Last week’s MTA board meeting brought a rush of really rotten news: Ridership continues to fall, which will deepen the agency’s cash woes. And it’s dropping because of poor service and increased fare-beating — as well as people opting for ride-share services instead of the subways and buses.
MTA stats show annual paid subway ridership dropping since 2015: down 0.3 percent in 2016, 1.7 percent in 2017 and 2.1 percent so far this year.
To his credit, MTA chief Joe Lhota doesn’t blame Uber, etc. for taking riders away; he understands that New Yorkers have a right to choose, saying, “Some days I drink Coke, and some days I drink Pepsi.”
What’s utterly damning is that so many people would pay much more for a car service rather than wait for a train. That shows just how bad service has become.
Notably, the ridership drop is strongest in Queens (down 6.6 percent from May 2017 to May 2018) and The Bronx (down 8.2 percent).
While Lhota says the MTA lacks “the analytical tools to tell you exactly what” is behind the ridership decline, the bottom line is that it’s on track to cost the agency about $90 million a year in lost fares. That would eat big-time into any windfall from a congestion-pricing plan — cash that’s supposed to fund major system improvements, not just keep the agency afloat.
Meanwhile, the MTA admits that service hasn’t significantly improved one full year into the emergency action plan it launched shortly after Lhota took over: On-time rates remain stuck at about 65 percent.
So its only achievement so far is to have stopped things from getting even worse — which is something, but plainly not enough.
Of course, the MTA last year didn’t offer any benchmarks for when straphangers would see light at the end of the tunnel. Instead, New York got months of posturing from Gov. Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio over whether City Hall would fork over the cash to fund half the emergency plan.
Pointless posturing, at that, since Cuomo, with the Legislature’s support, eventually wound up forcing de Blasio to pay.
Here’s one red line: New York City Transit chief Andy Byford vowed to the Post editorial board in late May that riders would see measurable service improvements within six months. He’s got four months left.
If that turnaround does materialize, ridership should start rising again, and the whole picture turns less dark. If it doesn’t, the MTA’s leaders are going to have to admit they don’t know what they’re doing.