Best: 6 with ‘MetroCard Rating’ of $1.40;
N and W Are Worst with 75¢ Rating

A “Mixed Picture” Overall: Fewer Car Breakdowns But Cars Dirtier and Less Regular; Announcements Unchanged

The NYPIRG Straphangers Campaign today issued its ninth annual “State of the Subways” Report Card, rating the 6 as the best of 22 subway lines with a “MetroCard Rating” of $1.40 and the N and W the worst with a rating of 75 cents.

The 42-page report is based on an extensive review of official data on subway service, much of which has not been released before on a line-by-line basis. It includes detailed one-page profiles of 22 lines and a Straphangers Campaign “MetroCard Rating.”

The profiles report six measures of service, based on recent data from MTA New York City Transit, largely covering the last half of 2005. The measures are: the amount of scheduled service and the regularity of train arrivals; mechanical failures of subway cars; chance of getting a seat at the most congested point; cleanliness of subway car floors and seats; and adequacy of announcements.

The MetroCard Ratings are a shorthand tool to compare lines and are based on a formula developed in consultation with independent transportation experts. A line could receive a rating of $2.00 if it scored, on average, in the top 5% on the six measures of service.

“Overall, we document a mixed picture of the subways, with fewer breakdowns, but dirtier cars and more irregular arrivals,” said Gene Russianoff, Straphangers Campaign attorney. “We credit the progress in fewer breakdowns to thousands of new cars coming into service. We will continue to get hundreds of new cars only if the MTA is given adequate rebuilding funds, such as from a fair price for its MTA’s Manhattan rail yards.”

Among the key findings of the report:
1. The best subway line in the city is the 6 for the third year in a row, with a “MetroCard Rating” of $1.40. The 6 ranked high because of its frequently scheduled service and it also performs above average on four of the other measures: arriving with more regularity, fewer car breakdowns and dirty cars, and better announcements, where it had a near perfect record. The line did not get a higher rating because it performed below average on one measure: a chance of getting a seat during rush hours. This is the third time in a row that the 6 line has ranked first in the Straphangers Campaign Report Card. The top performance is due in large part to the new technology subway cars, which began replacing the line’s aging fleet in recent years. The 6 runs between Pelham Bay Park in the Bronx and the Brooklyn Bridge subway station in lower Manhattan.

2. The N and W tied for the worst subway line, both with a MetroCard Rating of 75 cents. The N and W lines both have a low level of scheduled service. The N performs below average on three other measures: seat availability, arriving with regularity and announcements. The N line did not receive a lower rating because its cars break down slightly less often than the system average. The N was also the worst performing line in our 2004 and 2005 reports. This is the first time the W came in last. The W performs below average on three measures in addition to frequency of service. These are breakdowns, seat availability, and announcements. It performed above average on cleanliness. The W line operates between Astoria, Queens and downtown Manhattan; the N runs between Astoria and Coney Island.

3. Overall, we found a mixed picture for subway service. On the plus side, we found that car breakdowns were on the right track, improving between our 2005 and 2006 reports. But the regularity of arrivals and cleanliness went into reverse ­ both slightly worsening — while announcements remained unchanged. (We were unable to compare the remaining two measures.) :

• The car fleet breakdown rate improved from an average mechanical failure every 156,815 miles in our 2005 report to 178,085 in our 2006 report. This is an ongoing trend as new technology cars come on line. We found that: thirteen lines improved (1, 2, 3, 4, 6, B, F, G, J/Z, M, N, R and V) and nine lines worsened (5, 7, A, C, D, E, L, Q and W).
• Subway cars arrived with less regularity, going down from 88% regular arrivals during the daytime in 2005 to 87% in 2006. We found that: four lines improved (4, D, F, Q), twelve worsened (1, 2, 3, 5, 6, A, C, E, G, M, N, V) and six remained unchanged (7, B, J/Z, L, R, and W).
• Subway cars became less clean, going down from 81% in 2005 to 79% in our 2006 report. We found that: eight lines improved (2, 6, A, C, D, L, M, and N) and fourteen worsened (1, 3, 4, 5, 7, B, E, F, G, J/Z, Q, R, V, and W).
• Accurate and understandable announcements remained unchanged at 90% between our 2005 and 2006 reports. We found that: eight lines improved (3, 7, A, B, C, F, L, and N), eleven worsened (1, 2, 5, 6, D, J/Z, M, Q, R, V, and W) and three remained unchanged (4, E and G).

• Breakdowns: Cars on the 5 had the best record on delays caused by car mechanical failures: once every 353,904 miles. Cars on the G line had the worst, experiencing breakdown delays more than four times as often: once every 81,095 miles.
• Cleanliness: The 2 and C tied for the cleanest line, with only 10% of their cars having moderate or heavy dirt, while 45% of cars on the dirtiest line — the 7 — had moderate or heavy dirt, a much worse performance.
• Chance of getting a seat: We rate a rider’s chance of getting a seat at the most congested point on the line. We found the best chance is on the V line, where riders had a 91% chance of getting a seat during rush hour. The 5 ranked worst and was much more overcrowded, with riders having only a 31% chance of getting a seat.
• Amount of scheduled service: The 6 and the 7 lines had the most scheduled service, with two-and-a-half minute intervals between trains during the morning rush hour. The W ranked worst, with ten-minute intervals between trains all day.
• Regularity of service: The J/Z line had the greatest regularity of service, arriving within two to four minutes of their scheduled interval 92% of the time. The most irregular line is the 2, which performed with regularity only 79% of the time.
• In-car announcements: The 2, 5 and 6 lines had the highest rate of adequate announcements made in its subway cars, 99% of the time. The J/Z was the worst, at 78%.

The Straphangers Campaign’s work to rate the quality of subway and bus service is funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, which is a leader in supporting the assessment of government services. The full report can be found here.