MTA / New York City Subway (New York, New York)

OK, right now I'm on the L train. Few minutes ago I tried to add $4.50 but vendor machine acted up: it took my money but transaction failed and money didn't go to card. Mean teller in the booth yelled at me and gave me the envelope. BECAUSE I MUST SEND THIS MTA CARD AND RECEIPT TO MTA OFFICE AND CLAIM MY $4.50 OVER THE MAIL!!! SO IF IT WAS MY LAST 4 BUCKS I WOULD BE SCREWED. The worst subway system in the world! Dirty, urine smell, slow, full of rats! Also bunch of perverts and thugs. Endless construction work and constatntly jumping price. Some stations are so scary and dirty - they would be a perfect decoration for the scariest horror movie. Trains always run mad slow, and always have to stop unexpectedly. Simple trip from brooklyn to manhattan may take freaking 2 hours! Riding with MTA is like a playing with dead dog pretending its alive lol

NYC's subway is an absolute marvel of engineering. The good: Cost, cost, cost. For $2.25, you can go from Pelham Bay Park to Rockaway. No other service even comes close to how cheap the subway is if you need to go all the way across town. You also get free bus transfers with your MetroCard...you can even buy unlimited passes for a day, week, or month, all at very reasonable prices if you ride the subway more than once per day. It's also usually very quick, even if you're on a local train. It's not instantaneous transport, but a 30 minute subway ride could easily take two hours by car/bus/taxi. You rarely have to wait very long for a train. For a city with 18 million inhabitants in the metro area, the subway cars are surprisingly clean. You'll find the occasional spill, but nothing that would gross you out beyond belief. Although subway incidents are usually well-publicized in the New York media, I've never felt unsafe on the subway. Just watch yourself and use some common sense. ... Read more

MTA is one of the largest transit systems. It is efficient and services millions of commuters daily. It is an excellent, cost efficient method of transportation.

It is quite efficient to ave a lot of stations in the 5 boroughs of the city, but what I saw after riding four lines is that they have different cars. Some are quite herky-jerky and otheres can make a lot of noise while on the rails. The best one I rode so far is the green lines (4, 5, 6 line) since it is more modern and smooth riding. Anyhow, the cleanliness needs a lot of work in some stations- graffiti in the tunnels and mice are are a porblem. I do say that the Long Island Railway is one of the good parts of the MTA, and it is efficient enough to go from suburbia to NYC and back. Do not say that my three stars are bad, it is better than this, but does not meet my specificities to a four-star standard. Nonetheless, I would like to ride it again when I vacation.

I use it when I'm there. Of coarse the security's better than it was but sometimes you have to share a seat with some shady characters, haven't had any problems though.

I was always impressed with the New York subway - for a city of it's magnitude to have a subway in decent condition is impressive. It doesn't give off the mass confusion vibe that the T in Boston does (granted, New York's streets are in a grid, as opposed to whatever randomness Boston streets are comprised of).

I think that, overall, it's a good system. MAny people think that the NYC subway goes everywhere, but they are dead wrong. There are huge areas of the city that go without subway service. For example, Main St-Flusing station, which services only the (7) train, is the 10th most used station in the entire system. Why? Because there are a million bus routes feeding into it from the extremely large area of Queens that goes without subway service. Staten Island is even more poorly served. Also, the Bronx, Manhattan, and Brooklyn all have entire neighborhoods that go without subway service. But the MTA boasts Rockaway service of an example of "complete coverage": "If the Rockaways have service, everybody has service!" The frequent weekend GOs (diversions) get on my nerves too. There are like a million of them and they make commuting so much worse. Visitors already get lost enough. The milion and one diversions don't help. Finally, NYC Subway headways are terrible. The NYC Subway has some of ... Read more

Great System. I can wait for the R-160 Subway Cars!

An essential part of travel thru the City, they do a very good job conisdering the importance they have to NYC. MTA is a part of the NYC experience and are essential to many in the area. For all that, the system runs very well for a large entity. It is dirty and the people riding run the gamut of the human experience but things work, you go where you need to go effeciently. Just going to the MTA is worth it, there is some interesting human drama to be seen, from live music to public spectacles like fights.

Efficient and goes everywhere in the city, but wow, is it confusing. You can easily go the wrong way, get on an Express train you didn't want to be on, or not be sure where to transfer. It could also use some cleaning. However, the station agents are very friendly, they give good directions if you do get lost, and the whole system is quite a lot safer than I would have expected - there are so many people there at all hours of the day and night, just for starters.

took me 2 hrs to get to my pointless job today. best system in the world? not when it snows. heck the thing backs up when it rains. ask NYers why they walk everywhere. it's b/c of this garbage system. if it isn't the weather, the trains are delayed b/c of some lunatic. after work, it's so packed and horrid. that's just what you need after work, a packed train going back to Brooklyn, to make you fee good. if not that, there's a lunatic or some bum on every train.

First of all I do have to admit the delays at times are downright frustrating (though I had very little delay getting to work at 6am this morning) and the arbitrary closings of certain lines particularly the 6 every damn Saturday drives me up a freaking wall... But what do you expect for 2 bucks? Everytime they try and raise this ridiculously low rate commuters cry bloody murder- meanwhile the unions bilk the system for obnoxious pay rates so these fat lazy asses can sit in a box sell Metrocards and give poor directions. As long as the government runs it and the unions control the system by the balls we will all continue to get crammed into repugnant cattle cars in this poorly run system.

Efficient and goes everywhere you want to. Could be a tad cleaner.

Good. And despite what Hollywood would have you believe, pretty safe as well.