As I spoke about in my Last Week Today presentation, one of the major reasons that New York City has been able to sustain its massive population and workforce is because of the subway system. Due to this reality, it is New York City’s obligation to continue to sustain our subways at all costs. This picture represents an interesting paradox that has been a major pain-point for the MTA and many New York City residents.
The reality is that the New York City subway system was built approximately a hundred years ago and as a result, it requires a significant amount of maintenance and upkeep. This picture illustrates the much-loathed construction that the MTA has been conducting on the L train. The MTA’s reasons for conducting this construction project is to restore the damage that the train sustained during Hurricane Sandy as well as to increase the L train’s carrying capacity in general.
The reason that this picture represents a paradox is that while this construction project aims to maintain the L train and thereby allow New York City to continue to be sustainable, it also creates hardships for hundreds of thousands of daily commuters, which also slightly hinders New York City’s ability to sustain its massive workforce. So, while this construction project is necessary to maintain New York City’s ability to be sustainable, it also hinders this ability by creating adversity for a good portion of New York City’s workforce.
I believe that as residents of New York City, it is important to be aware that the MTA and the governing bodies of New York City share our same vision for New York City’s continued sustainability. As a result, it is essential that we understand that sometimes there is really no way of bypassing these difficult decisions and that sometimes these decisions must be made so that New York City can continue to be sustainable.
I think it’s absolutely necessary to have in mind that when one has a long term goal he has to make sure that the short term interval won’t be filled with chaos. In order to sustain a society, order needs to be thought about in both the present and future. I think that you conveyed such an idea that the L train plan is going to serve the people better in the future but is there a “now” solution that would make it easier on the people who are you are trying to help. This paradox can be broadened and applied in many other situations which is why I love the thought and idea conveyed. Great job!!!
I’m in Williamsburg every other weekend, so I understand this struggle. While this ongoing construction is going to be inconvenient for a lot of people, I think it is a much better alternative than shutting down the entire tunnel from Williamsburg to Manhattan for a year and a half – which not only forced a lot of people to move out but also landlords to drop rent prices to convince people to stay. Since the L is the only train that really runs straight through Williamsburg, that would’ve decreased overall prosperity in Williamsburg and that’s the opposite of the whole idea of sustainability that NYC tries to preach.