very simple

Thanks to a single fire this weekend, service will be out on the A and C trains for the next 3-5 years. Yeah, that should be fun for the commuters. Yet this only reduces the number of trains running up the upper west side to, well, several (the 1/9 up Broadway, and the B/D up Central Park West for starters). The upper east side? still only has one train (the extra narrow 4/5/6 up Lexington). And apparently always will, as whatever money the MTA thought was going to fall out of the sky to pay for a 2nd Avenue line (not to mention the west side extension, part of the olympic stadium/jets arena boondoggle) is now clearly going to go to fix the 600 signals that have been destroyed thanks to the fire.

And Curbed has some insight into the effect on the real estate market. Apparently it will suck slightly more to live along the route. Of course, in this town, that means that you’ll only be able to get 900K for your one bedroom walkup instead of $1.1 million. (I’ve been spending a little too much of my free time browsing the real estate listings recently – can you tell?).

There is always that forgotten middle child of the New York City transit system – the bus!

(I’ll admit that I actually love the bus, but I like it precisely because it’s so slow – I can usually read a full chapter or two of whatever book I’ve got with me on the two mile journey from my office to my home. And I only take the bus when I’ve got nowhere to be, like on my way home from work – If I’m in a hurry (like on my way to work), it’s all about the subway or a taxi)

And how about that. I just realized, looking at the date of the entry form, that today would have been my Mom’s 55th birthday. Happy Birthday Mom, wherever you are……

Tags: new york city, real estate