Outage Outrage
A case against the broken elevators of the New York City subway goes to court
First steps were taken in a case challenging the Metropolitan Transit Authority’s (MTA) elevator maintenance.
On May 2nd, U.S. District Judge, George B. Daniels, heard the beginning arguments of a class action lawsuit brought forward by the Disability Right Advocates (DRA) against the MTA and the New York City Transit Authority (NYCTA). DRA, a nonprofit organization protecting disability rights, claims the transit authority failed to maintain the elevators in the subway system, providing inadequate subway accessibility for people with mobility disabilities.
Members of various disability rights groups rallied in front of the courthouse before the hearing.
“I have not been able to ride the subway in 25 years,” said Jean Ryan, President of Disabled in Action. “I know the elevators are often out of service. And even if you know [the elevator is out], you still can’t go there and get out of the station.”
Only 20% of the New York City subway system is accessible for people with disabilities. Though the MTA counts 118 stations accessible, the current number of unique accessible stations is actually only 90, according to Jessica Murray, a doctoral candidate and a fellow at the CUNY Graduate Center working on psychology, transportation, technology, accessibility, and disability rights.
Murray counted station complexes as unique stations. She then calculated the percent accessibility of those unique stations. For example, 34 Street-Herald Square (N/Q/R/W) and 34 Street-Herald Square (B/D/F/M) each count as 50% of 1 station instead of counting as 2 accessible stations.
Already limited to a handful of stations, commuters with mobility issues are further inconvenienced by broken elevators. There were over 16 thousand outages last year, with 44 occurring daily. In other words, nearly 14% percent of elevators were out per day, on average. The risk of being trapped underground by an out-of-service elevator is internalized by commuters with disabilities and prevents many of them from taking the subway altogether.
Sasha Blair-Goldensohn, member of Rising and Resist’s Elevators Action Group and one of the plaintiffs in the case, said it’s the unplanned outages, which account for 72% of the total outages last year, that cause the biggest issue. “It’s two hours one day, 20 minutes the next day, a day here,” he said, “you never know.”
The MTA’s lack of real-time communication about these outages further frustrates Blair-Goldensohn. During his subway commute to work, he said he’ll unexpectedly run into a broken elevator, often accompanied by an apology from the MTA. “And it’s not sorry, there’s someone there to tell you what to do. Maybe there’s a cardboard sign and a ribbon up; that’s it,” he said. “You’re on your own. They put us on our own and it’s no good.”
The MTA posts the status of their elevators and escalators online. Commuters can also sign up for e-alerts to be updated when an elevator goes out.
Though disability rights activists say the transit system still fails to offer adequate, accessible alternatives on-site of the outage.
Commuter Alan Timothy Lunceford-Stevens said he was recently greeted by both an elevator and an escalator that were out-of-service at Grand Central. “There were other disabled people standing around there and none of us knew how to get down to the train,” he said.
When Lunceford-Stevens asked the transit employee for an accessible alternative, the employee suggested Lunceford-Stevens walk half-a-mile to the closest accessible station. Lunceford-Stevens waited 45 minutes for a bus instead.
In the elevator maintenance hearing, a lawyer representing the transit authorities argued that outages may delay commuters by “15 to 20 minutes.” He also said that despite there being no law requiring a percent of elevator and escalator availability, they are “as close as they can get to 100%.” DRA lawyers, however, called these numbers “red-herrings,” suggesting that many of the outages go unreported.
The case will continue throughout the year, with motions made by early August and a trial tentatively set for September.
In the meantime, DRA has another class action lawsuit against the transit authority, arguing that the MTA failed to install elevators in all New York City’s subway stations.
