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BROOKLYN WEEKLY, JULY 28, 2019
Councilman Brad Lander (D-Park Slope) delivered a petition to the MTA with more
than 650 signatures opposing the transit agency’s plan to run express F trains
through brownstone Brooklyn. Photo by Aidan Graham
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BY AIDAN GRAHAM
More than 650 scorned straphangers
signed a petition opposing the
Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s
plan to run express F
trains through brownstone Brooklyn.
Councilman Brad Lander (DPark
Slope) delivered the signatures
to transit head Andy Byford
at the MTA’s monthly board meeting
on Monday — arguing that the
scheme throws commuters living
between Cobble Hill and Windsor
Terrace under the proverbial train
in an effort to shorten ride times
for southern Brooklynites.
“The current proposal adds no
train service whatsoever. It simply
eliminates service during rush
hour at six local stations — some
of the busiest and most used ones
on the line, stations that already
experience severe overcrowding,”
Lander said at the July 22 meeting.
The Transit Authority says
adding additional trains to make
the arrangement work is impossible
due to signal constraints that
require long spaces in between
trains.
Instead, the plan calls for four
existing local trains — two Manhattan
bound trains in the morning,
and two Coney Island-bound
trains in the evening — to be converted
to run express between Jay
Street-Metrotech and Church Avenue
stations during weekdays. Between
those stations, the express
F train would stop at Seventh Avenue
only, while bypassing six other
stations in a service expected to debut
this September.
Lander said the potential benefi
t to commuters would be minuscule,
arguing that catching the
limited express trains would come
down to luck.
“You’d have to be like a lottery
winner — more than a lottery winner
— to get the benefi ts,” he said.
“You don’t really know which days
that you’ll be able to save the up-to
six minutes.”
Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon
(D-Cobble Hill) joined Lander
in criticizing the Transit Authority
at Monday’s meeting, echoing
his claim that the MTA is not adding
service, but reducing it.
“Getting on those trains now is
next to impossible. It will be even
more diffi cult if we are skipping
two trains in the morning, and two
trains in the afternoon,” she said.
“We should be adding service, not
reducing service — anywhere in
the system.”
Even the Transit Authority
agrees that the F express would
hurt more riders than it would
THIS!
Angry commuters sign petition
opposing express F train plan
help, according to Lander, who
pointed to a 2016 study published
by the MTA that concluded 52 percent
of riders would face longer
commutes under the new plan.
However, the Authority’s report
notes that riders who do benefi
t from the new express service
will save more time on average —
about 3.4 minutes — as compared
to other commuters, who will only
lose 1.3 minutes.
As much as Lander and Simon
opposed the new service swap,
southern Brooklyn politicians defended
the express F train, claiming
uptown straphangers can wait
the extra minute to ensure their
long-suffering southern neighbors
get to work on time.
“We’re asking some people in
New York City to wait on a platform
for approximately a minute
more — those who live closest to
Manhattan,” said Kalman Yeger
(D-Borough Park). “In exchange,
those who live further away will
see their commutes reduced.”
Coney Island residents, who
live on the farthest reaches of the
F line, currently travel the longest
stretch of exclusively local service
in the city — 26 uninterrupted
stops between Coney Island-Stillwell
Avenue and Broadway-Lafayette
Street, where straphangers
can transfer to express B and D
trains, which run parallel to the F.
F
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