Unsuck DC Metro: Reliability: NYC vs. DC

Thursday, September 13, 2012

Reliability: NYC vs. DC

I thought people would have gotten a little more ticked off after Ron's excellent post showed Metro is missing its fleet reliability goals by a whopping third.

A third! Where's the commercial media on this? Come on guys!

Perhaps some perspective will show just how poorly Metro performs.

As of April:

New York subway's "mean distance between (railcar) failures": 168,209 miles; #wmata's 40, 275 miles
— Unsuck DC Metro (@unsuckdcmetro) September 13, 2012

March:

In March 2012, the New York City subway's newest cars went almost a million miles between failures: bit.ly/TMdFt3 #MTA #NYCT #WMATA
— Kurt Raschke (@kurtraschke) September 13, 2012

The mean distance between failures for #MTA #NYCT's newest cars (the R160s) is 13 times the MDBF of #WMATA's newest cars (the 6000 series)
— Kurt Raschke (@kurtraschke) September 13, 2012

Ugh

New York subway fare: $2.25; #wmata's average fare: between $2.75 and $3 yet New York's trains are 4 times more reliable.
— Unsuck DC Metro (@unsuckdcmetro) September 13, 2012

Other items:
NoVa to study transit options on Rt. 7 (Examiner)

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+3 Vote up Vote down

Knows Metro · 654 weeks ago

I know one reason. CMNT folks increasingly populated by unskilled, non English speakers because Metro can't attracted qualified people any more.

2 replies · active 654 weeks ago

+27 Vote up Vote down

Daily Rider · 654 weeks ago

Probably couldn't happen this way, but I would not care if they only spoke an ancient dialect of Flemish if they fixed the cars right.

-9 Vote up Vote down

DSteller · 654 weeks ago

you must be a republican

+16 Vote up Vote down

Anony · 654 weeks ago

And before anybody claims that DC fares aren't comparable because of the distances, remember NYC is a huge city (essentially 5 counties). The distance from Vienna to Metro Center is comparable to the distance from other the outer reaches of MTA to Penn Station.

+14 Vote up Vote down

BradK · 654 weeks ago

For us riders, its not that we're less ticked off, it's that there seems to be no reason to re-state the obvious.

WMATA is a joke, it's not even a jobs program. The agency has no oversight with any teeth, and it shows.
One of my favorite blogs was http://washington-dc-metro.com/documents/ even this blogger, who was ademently passionate in making the system better has given up (or has gotten fired).

Unsuck, you are doing a great job, I think we are all just getting a little too discouraged. Hopefully the September traffic will spice the life back in to the crowd.

+9 Vote up Vote down

John S. · 654 weeks ago

You can ride from the north Bronx to the Battery in NYC for one price and they *still* manage a vastly better maintenance record than WMATA.

+11 Vote up Vote down

jackie jeter · 654 weeks ago

Knows Metro,

That was a racist comment! You must hate minorites and folks who are not white. We have the right to get higher pay with lower skills becuase of years of racism!

Apparently, you believe in slavery!

2 replies · active 654 weeks ago

-14 Vote up Vote down

jason · 654 weeks ago

stfu

+9 Vote up Vote down

finch2012 84p · 654 weeks ago

Pretty sure this is the latest in a long line of sarcastic posts by one or more people pretending to be Jackie Jeter (which never fail to get a chuckle out of me).

+9 Vote up Vote down

Brian · 654 weeks ago

Unless you can get rid of the unions and get Congress to stop funding Metro, it really doesn't matter. What incentive does Metro have to stop doing business the way they are currently doing it? There are a bunch of unqualified people getting paid a boatload of money to keep the status quo and no one is pulling the plug on the money, so why change? We can keep complaining on blogs like these and get minimal exposure on news outlets every now and then, but again, Metro still gets their money, so there is absolutely no incentive to stop what they are doing. The absolute only way to force change is to stop riding, which won't be done.

Its so frustrating that literally 10 people on this blog could probably turn Metro around in a year (if we didn't have do deal with the Mafia/Union that strangles this country in every sector there is these days, thanks unions, your job was done about 50 years ago). I would love to see what would happen if the Union just stepped aside for a year....lets discuss that point one day!

4 replies · active 654 weeks ago

+9 Vote up Vote down

Daily Rider · 654 weeks ago

You do realize that the workers in other systems, which are said to far outperform Metro, are unionized also?

It appears that a major problem is that a committment to skill and excellence is generally lacking in manangement. This attitude rolls downhill, and manangement then does not foster good performance in the front-line workers.

+5 Vote up Vote down

Brian · 654 weeks ago

You do realize that unions were the reason the auto industry imploded, the federal government languishes to get anything done, and metro has to pay bus drivers 6 figures, correct? When your hands are tied to implement change at the lower levels because you can't fire anyone at the lower levels because of the union protection, what can you do to foster good performance at the front-lines when there is no incentive to do so? If there is no fear of losing your job and you are accustom to skating by, who implements the change? Not trying to argue here DR, and I will leave it at that, my point is these types of unions exist for only one reason, and it certainly isn't for the advancement of workers rights....it is for keeping the status quo. Jackie Jeter can certainly attest to that.

0 Vote up Vote down

Daily Rider · 654 weeks ago

The management at the auto companies did not have to give in to all of the union demands in past contracts, but chose to do so rather than take strikes.

Union workers can be fired, and it will stick. it has to be done according to the terms in the contract, however.

Metro does not have to agree to continue to count overtime in pension calculations, but management does not choose to stand firm on that point when negotiating contracts.

Metro operators who make six figures do so becuase of the amount of overtime hours they work. Straight time pay does not approach six figures. Management decides how much overtime work is going to be available.

+4 Vote up Vote down

@WMATARage · 654 weeks ago

I don't think denying WMATA funding is going to procure new trains or upgrade the power systems or fix the offload/door problems. As Daily Rider says, it's on management AND workers, but with no actual oversight whatsoever for the entire agency, we're all on our own.

+15 Vote up Vote down

Metro is awful · 654 weeks ago

I love the comparisons to NYC subway, great post.

It's amazing how much cheaper and more reliable the system is there. On my last trip to NYC a month or two ago, I was waiting for a train on a saturday in brooklyn. The train was coming in about 9 minutes and the new yorkers couldn't believe it.. "9 WHOLE minutes? There must be something seriously wrong." I thought, you can end up waiting 9 minutes in DC during rush hour and we're paying so much more. I would much rather have a dirtier system that just ran fairly consistently.

What about the cars, too? The cars there are so much better, they're more open, seating is more comfortable, and you don't have to get up all the time to let people out. WMATA is terrible.

Thanks for keeping up the fight.

1 reply · active 654 weeks ago

+1 Vote up Vote down

Guest · 654 weeks ago

The NYC subway tunnels have much better C*H*U*Ds living in them than the Metro tunnels here.

+18 Vote up Vote down

Neenya · 654 weeks ago

I moved to New York from DC right before the start of Rush Plus (and as a former blue line rider, could not be more grateful for that timing). I've posted on here before about this, but it bares repeating:

I now commute out of Grand Central on the downtown 4/5. An express train comes very two minutes, everyone crams with as many people in each car as possible, and after a certain point, people stop because they know the next train is coming. People are also willing to go to the middle of the car, because the doors stay open long enough so that everyone can get off at their destination. For my first week back, I was the obnoxious idiot cramming myself on to far too crowded trains, refusing to move from the doors, and shoving my way out as quickly as possible. That's how WMATA had conditioned me to ride the subway - or else you end up stranded while you wait 12 minutes with a million people for the next train or caught in the doors.

According to Google Maps, my subway commute in New York is 4.8 miles and should take 22 minutes. I leave my apartment half an hour before I have to be at work and have yet to be late because of transport troubles. My commute in DC (Crystal City to Foggy Bottom) was 4.6 miles. According to the WMATA website it should take 11 minutes. I routinely left my apartment an hour before I had to be there, had a shorter walk to the Metro, and that was pre-Rush Plus, so... that has never once been even close to true.

I also have an unlimited monthly pass that cost me $104. If I only used it to go to work, it would be $2.60 per trip, which is more than the current $2.40 on WMATA. Unlike DC, however, I actually use the subway on the weekends and not only when strictly necessary, so I'm sure it averages out in the end. (It is such a small but delightful pleasure to be able to stop on my way home to get dinner without paying an extra fare or wondering if it's worth it because I might encounter a delay)

As for the cleanliness issue, the cars in New York are absolutely, no question cleaner. The New York stations are grimier, but the WMATA ones are so dark that I'm not really sure how much credit I should give there... what would they look like if the lights were on?

I will give WMATA the fact that MTA has express tracks, which makes avoiding delays, performing maintenance, and fixing problems while keeping the system open much easier. But, to put that in perspective, MTA is working with 656 miles of track to WMATA's 106.3 and 468 stations to WMATA's 86.

1 reply · active 654 weeks ago

+1 Vote up Vote down

NYC Native · 654 weeks ago

To see the NYC counterpart to Unsuck, go to: http://secondavenuesagas.com/

+10 Vote up Vote down

Gooch · 654 weeks ago

But, But - the point of Metro isn't that it works - it's that it's prettier! It has countdown clocks! No rats! Escelators! Upholstery! It's quieter than NY!

If you've got all that, who needs reliability?

</sarcasm>

In all seriousness, every time I travel around the NY metro area by public transit (grew up in NJ) it reminds me how much the entire setup sucks around here by comparison. There is a shorter headway on commuter trains from Secaucus to Penn Station at 10:30 in the morning than there is on the Redline at the same time.

Of course, forget about a commuter train at that hour from, say, Gaithersburg; it doesn't exist.

1 reply · active 654 weeks ago

+1 Vote up Vote down

Neenya · 654 weeks ago

The one thing I do miss are the countdown clocks - major NYC stations have them, but not all of them yet (my work station is without one). But I'm pretty sure the ones they have don't work right anyway... aren't the numbers supposed to go up, not down?

+21 Vote up Vote down

@ChrisHowdy · 654 weeks ago

We used to have "well at least Metro doesn't smell like pee" to fall back on, but that's not really even true anymore.

+4 Vote up Vote down

Tricky Dick · 654 weeks ago

One of the biggest issues metro faces is due to its shortsighted design, there is no third track. A third track at rush hour would do wonders and would help with maintenance as well. Instead of wasting money on the Silver Line, we should have been looking for a way to begin building third tracks at the end of the lines and moving them in toward the city. It would be an expensive and long process, especially inside DC, but can you imagine have a 3rd track from Vienna to Rosslyn at the very least? You'd be able to get around stuck vehicles, do routine maintenance during the day when it's less expensive (labor costs) and show a tangible goal to riders.

+7 Vote up Vote down

Ever n Anon · 654 weeks ago

Bet NYC trains don't smell like fish either...

0 Vote up Vote down

WRD · 653 weeks ago

Just curious how the following comments are consistent:

"CMNT folks increasingly populated by unskilled, non English speakers because Metro can't attracted qualified people any more" (Knows Metro)

And this:

Its so frustrating that literally 10 people on this blog could probably turn Metro around in a year (if we didn't have do deal with the Mafia/Union that strangles this country in every sector there is these days, thanks unions, your job was done about 50 years ago). I would love to see what would happen if the Union just stepped aside for a year.... (Brian)

Metro operators who make six figures do so becuase of the amount of overtime hours they work. Straight time pay does not approach six figures. Management decides how much overtime work is going to be available. (Daily Rider)

So....are workers overpaid or underpaid?

The fact is NYC has dedicated significantly greater financial resources to their subway via dedicated taxes. Further, NYC has density advantages that no other American city has. Ultimately, comparisons to NYC can be insightful and they can be misleading.