Pavel Nunez
Dr Carrie Hall
4/3/19
English 1121
Research Memos
Based on the 1st article I read that “Seven people died while walking or riding between New York City subway cars in 2018, according to the MTA, including four people in December alone — a jump from five total deaths in 2017. There were also five deaths from passengers going between subway cars in 2016. After 2018’s deadly year, the transit authority is reminding New Yorkers how dangerous walking between subway cars can be.”,and to combat this After 2018’s deadly year of a lot of deaths, the transit authority is reminding New Yorkers how dangerous walking between subway cars can be everytime someone gets on the train.
On the other article The MTA has came up with an effective solution for combating the amount of people that jumped on the tracks of the train by the installation of platform screen doors, which are common in European cities and Asian cities. Aside from preventing people from falling or jumping onto the tracks, having a barrier between the platform and the tracks keeps stations cleaner(so nobody throws trash), reduces fires caused by garbage on the tracks(which causes delays, and allows for air-conditioned platforms. But unfortunately for the MTA, there isn’t enough money to fund this idea because its out of their yearly income and honestly why install this to protect 0.2 percent of the people that are crazy enough to go in the tracks and kill themselves.
Also on another group members article I learned Most trains on the New York City Subway are manually operated. The signal system currently uses Automatic Block Signaling, with fixed wayside signals and automatic train stops. Many portions of the signaling system were installed between the 1930s and 1960s. The age of the subway system shows that many replacement parts are unavailable from today’s signal suppliers and must be custom built for the New York City Transit Authority, which obviously operates the subway. Additionally, some subway lines have reached their train capacity limits and cannot operate extra trains in the current system to avoid even further delays. They could try upgrading this but the again, that requires a lot of money which the MTA doesn’t have despite earning billions each year, which is a similar problem on the research above.
