bus shuttle - https://i.pinimg.com/originals/02/35/9c/02359cce293b989333b2...
Traffic while the subway was down - https://cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/121031090241-18-sandy...
But somehow the money has to be paid back, or else there has to be a consensus that "we won't get the money back directly but it is a good thing to do for NYC" with NYC taxpayers then picking up the slack.
NYC subway stats, 2016
5,655,755 (weekdays, 2016) 3,202,388 (Saturdays, 2016) 2,555,814 (Sundays, 2016)
Stats include ALL riders including tourists and commuters etc.
This when NYC population is ~8.5 million in 2016.
Note that the $5000/head is just for the additional capital expenses.
Your math doesn't cover all the other expenses the subway system would incur, like wages, power, maintenance over the estimated 2.5 year period you mention.
Not much of a shocker there. That’s a true apples to oranges.
It is true that corruption has resulted in exorbitant cost over runs by the MTA but I think this is a silly comparison.
https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/insurance/cheapest-car-insur...
But that number is only valid if the project delivers. Big if.
They are literally correcting for the fact that young driver's drive cheaper cars less distance. It's definitely true in the US that car insurance is more expensive for younger drivers when all other aspects are held fixed.
For smaller costs a good one is submarines: about $2.4 billion.
I did the math once and the war in Iraq directly cost about the replacement value of the nyc subway but can’t recall the figures well.
But military devices seem like things whose value is very unintuitive. (I've made similar criticism of people who say "oh, $6B? That's just three B2 bombers.") Obviously, we have no real conception of how complicated and expensive such devices are to build. But more importantly, few of us have a good grasp of the value to world stability delivered by rarely-used weapons that play a mostly deterrent role.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/05/03/letter-bay-bridge-cos...
I think we're many years and a couple trillion in infrastructure retooling from this reality. But when my infant daughter is my age, I think this is what NYC will be like, assuming society as we know it keeps progressing, while diffusing the many potential catastrophes we've set up for ourselves.
I find it strange that you mention Smart Fortwo, which is not particularly small when one compares it to VW Golf for example. Toyota IQ would be better example, it's not much bigger than Fortwo, but has four seats.
Imagine removing street-side parking. Not all at once. First on some key streets, then every 5 or so streets, and so on. Eventually, perhaps a couple of decades from now, there could be no daytime street-side parking (autonomous vehicles "sleeping" in the erstwhile parking spots at night).
On many streets in NYC removing street-side parking will triple bandwidth. This could be piloted now, though without autonomous vehicles. And perhaps some such streets could be limited to access by buses, taxis, and limousines (uber, lyft, ...).
Of course, selling this to voters will be impossible for a while yet. Once we get autonomous cars though, this concept will become very tempting.
Cars are extremely convenient and comfortable, but an extremely space inefficient way of moving large numbers of people. Even with autonomous vehicles, you still have hard limits on how many vehicles per hour you can physically move through any point.
I just got back from Tokyo. What an incredible network of trains/subways. I know every city has its own challenges but if there are any questions, ask the Japanese because they seem to have figured it all out. Moving 10 million people a day in Tokyo is a testament to their know-how.
If you're looking to build something at the same scale of Tokyo (in terms of KMs of track, and daily ridership) I think you need to do better. The system feels like it's bursting at the seams.
On a smaller scale, Taipei's subway is pretty damn impressive. Hong Kong's octopus and airport express are still gold standards in payment and airport link. Finally, in many way's Shanghai takes the cake, in large part because of how it went from nothing to this massive system (largest by distance, I believe), in a relatively short time. I believe Shanghai has roughly the same daily ridership as Tokyo and, although it's also insane at peak hour, it's better than the worst of the Yamanote line.
It's hard to make the case that an absurdly busy transit system is the sign of a transit system that needs improvement. The stations can be confusing at first (especially to a foreigner), but part of that is that the stations are huge... though after a few trips it's much more navigable.
The thing that I like best about the Tokyo transit system (and Japanese transit in general) is that it's so punctual and reliable. In the USA (SF Bay Area) I need to take a train scheduled to reach my destination at least 30 minutes before I need to be there to account for inevitable delays. And in the off hours, trains may only run every 30 or 60 minutes, meaning that I might be padding my schedule up to 90 minutes to make sure I get there on time. While in Tokyo, trains arrive almost to the second of their scheduled time.
What about NYC makes it the perfect location?
Can’t do that when the population is spread out. (Or the workplaces, but IDK if that happens).
Much like how a grad student was supposedly tasked with doing image recognition over a weekend, and 30 years and billions later it only mostly works.
Andy Byford, who made a name for himself running transport systems in London, Sydney and Toronto, is now in charge of turning around New York's Subway.
Still - that doesn't mean he'll do a bad job. He has worked his way up and spent his whole life working in public transport. And some fresh outside thinking might be what the MTA needs.
It's not New York Subway, but it's already a large sprawling system just for those two stations. In one way it's more complicated than the New York Subway - St Pancras station needs immigration and customs control because it's effectively a border with France. This is definitely a management job, taking personal control over everything, as a station master might, just isn't possible.
There are less than 1,000 trains in the entire system and their movements are highly constrained. A WiFi based system could both easily communicate with and locate (WPS) each train. Modeling the entire system in real-time seems doable. Lastly there would need a UI for the driver (or eliminate the driver completely) and various hardware interconnections.
The core of the system would appear to be a WiFi network, servers, tables and custom interconnects to train controls, trip stops, switches, etc. Sure it has to be incredibly reliable but $19 billion?!
Seems like a great business opportunity.
Firstly, no, WiFi is not going to work. WiFi runs in the junk bands like Bluetooth does. It's designed to run in unregulated spectrum, not be reliable, which is why WiFi is a synonym for "why does my internet not work today". Just think of interference from the riders phones, for example.
You also need to know the location of the trains to a much higher degree of accuracy than what WiFi would allow. The trains use transponders on the track that antennae pass over. It's closer to NFC than WiFi. When the train knows where it is, it can communicate that info to the control rooms but trains spend a lot of time inside tunnels which are not exactly famous for their excellent radio propagation properties. There's a lot of testing and planning work required to figure out where to install antennas and cable uplinks. Remember that track maintenance hours are severely constrained on any live transit system so reducing the amount of equipment to install is important.
Then you have redundancy. When your home wifi router goes on the fritz it's annoying but not that big a deal. If a part of the train monitoring network goes black, done naively that would shut down an entire line, which is catastrophic. So you want redundancy, you want spare parts inventories, you need to train staff how to do the replacements etc. Every train needs to be brought back to shop and refitted, usually using custom equipment and designs because trains are not standardised across the world.
That's just the hardware.
The software needs to be developed and tested too. Again, no standardisation in how transit systems work, so each deployment is a custom job requiring the engineers to have a good understanding of each railway with all its quirks and complexities, especially in exotic signalling and switching arrangements.
Still, in the end, $19 billion is too much. The NY premium.
I've toyed with the idea of doing a popular subway improvement project where we'd make battery-powered devices (arduino, rpi, whatever -- the biggest cost irl would be labor) to plant on subway cars and stations for tracking trains. A proof of concept could be done with just a few tens of such devices. They'd use the subway wifi to transmit train locations.
Of course, there are complications. There's no such thing as a head train car -- these things get mixed and matched. So ensuring that every train has such a device might mean ensuring that every car has one or that every train gets a car that has one, and this seems difficult. But even so, this could cost just in the millions done right.
For an informational system (i.e. telling passengers how long trains are away or for statistics gathering), sure. You could absolutely do that like you say. But as soon as it involves controlling the train or anything to do with signalling, it just can't be done like that.
From what I understand, the L train is one of few that has the necessary upgrades, primarily because it doesn't really intersect with other lines, which makes it a lot easier to deploy. If I recall, the L functions with only one conductor when the other lines use two. I agree that the union could be more progressive and embrace change... but the big problem is money, and consequently, state politics.
Most importantly, most of the lines are using signaling systems installed decades before computerized signaling existed so currently operating them without people is impossible. Much of the current system is so outdated that even the human dispatchers don't know the precise position of any given train without radio contact with the onboard crew. The upgrade project that the article in the link talks about would move towards enabling this at a technical level.
Secondly, because the trains _have_ had human drivers and conductors for a century, the union representing them is extremely powerful and there are many political considerations that go into getting humanless train operation. A newer system, which was built fully-automated and never had a motorman or conductor's union in the first place, has it much easier in that regard. Its a classic legacy problem, building anew doesn't involve any of the hassles of upgrading an old system.
(None of these problems are unsolvable, and all the fixes are waaaayyy overdue... but these are the cards we're playing with here in NY. There are a ton of entrenched interests and a few decades of technical debt to pay back.)