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CNG Boro Politics

What the F?! Finally, the MTA wants to know

By Mike McLaughlin
The Brooklyn Paper
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The Brooklyn Paper / Aaron Greenhood
This is how most riders know the F train. This week, they'll get a chance to complain to the MTA about it.

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Hate the F train? The Metropolitan Transportation Authority says it wants to hear from you.

This week, outside contractors hired by the transit agency — whose public image is at lowpoint, what with the looming service cuts and fare hikes — handed out “rider report card” questionnaires to F-line riders to ask them about the quality (insert “… or lack thereof” joke here) of the line, which runs through DUMBO, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens, Park Slope, Windsor Terrace and Kensington en route to its Coney Island terminus.

Riders are being asked to judge the line in 21 categories from punctuality to crowding to station cleanliness (no, there is no lower grade than F). Last November, in the route’s first performance review, riders gave the F a C-minus — but that middling grade masked serious flaws in the line’s grade for rush-hour crowding, which received a D grade.

The line’s highest mark was a B-minus for the relative abundant availability of MetroCard machines in its stations.

This year, F regulars don’t think last year’s C-minus will get any better.

“Service is fair — waiting for trains is the biggest problem, especially on weekends,” Jake Hokmanson said on the Carroll Street platform on Tuesday morning.

Fellow straphanger Bethany O’Neill added, “I’d give it a C, because it tends to back up and it has a lot of delays.”

Then again, do the report cards even matter? Gary Reilly, a City Council candidate who has made the F train his central issue, said that the forms “don’t ask the right questions and [offer] no room for input.”

“They ask about safety and cleanliness, but not about functional things, such as when is the service poor or how it could be made better,” he said.

The “Rider Report Cards” are now being distributed only online. Go to the MTA’s Web site to access one.

©2008 The Brooklyn Paper

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