A New Separation of Powers

William Neuman's article from today's New York Times announced New York City Transit's intention to start delegating some supervisory powers to relatively autonomous authorities for two of the city's twenty-four major subway lines. The 7 and L trains, which do not share their track with any other lines and do not have any spur lines of their own, will serve as pilot programs for this new experiment in the MTA's organizational structure. The 7 and L have served as guinea pigs before: the 7 is still the only line running 11-car trains, and the L is the first line to benefit from systems for One-Person Train Operation, Communications-Based Train Control, and improved in-station communications displaying train arrival times and other useful information.

Pros: It may be quite possible to be in a station on the L and, if you see something especially hideous--like a radioactive mutant rat or a recent NYU graduate trying to find cheaper real estate in the trendier parts of Brooklyn--you would have the option of knocking on the station manager's door, telling him or her about it, and then watch them eliminate your nuisance before the train arrives. This is of course under the best possible circumstances, but the fact of the matter is that station condition issues that used to have to trickle through the entire MTA before getting into the hands of City Transit's station maintenance staff will now be handled by much smaller and ideally more efficient authorities.

Cons: It is the intention of City Transit President Howard Roberts, Jr. to eventually group all lines into semi-autonomous railroads. This seems like a regression back to the days of the IRT, BMT and IND networks competing against one another for the same riders, all ultimately failing financially before being lumped into the first direct forerunner of the MTA in 1940. Somehow, I feel that too much division within the lines would work to undo some of the progress made in the last 67 years (much of which has come in the last 20 when ridership started to surge). However, if Roberts and MTA CEO Lee Sander get what they want out of this--increased efficiency and better Route Report Cards--New York may stand as a model for a multi-level transit network for other cities or regions to follow.