nice that he's advocating to keep the employees in the booths but its meaningless without any suggestion of how to bridge the gap in funding that's the root cause of the closures. perhaps if he supported bridge tolls and the original ravitch plan had passed we wouldn't be in such a deep transportation mess.

paco, how long have you live in the city? You have to keep people in the booths, regardless of what the economic situation is. Manned booths prevent crime.

You could toll all the bridges you want, the MTA will still be greedy. Perhaps they should abandon the 2nd ave subway as they have for decades before. Perhaps they should sell land at market value rather than below it. You close the budget gap by restricting how the MTA spends, not by forcing the public to pay more.

Metro cards were supposed to save money, did they?

The MTA is a cash black hole. THAT is the 'root cause' of the MTA's budget problem.

We need security people to enforce the fare and make sure rules are followed an assist in an emergency. None of these tasks are the tooken booth clerks job. Most just sit there as people walk in or out of emergency gates . All station agents should be phased out in favor of new security code enforcers. Outdated job tittles such as station agents and conductors cost the mta over $900 million a year and are obsolete. A new integrated approach could be deployed at half the cost and provide a human in each station and on trains that could enforce mta rules and issue tickets to fare beaters, door holdersand litterers.

It amazes me how misinformed many people are about the REAL problems at the mta. No new toll or fare hike will ever get the mta out of its finacial mess as long as the politicians allow the unions campaign dollars dictate mta operational decisions. Any new revenue gets chaneled into raises and outdated union rules and job titles that drive up costs in the tune of over a billion$ a year. In fact a good portion of the bailout money just got awarded by a sham arbitator in raises. the arbitator stated the mta ability to raise fares and taxes as a reason to sward an 11% raise. The arbitrator also voted in the unions favor on all cost saving issues

It amazes me how misinformed many people are about the REAL problems at the mta. Mta management has thier hands tied to cut costs and pay down the debt. The union refuses to allow the mta to combine the three bus companies it operates inside nyc(nyct, mbstoa, mta bus) to reduce costs. The sham arbitator ruled with the union. This prevents the making changes transparent to the public that would save tens of millions per year. Moving the bm4 express bus to ulmer park depot(nyct) from spring creak depot(mta bus) would save $400k alone in fuel and salary. The bus travel 30 min to the start of tge line vs 5 min from ulmer park

Gullible Brooklyn politicians from Borough President Marty Markowitz on down support the now over $5 billion, 1.7 mile Second Avenue Subway. Of this $5 billion plus costs, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) is paying through an understanding with former Pres. George Bush in return for Manhattan East Side Democratic legislators, Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, Sen. Liz Krueger, Assembly Members Jonathan Bing, Micah Kellner and their political organizations to either support or not publicly oppose US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, $1.7 billion. $450 million for the Second Avenue Subway comes from the 2005 New York State Transportation Bond Issue. The remaining approximately $3 billion and counting must be paid for by increased taxes, higher fares and service cuts.

Ironically, if Markowitz & Co. would fight for Brooklyn, he would back City Councilmember Tony Avella's proposal to substitute light rail as a cost of $500 million at the most for the $5 billion plus Subway. This would leave about $1.2 billion from the Bush-FTA understanding with Maloney, Krueger, Bing and Kellner for much-needed light rail extensions in the Mill Basin area of Brooklyn, Douglaston and Little Neck in Queens and the North and West Shores of Staten Island. Moreover, Avella's plan would negate the need for higher taxes, fares and service cuts including toll booth closings

Power to John Heyer for recognizing a community need, and organizing a rally in support.. within days of learning the plans. It's an active way of calling attention to the matter, and surely demonstrates a concern for what he's heard about our area's reaction to this service cut. (See you there & will lend quick support on my commute to work on Mon.) GL

The unreported story is that the MTA is closing down the Carroll Gardens' 2nd Place and Smith Street subway entrance, the week of September 14th for 10-12 months. The problem is that there is not a striped pedestrian crosswalk at 2nd Street and Smith Street where the other entrance is located. The way I get across the street to that entrance every morning is to poke my head out from where I stand between parked cars, to see if it is safe, then I run like heck. The MTA could care less about the disruption to the community. Their plan is to just close down the main CG entrance to the subway without previously making arrangements with DOT to put in a crosswalk to ensure the safety of their patrons. Especially vulnerable are the many grade school and middle school students, as well as seniors.

When Billie Stein previously announced that he was going to close down that entrance, when he originally put up the sidewalk shed a year or so ago, I brought this problem to the attention of MTA Govt. Relations. I was told that it wasn't their problem. On Saturday, I spoke to Bill de Blasio's office, which is going to call DOT to see if they can, post haste, put in a crosswalk.

you got it right paco. It's a classic political stunt ( in a somewhat heated contest and economic depression) to ride on an imagined service maintenance status quo while avoiding the sobering, daunting -shall I say CRISES of the fiscal realities facing the public transit system. This dude is living in political universe detached from reality, although it seems like he'd make for a nice enough neighbor.