| Releases & Statements
New York City Public Advocate Betsy
Gotbaum released a report today revealing that a whopping 28.75
percent of MetroCard swipes at subway turnstiles fail to let the
customer through to the platform. At the worst-performing station,
the Rockaway Avenue stop along the C line in Ocean Hill/Brownsville,
Brooklyn, 54.50 percent of the 3.4 million swipes since 2003 failed
to let passengers through. Gotbaum unveiled the report, Stuck
at the Turnstile: Failed Swipes Slow Down Subway Riders, in Northern
Manhattan at the 116th Street “B” and “C”
Train station, which has one of the highest failure rates.
“This is yet another example
of the MTA's failure to provide its customers with adequate service.
Riders are forced to pay higher fares while facing a host of new
problems. The MTA must reduce these swipe failures,” said
Gotbaum. The data is based on all 2.5 billion Metrocard swipes
that were made since tokens were eliminated in June, 2003. In
all, approximately 688,000,000 swipes have failed.
In the worst-performing boroughs,
the Bronx and Brooklyn, almost a third of swipes fail. In Manhattan,
which has the largest subway ridership, more than a quarter of
all swipes fail. The turnstiles and stations with the highest
failure rates are mostly in New York City’s low-income neighborhoods,
including four stops along the B line: 167th Street in the Bronx,
Tremont Avenue in the Bronx, 135th Street in Manhattan, and 116th
Street in Manhattan. MetroCard swipes at each of these stops failed
between 43 and 45 percent of the time. Swipes at the Nostrand
Avenue #3 train stop and the Myrtle-Willoughby G train stop, both
in Brooklyn, failed nearly 46 percent of the time.
For the report, Gotbaum’s office
used data obtained from New York City Transit (NYCT), the MTA
subsidiary which oversees the subway system. The data quantified
all the failed and successful swipes. The MTA defines a failed
swipe as any swipe that does not produce a complete transaction;
however, as Gotbaum's report points out, the MTA fails to identify
reasons for these swipe failures.
The report also looked at swipe failures
at the subway stations where the MTA plans to phase-out token
booths in the coming months. New Yorkers depend on booth attendants
for assistance but getting help will be difficult and frustrating
with 164 booths closing over the next few months and their attendants
instructed to roam around the entire station. "Here is a
clear example of how closing token booths hurts New Yorkers: riders
whose cards are declined at the turnstile will have difficulty
getting help," Gotbaum said.
Gotbaum’s report makes several
recommendations to address the failed swipes problem, including
the following:
NYCT should update its software to
keep track of the different types of error messages at each turnstile-booth
area to better determine what maintenance is needed.
Over the next few months, the MTA
should carefully examine the effects of its floating attendant
program at the turnstiles. If necessary, the MTA should have attendants
return to their booths at busy subway stations.
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