The NY congressional delegation had "very productive" talks with the U.S. Railroad Retirement Board to discuss reforms. Last month, the NY Times found that since 2000 virtually all LIRR employees applied for--and received--disability payments, raising questions about the USRRB's approval process (the board grants pensions). Newsday reports the USRRB is considering including "independent medical doctor to review disability claims; better oversight of the board's Long Island district office; and a re-evaluation of past LIRR retiree......

Two weeks after the NY Times found that virtually most retired Long Island Rail Road employees since 2000 have successfully applied for disability payments--at a cost of $250 million in federal funds--the LIRR president Helena Williams announced she is creating a unit to review disability applications, requiring LIRR workers to undergo ethics training, and asking for legislation to overhaul the U.S. Railroad Retirement Board, which approves disability requests. Williams said the internal "compliance" unit would......

Yesterday, the Westbury, Long Island office of the Railroad Retirement Board was was raided by federal agents who are investigating possible fraud in disability payments to Long Island Rail Road retirees. While the NY Times recently detailed how 90-97% of LIRR employees were applying for--and receiving--disability benefits upon retirement since 2000, it turns out the feds had been investigating the situation for the past six months. Newsday reports, "agents, from the FBI and the inspectors......

After the NY Times' sprawling investigation showing many Long Island Rail Road employees apply for--and get--disability payments after reaching the retirement age of 50, Governor David Paterson is asking Attorney General Andrew Cuomo to investigate the situation. The Times found that LIRRemployees have received $250 million in federal disability payments since 2000, while the MTA's other commuter railroad, Metro-North, has nowhere near those numbers of disability claims. Paterson said, "At a time when our state......

The NY Time has a huge, front page article on the curious "disability epidemic among" Long Island Rail Road retirees. In a nutshell, the article points out how many LIRR employees apply for disability after retiring...and they end up getting those federal payments. Back in 2004, 97% of employees who retired after the age of 50, applied for and received disability. The article starts off at the Sunken Meadow golf course, citing how dozens of......

An assistant conductor noticed a man attacking a woman yesterday at the Freeport LIRR station, according to Newsday. Passengers thought they heard a child crying and when assistant conductor Eugene Chino lookd at the end of the platform, he saw the assault, which "occurred on the trackbed between the two tracks alongside the cement housing for the platform staircase." The 3:42 p.m. train from Babylon to Penn Station was stopped and the suspect apprehended.......

The MTA's various fare hikes are starting to go into effect next month (aka tomorrow). Tomorrow, Long Island Railroad and Metro-North fares are going up. Bridge and tunnel tolls are going up on March 16. And the doozy will be the NYC Transit subway and bus fare hikes which go into effect on Sunday, March 2. Expect tons of confused riders and weary MTA workers on Monday and for the next few weeks. The......

Hundreds of thousands of commuters can breathe a sigh of relief today as a threatened strike by Amtrak workers has been avoided. A strike would have shut down Penn Station, diverting travelers on the Long Island Rail Road, Amtrak lines, and New Jersey Transit to subways and the PATH system. The city was already preparing contingency plans to have LIRR riders disembark in Brooklyn, and Jamaica Station and Woodside in Queens to take the subway.......

Eight separate unions representing Amtrak workers are threatening to go on strike as early as January 30th if they are not presented with new contracts, which they've worked without for years. A strike would hurt more than people taking the Acela between Washington D.C. and Boston. If Amtrak workers strike, it would close Penn Station and hundreds off thousands of daily commuters on the Long Island Rail Road, NJ Transit, and Amtrak would be seriously......

CNBC's Money Honey Money Honey Says Mind the Gap Earlier this week, while in Grand Central Terminal we heard a familiar voice reminding us to “Mind the gap.” It turns out it was CNBC “Money Honey” Maria Bartiromo. Apparently Metro-North riders aren’t the only ones who are being reminded, as the Post reports that Long Island Rail Road commuters are getting similar reminders. The recorded messages were the brainchild of MTA board member Mitchell Palli.......

From 1910 until 1963, when New York actually had a Pennsylvania Station instead of a dingy 1960s subterranean rat warren beneath a hockey rink and office towers, twenty-two stone eagles stood guard over the McKim, Mead, and White masterpiece. The eagles themselves, along with almost all the other stone artwork on the station were the work of artist Adolph A. Weinman, who among other things created Civic Fame atop the Municipal Building and the......

Holy Tornado, Brooklyn! Reader Jeanne just emailed us with this observation: I live in Kensington, Brooklyn and I think that a tornado just passed through. Have you heard any news about a tornado from anyone else? Around 6:30am there were heavy rains, thunder and lightning when all of a sudden the wind got really loud and we could hear stuff smashing into the house. It was all just 30 seconds or so but now......

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority board decided yesterday not to act on a ban of alcoholic beverages on Metro-North and the Long Island Rail Road. Both railroads sell beer, wine, and liquor (along with soft drinks, water and snacks) from carts at Grand Central Terminal and Penn Station, as well as from bar cars on trains. Sales yielded a $1 million profit for the MTA, so the decision was probably more based on pure hard economics......

Wednesday power woes weren't just for parts of the Bronx and Manhattan: Over 4,000 (or 8,000, depending on what you read) Queens residents were without power when last night's storm made its presence known. In fact, two hours after the MTA said LIRR service was a-okay after the Bronx-Manhattan power outage, the rain screwed up Long Island Rail Road track signals, causing hours of delays after service was suspended. In this instance, we feel......

The story: a man walks into a clam bar and orders a plate of fried clams, and the confusion begins. “Fried clams” can refer either to squiggly strips a la HoJo’s (RIP), or clam bellies. Otherwise known as Ipswich clams, bellies refer to the shucked ball-and-chain shaped whole bivalve, minus the clam’s soft shell. In its fried form, Ipswich clams are harder to find. Regardless, there are few restaurants that serve fried clams in either......

Yesterday, the MTA lowered the first of many parts of the Tunnel Boring Machine into the lower level of the 63rd Street tunnel as part of the MTA’s East Side Access project. The lowering itself could have been dismissed by passersby as just some sort of generic routine construction work, but it was much more than just moving a boring machine. When finally assembled in about two months, the 600-ton automated Spanish-owned and Italian-made......

This map isn't necessarily brand new, but it is a nice look at the MTA's big East Side Access project, which will connect the LIRR to Grand Central Terminal. amNew York (which has a gallery) and the NY Times visited the tunnel near 63rd Street and 2nd Avenue, where parts for the tunnel boring machine are being delivered. The TBM will then drill through rock to extend an existing tunnel to Grand Central. Fun......

The MTA released some St. Patrick's Day rules for the Long Island Railroad: "In an effort to maintain orderly travel for our customers attending the St. Patrick's Day Parade, alcoholic beverages will not be permitted." Newsday reports that alcohol will be banned all Saturday (March 17) and early Sunday and that any alcoholic beverages will be confiscated. Given that there doesn't seem to be a fine or penalty attached to having alcoholic beverages, we bet......

Ever since a teenager died after falling through a large platform gap at the Woodside Long Island Rail Road station last summer, Newsday has had excellent coverage over the platform gap safety issue. On the Newsday website, there's an extensive "Investigating the Gap" section, complete with video, articles, and an amazing map. The "How safe is your station?" map allows people to select a station (each is color-coded by number of injuries), which then......

After Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver blocked Governor Pataki's Moynihan Station plans last October, we wondered how Governor Spitzer would take up the task and spar with Silver. To refresh your memory, Spitzer's problem with Pataki's Moynihan Station plans was that they were incomplete, given that developers had more extensive ideas about a Farley Post Office and Madison Square Garden revitalization (known as "plan B"); Pataki, on the other hand, wanted to get the plan A......

A train commute without a buzz? The MTA may look into banning alcohol sales on LIRR and Metro-North trains. The NY Sun reports MTA board member Mitchell Pally as saying, "They can have as many beers as they want as soon as they get home. I would prefer we don't let anyone drink alcohol on the train. If we're not ready to go that far … the least we can do is not make it......

As we all know now, the soaring glass atrium dome and underlying transit hub designed by Nicholas Grimshaw will be much more modest than originally planned (above). The problem, of course, is b-u-d-g-e-t. A brief recap: The MTA cup that once runneth over with federal aid for post-9/11 redevelopment in Lower Manhattan now appears rather dry, owing to rising real estate and construction costs. To keep the project under a billion dollars, the dome will......

The lawyer representing of the family of the 18 year old girl who was killed when she fell through a Long Island Rail Road platform gap says the MTA "doesn't give a tinker's damn about drinking and intoxication on the railroad". Earlier this week, the state's Public Transportation Safety Board issued a report saying that Natalie Smead was responsible for her death (versus saying the LIRR was responsible) because, in part, she was intoxicated and......

The Long Island Rail Road has been starting to fill in gaps at certain train platforms in the wake of various customer falls. Eighteen year old Natalie Smead, visiting from Minnesota and on her way to Manhattan for a concert, fell in the gap at the Woodside stop and was fatally hit by a train when she tried to get out of the tracks. Newsday found that the gaps at Woodside were as wide at......

Last week, a survey about rude rider behavior on the Long Island Railroad was released (43% hate cellphone conversations!), which is most likely what prompted the Daily News to ask straphangers what they hate about the subways? One person, Sheree McIntosh, brought up three very annoying things:"Why is it that with both of my pregnancies I can count on both hands how many times I was offered a seat? Why must people talk and/or sing......

A month after a visiting teenager fell through a platform gap at the Woodside Long Island Railroad station and died, a 4 year old fell into a platform gap at Penn Station. Little Britney Walker, and her family, who moved to Long Island because their Mississippi home was damaged by Hurricane Katrina, were boarding an LIRR train to Huntington, and when Britney fell, her mother Terrian Walker had been walking right behind her, but she......

A Long Island Railroad train is stuck in an East River Tunnel, causing 30 minute delays in and out of Penn Station. The MTA says, "Please be advised that, as a measure of crowd control, the LIRR concourse at penn Station is temporarily not accessible via the 34th Street entrance. Customers are advised to use the LIRR entrance on 7th Avenue as an alternative." Yikes - good luck, LIRR commuters. And we're hearing that some......

On Saturday, a teenager visiting from Minnesota was killed by a Long Island Railroad train in a strange and scary accident. Natalie Smead and her father had been visiting relatives on Long Island, and she headed to Randall's Island for a Dave Matthew Band concert with other relatives and friends. She was getting off a westbound train at the Woodside, Queens station when she fell between the platform and the train car onto the tracks.......

Probably realizing that many of its riders are listening to their iPods and not conductor announcements, the MTA has its own podcasts - TransitTrax:We keep New York and you moving, and we're excited to offer you a variety of Podcasts that include service change information, getaways and deals, and behind the scenes interviews - all to help you get the most out of your ride or just to get to know us better. We'll be......

Five different riders' groups - the Straphangers Campaign, the Empire State Passengers Association, the Institute for Rational Urban Mobility in New York, the New Jersey Association of Railroad Passengers and the Lackawanna Coalition in New Jersey - sent a letter to NYC officials citing concerns that plans for railways and a commuter terminal are dangerous. The MTA and NJ Transit are planning new tunnels and a station that are 100-150 feet underground, and the natural......