|
V for Victory? Not in This War
By RAY SANCHEZ
May 16, 2002
The masters of the underground may soon resort to instant prizes
to get you to ride the much-despised V train.
Perhaps you might be enticed with a spin on one of the new Harley-Davidson
motorcycles recently purchased for the Department of Subways.
Surely, distributing unlimited-ride MetroCards inside those free
MetroCard holders would lure more riders.
At this point, the people who run the subway will do just about anything
to get you to try the often-ignored local line, which was supposed to bring
relief to the long-suffering patrons along the Queens Boulevard corridor.
"Desperate times require desperate measures," said Gene Russianoff,
senior attorney with the Straphangers Campaign. "They're going to move
from card holders to sets of dishes."
The V was launched six months ago as the solution to overcrowding on the
E and F express trains into Manhattan. But many subway riders have shunned
the local service, which is slower with more stops. Manhattan-bound E trains,
meanwhile, seem as congested as ever.
"We still think it's too early to either declare victory or defeat,"
NYC Transit President Lawrence Reuter said yesterday.
This spring, conductors along Queens Boulevard began making special
announcements urging people to try the V for comfort. Then, earlier
this month, a NYC Transit document outlined an extensive marketing
campaign to encourage riders to use the line, including free MetroCard
holders, station posters in Korean, Chinese, Spanish and Russian,
and ads in ethnic and local newspapers in Queens.
"Stay on the V!" is the marketing message. "It takes only 5 minutes
more than the E from Roosevelt Av to Lex Av/53 St."
The reality is that before the V, the E train was running at 116 percent of
capacity during peak hours, according to NYC Transit. In March, the E ran
at 96 percent capacity. That means crowds on the E that month were within
the loading guideline of 145 passengers per subway car - still a tight
squeeze. From NYC Transit's perspective, the new line succeeded if it
siphoned away just 5 percent of E riders.
"They did not aim high," said Russianoff, echoing the sentiments of
many straphangers along Queens Boulevard.
"The V is working," Reuter insisted yesterday.
Ridership on the V has increased 30 percent since December, Reuter said,
and he expects it to keep rising. The E trains are still packed, he said,
because they're unevenly loaded with most passengers squeezing into
the front cars.
The V runs Forest Hills to the East Village, making at least 10 more stops
than the E and taking 12-15 minutes longer to get to the
53rd Street/Lexington Avenue station.
Crowding on the F line, which travels now across the 63rd Street connector
to Manhattan, dropped 10 percentage points to 85 percent in March.
The V has been running at a comfortable 49 percent of capacity.
The V, like the E, travels into Manhattan via the 53rd Street tunnel.
The real problem is that the overburdened Queens Boulevard corridor has
only one express track as ridership continues to rise.
"My sense is that the V is catching on," said Andrew Albert, chairman of the
New York City Transit Riders Council and one of the few voices in support
of the troubled line. "What would make it really catch on would be to have
it running on weekends, as well. You always have a problem when you have
a service that is not full-time."
The V runs only on weekdays.
"It's only five to seven minutes difference if you're going to, say,
Rockefeller Center, than if you were taking the old F route," Albert said.
"For those extra minutes, you're getting a seat. You're getting to sit and
read like a civilized person."
Another problem, Albert said, is that the system is running almost two
E trains for every V. Straphangers tend to jump on the first train to
arrive at their stations and make connections later. Transit officials
have said they don't have the subway cars necessary to expand the V.
As for door prizes, Reuter said: "We may give out the MetroCard holder ...
We're looking at those types of things."
Copyright © 2002, Newsday, Inc.
|
