NYC Subway System to Get Wi-Fi, Cell Service and Revamped Stations
Standing in a location devoid of Wi-Fi or cell service, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Friday he wants to leverage technology to better serve transit riders.
"I don’t wasn’t to get in a train and feel like a sardine for an hour and a half on the way to work," he told a crowd of MTA officials, labor leaders, and politicians at the New York Transit Museum. "I don’t want to do that. I want to be able to sit in the seat, I want to be able to listen to my music, I want to be able to make the telephone call, connected to Wi-Fi. I come to expect that."
It was a change in tone for a governor known for his love for muscle cars rather than mass transit. But lately, in the run-up to next week's State of the State address, he has talked a lot about transportation initiatives. As with previous announcements, the governor spoke about the Founding Fathers — as well as the Erie Canal — in a message designed to evoke the Empire State's grandeur.
"You know how they say 'Oh, you New Yorkers, you're so high strung,'" he told the audience of journalists, elected officials and labor union members. "They're right! We're high strung! We're ambitious. And we built the greatest city and the greatest state on the globe because we are."
And, as with previous announcements, a lot of Cuomo's plans are already in the pipeline — but he wants to speed them up or expand upon them. He called for all 277 underground subway stations to have Wi-Fi by the end of this year, a year ahead of the current schedule, with cell phone service not far behind. And the governor promised to completely overhaul 30 subway stations, compared to the 20 outlined in the MTA's capital program.
But there's a catch: those stations would be entirely closed for six to eight weeks, and construction at each location could last up to a year, according to an MTA spokesman.
"Let people walk in there and say, 'Wow, this is the MTA,'” he said. "This is the train station – amazing. Yes, we can."
Other proposals include an accelerated timeline for countdown clocks, mobile ticketing for the commuter railroads, and the next generation of the MetroCard, which could let you use your cell phone to go through the turnstile.
But where is the money for these initiatives coming from? Like the commercial for Prego spaghetti sauce, Cuomo promised reporters, it's in there.
"We have roughly a $140 billion annual budget, part of it is debt, part of it is revenue, and the state's contribution of $8 billion [for the MTA] will be in that $140 billion dollar financial plan," the governor said after the speech.
But that lack of clarity worries some transportation watchers. Nicole Gelinas of the Manhattan Institute was perplexed that on top of all that spending, the governor is also promising to reduce tolls on the New York State Thruway. That toll revenue, she pointed out, is supposed to be helping to fund another signature Cuomo project: the $4 billion replacement for the Tappan Zee Bridge.
"If we're going to continue to build infrastructure like that," she said, "then we do need to pay for it. So saying that drivers...will be paying less, means that in the long term we won't be building the infrastructure that we need."
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