Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. We'll begin today with the head of the MTA, Janno Lieber, with a lot of news right now about the Trump administration's interactions with the transit system around here. That includes a takeover from the MTA of the renovation of Penn Station and another deadline for an end to the congestion pricing toll for Manhattan below 60th Street. It might even include their interactions with the Trump administration. A new transportation funding formula based on an area's marriage and birth rates. Have you heard that one yet? We'll talk about those things, as well as transit news that has nothing to do with the changes in Washington. Janno Lieber is chair and CEO of the MTA. Chairman Lieber, we always appreciate when you come on with us. Welcome back to WNYC.

Chairman Janno Lieber: Good to be with you, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, our lines are open for your questions, comments, and stories. 212-433-WNYC. Call about the state of your bus or train line or public safety or the warning from the MTA about another potential "summer of hell," regarding equipment problems or funding and policy issues, or how congestion pricing is affecting you for better or worse, or what kind of Penn Station reno you want to see. Classical like Trump, seems to prefer brutalist, modern. Do you even care as long as the train service is good? Does Penn Station even need more reconstruction?

The New York Post says it doesn't. We'll get to that, but you tell us or ask any MTA-related question. 212-433-WNYC, call or text 212-433-9692. Chairman Lieber, let's start with Penn Station. As most of our listeners know, subway lines, Amtrak, NJ Transit, and the Long Island Rail Road all go there. Metro-North will, too, in a couple of years. Remind everybody what the goal is for improving it. They've actually been two separate projects that the feds now say they'll combine, right?

Chairman Lieber: Yes. Here's the bottom line is that the MTA riders, Long Island Rail Road riders, but especially subway riders on the 8th Avenue line, the A and the C and the E, and also the 1-2-3 7th Avenue line, are by far the largest group of riders who come into Penn Station. We don't own the station. We're a tenant, and Amtrak, the federal government, is the landlord. We fixed up the portion of the station that our riders use the most and that we control, that's part of our lease.

That's that concourse running along 33rd Street from the 7th Avenue subway to the 8th Avenue subway and on out to Moynihan Station, which was also developed by the State of New York. I was involved with that project as well years ago. We fixed up the piece that impacts Long Island Rail Road and subway riders, and it's really popular with the riders. We doubled the width of the concourse. We raised the height because Amtrak wasn't on top of us. It was under the street, under 33rd Street. We're able to raise the ceiling height, and we put in new retail and new amenities, and riders love it.

We've been working on a plan to try to expand that kind of condition, modern transportation facility, to the whole station. We understand that in an ideal world, people love it if Madison Square Garden moved and we could start all over again and get a super grand version of the station like the one we lost 50-plus years ago. I live in the real world, and I want passengers to have really safe, convenient, and usable facilities. We were moving pretty quickly to try to make the rest of the station as good as that 33rd Street concourse project.

The federal government, the new administration came in, and they said, "You can't do this. We're giving it to Amtrak." That's okay. If the landlord wants to come in and fix the whole station because they own the whole thing, and the rest of Penn Station that we haven't fixed up is kind of a dump. Especially the areas that Amtrak controls, which are filled with back-office operations that have no business. The area should be used for passengers and public use. I'm okay with that. The Governor Hochul has been pushing Penn Station and tried to get President Trump to become a partner in this.

Apparently, the Fed said, "We don't want to partner. We're just going to take over the whole thing and do it." Our attitude is great. Would you just please get started? By the way, make sure that New Yorkers who use the station have a voice in making sure it works well for them.

Brian Lehrer: I want to read to you. You've probably seen it, and the listeners from this New York Post editorial that supports the Trump takeover of the project, but with the premise that may surprise a lot of people. They write, "Penn Station is now just fine as it is for the hundreds of thousands of commuters who flow through daily. Recent projects have done more than enough. NJ Transit and the LIRR have perfectly fine new vestibules, entrances, and exits, including Moynihan Station." They like what you were just describing about the Long Island Rail Road concourse. It says, "For that reason, "This development isn't remotely about President Donald Trump looking to put yet more of his stamp on the city. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy is just protecting federal taxpayers from another New York scam." Then it says, "The only reason to do anything beyond maybe some track extension work at Penn now is to provide cash baths for the connected and a pretext for politicians to fundraise from moneyed interest." Finally, it says, "The MTA certainly has far better uses for any cash that comes its way. It was only dragged into these plans as a pawn in the pols' games." That from the New York Post editorial board. How do you react to any of that, including the notion that Penn Station is fine now as it is, and all this money, whether it's coming from local or the federal government, is mostly unnecessary?

Chairman Lieber: I think one thing I would say, and you heard it from me before, is Penn Station is a lot better because of that project that we did, most of it during COVID. We got a huge new escalator bank that went out to 7th Avenue. Before we did that project, people would wander around 7th Avenue right in front of Penn Station saying, "Where is Penn Station, the biggest transportation facility in the United States?" We fixed that. We made it a better place for Long Island Rail Road and subway commuters.

We wanted to extend that kind of improvement. Governor Hochul actually wanted to extend that improvement to the rest of the station and also to bring in natural light. It's possible to have this place not feel like a basement, a catacomb, bring in some natural light, improve passenger circulation, make it easier to get on and off the platforms where there are a lot of choke points. Without reacting specifically to The Post, I would say the premise that it could be done more a project of moderate size and ambition could be accomplished is not insane.

There is a project, and I don't want to be flip about the money because we're talking about hundreds of millions or billions of dollars, but it doesn't have to be an entire rebuild of the station. You could get something significant done in the short term. If that's what they want to do, we're all ears. We're ready to work with them. Notwithstanding the punitive vibe that came through in the way it was announced by the federal government. As Governor Hochul said, if they want to take over this project and save New York money that we've been setting aside for this and work with us on getting a practical solution in the short term, we're all ears.

Brian Lehrer: I'm going to take a caller who I think will echo some of what was in that editorial. It's also a perennial that we always hear, and I'm sure you always hear as a critique of the MTA. Daniel in Queens, you're on WNYC with MTA chair and CEO Janno Lieber. Hi, Daniel.

Daniel: Hi, Brian. Thanks for having me. I'm actually really grateful I have the opportunity to call and respectfully vent some of my frustrations. The thing with the congestion pricing that baffles me is this city has the most billionaires in the entire world. I think they're worth $700 billion. We're talking about capital projects, and then you're raising capital off the backs of working-class people instead of raising capital from capital. You could have done a modest 1 or 2% tax and gotten all the money you needed for any capital improvements.

Then we're paying every day. The conditions aren't the best, the stations are sometimes dirty, the trains are delayed, yada, yada. The projects and improvements, they go on forever. I'm here by Union Turnpike, Kew Gardens, and the project to fix just the stairs is eight months overdue. It was supposed to be done in September. How come in Europe they're building similar mechanicals, similar length of track, on budget, on time, for much less, for exorbitantly less than we spent?

Brian Lehrer: Daniel, let me stop you there and get a response. I didn't realize he was going to peg it to congestion pricing in particular, which we're going to talk about in some detail later. That critique is a perennial, and it gets attached to the reno of Penn Station and lots of things.

Chairman Lieber: It is, and anytime I hear from a rider on your show or otherwise who's frustrated, I got to listen. Here are a few facts that I think are relevant to this. Number one, subway service is now 84% on time performance. It's the best it's been in over 12 years. That's relevant. Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North service is literally the best service it's been ever. 97% Long Island Rail Road, 98.5 % Metro-North. Service has been improving. We are carrying more riders. Statistically, and it ain't perfect, for sure, subway safety is way up over where it was last year and even up versus where it was before COVID.

We have to do a lot of things, working closely with the NYPD and with a lot of investment from the governor, to make the system feel safer. We have made tremendous progress on that. On the cost and duration of capital projects, I came into the MTA to run the capital projects division after I had run the World Trade Center for 14 years, for, on the private sector side, which was a bit of a long process and a lot of fighting, but we got it done. We came in, we took the L train project, did it six months faster, $100 million under budget.

The third track project on Long Island, a 10-mile-long project through the center of the most congested part of Long Island, $100 million also under budget. We're knocking out those ADA Station projects again, much faster than the old MTA, and really saving a ton of money and getting them done on schedule. I'm very sympathetic to Daniel because when we do these projects, they are much more complicated than the public understands. When you're working with underground utilities, even when you're doing a stair, you're tearing up a huge network of underground utilities, and it takes longer than it feels like it should to do a simple project.

This MTA is getting work done on time and on budget more than every other MTA before it. For a guy like Daniel who lives in Forest Hills or Kew Gardens, let me tell you, all of a sudden, we're running 40% Long Island Rail Road service more than before COVID, more than before we opened that Grand Central Madison project, and lo and behold, a lot of that extra service is going to Queens. We made the cost of traveling on the Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North inside the city $5, less than half of what it was before.

We're providing a ton more service to Kew Gardens and Forest Hills, and places like that, through our city ticket discount. The Queens Boulevard line, which hugely impacts him, is getting modern signals. We have redesigned the Queens bus system, the route network, which hadn't been touched in 75 years, so that we no longer go to abandoned trolley terminals. We actually go where people want to shop and go to school, and get to work. Queens is winning. The MTA is doing projects on time and on budget. I'm always going to listen to people like Daniel who have their frustrations because projects feel like they take a long time.

Brian Lehrer: I'm just curious, Daniel, you feel any better after hearing that answer?

Daniel: No. I appreciate that things are being done for less than they were before or in a shorter time than they were before. If you still look-- I don't have the data in front of me, but anyone can look it up. If you see what our counterparts in industrialized nations in Europe spend for similar lengths of track, similar mechanicals, capital improvements, they do it for less, and they do it much, much quicker. I guess the frustration is, how come they can do-- like the Second Avenue, the Q line took forever. We all know that was way over budget and way over schedule. My question is--

Chairman Lieber: [crosstalk] All right, I--

Brian Lehrer: Hang on. Go ahead. Daniel, let's--

Chairman Lieber: [crosstalk] Let me come back. Because you're going to have to take other callers.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, of course.

Chairman Lieber: I came in right at this after the Second Avenue subway project was-- the first phase of it was finished, and I tore that project apart and figured out what had gone wrong. We learned a ton from it. I'm not going to enumerate all of it, but we changed a ton of things so that we make sure that you don't have to freeze the ground in order to do proper excavation. You make sure that you don't end up with contractors responsible for the communication systems and the other work in a station are running into each other and on and on and on.

I would go through that in detail with Daniel. We've addressed a lot of those issues. We're doing much, much better. As far as how we compare to the rest of the world, the rest of the world doesn't run 24/7 systems. We have to have duplicate major mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems, so we can never turn the system off entirely. We carry so many more people on our system that, for fire safety reasons, we need to build more escalators and stairs, and everything and everything and everything. It's a longer conversation, but believe me, I look at those international numbers, and we evaluate ourselves really tough on those benchmarks. There are reasons to be hopeful on that front.

Brian Lehrer: Daniel, thank you for your call. On Penn Station, you've reminded everyone that the MTA is the biggest leaseholder there, and you expect the MTA, even with the federal takeover of the renovation, "To participate in the administration's and Amtrak's efforts to ensure future plans meet the needs of everyone who uses it." Are there certain priorities you want to state specifically, or concerns about what they might do that your statement perhaps implies about what might be done wrong?

Chairman Lieber: Our priorities are pretty straightforward. One, passenger circulation. We need to open it up like we did on that 33rd Street concourse. You're not walking down the Hilton corridor, which is about 3 feet wide and barely 6 feet in height. It feels like you're in the catacombs of some ancient city. Opening it up, passenger circulation, a lot of passenger information, better amenities, including retail. Then we need to deal with basic stuff like the ventilation system was designed for 200,000 people, and Penn Station gets 500,000 to 600,000 people.

That's a safety issue. You need to deal with the basic stuff. Passenger circulation, passenger navigation, ventilation, entrances. We need more entrances. Grand Central is great because it's got 25 different ways to get in or out from all directions. Penn Station feels like you're locked in an underground basement with only one way out in each direction. We need to change that. Those are our priorities. Our customers cannot wait decades for another round of blah, blah about Penn Station.

That's one of the reasons, although I'm sympathetic to the folks who are very architecturally oriented and are focused on move Madison Square Garden, then build a new Penn Station. I get why people are passionate about undoing that piece of architectural history, where we knocked down the old Penn Station. New York can't wait another 30 years for a Penn Station to be functional. We can make it pretty good if we focus on the basics. I went through it, Brian, so I won't repeat it again.

Brian Lehrer: I think the Trump plan is to move Madison Square Garden. Are you saying you oppose that?

Chairman Lieber: I don't know if that's the plan. They were not clear at all. Just Penn State would be great again. The main thing I'm concerned about is in the meantime, don't screw up the service. Our riders have endured these constant-- There are different construction projects over time. Long Island Rail Road service is unbelievably expanded since we opened Grand Central Madison, 40% more service. Long Island Rail Road got the highest ridership relative to pre-COVID of maybe any transit service in the country. It's over 85% of pre-COVID and growing.

The weekends are 110%, 115% of pre-COVID. Don't screw up the service. I'm very worried that we haven't talked a lot about it, but the Amtrak is starting to work on the East River Tunnels, a project they've been talking about doing since Hurricane Sandy over 10 years ago. They're finally getting around to it now and I am focused on making sure that they don't screw up service. They've already taken down a couple of trains to Albany, which is their responsibility. I don't want them to screw up Long Island Rail Road service. That's where I'm focused right now.

Brian Lehrer: One last Penn Station question, and this is just something that I, maybe many riders, are curious about. I see Metro-North is supposed to start coming into there in addition to Grand Central Terminal when that work is completed. I think it's supposed to be 2027. Currently, all the inbound trains on all the branches stop at 125th Street on the East Side before reaching Grand Central. Will they still do that and cross over to the West Side after that, or will there be a West Side equivalent to the 125th Station, or how will that work?

Chairman Lieber: Hey, Brian, you're Mr. New York. We got to bring up to speed. There is a project called Metro-North Penn Access, which is going to take Metro-North trains starting in New Rochelle down what we call the Hell Gate Line that comes over the Hell Gate Bridge into Queens. It's owned by Amtrak. We're taking a two-track railroad that Amtrak uses and never has stopped in the Bronx, and adding four stations in the Bronx so people in Co-op City and Parkchester and Hunts Point, and Morris Park can actually get much faster to the central business district.

This is a huge opportunity for folks in the East Bronx who are a little out of the transit rail world, at least, to get into first-class mass transit. Then those trains are going to go east onto the Hell Gate Line, then into Queens, and then into Penn Station and it's a huge thing for the folks in the-- But what you're thinking of, I think, is what we would like to do, which is just take the Hudson Line that comes down the Hudson River and then has to go east to get to Grand Central. We've been talking about, can we bring it straight down where Amtrak goes up the West Side and into Penn directly, which would save time and give people--

Brian Lehrer: Whoops, did we lose Chairman Lieber? Did we lose me? No, I'm still on. We just lost for the moment, I'm sure we'll get him back. MTA chair Janno Lieber. I'll tell you what, we'll take a break, and by the time we come back, we should have him back, and we'll go on to congestion pricing and other things. Stay with us. Brian Lehrer on WNYC. We have the line back now to MTA chair and CEO Janno Lieber. Before we move on, just for people who might have been curious, who maybe live on the Hudson Line, which goes all the way up to Poughkeepsie.

I think you were in the weeds there on what would happen after Marble Hill, which is where it goes east. Would it now go down to Penn Station from there on the West Side?

Chairman Lieber: Now you're showing off your geography, Brian, that you're a northern Manhattan guy. We would cross over that bridge at Spuyten Duyvil and go straight down the West Side through what they call the Empire Line into Penn. There's a lot of complicated engineering and construction issues, but that's something that we're really interested in exploring, save time, give more optionality.

Let me tell you, I just heard you're having Mike Lawler on tomorrow, the congressman from Rockland County. Could you please ask him what are the Republican congressmen who represent New York City and the suburbs doing for transit in Washington? It used to be Al D'Amato and other Republicans who represented New York and Washington fought for transit. It seems like instead of running an I love New York campaign, those congressmen representing the New York region are running an I hate New York campaign.

They need to stand up for 90% of their constituents who use mass transit. I'm trying to get Lawler and the rest of those characters to speak up for mass transit funding in New York instead of attacking New York City and the MTA, which most of their constituents rely on.

Brian Lehrer: All right, control room, save that clip. I have a feeling we may re-air it with the congressman tomorrow. Some breaking news, and I don't even know if you have heard this yet, but we just published this on Gothamist like minutes ago. The federal government appears to have accidentally published an internal memo in the lawsuit over congestion pricing. It states the current legal arguments to kill the program are on shaky ground, but it also states there could still be a way to kill the program through the Office of Management and Budget. I'm curious. Have you seen this filing yet? If so, what do you make of it?

Chairman Lieber: I'm not commenting on any of that. The proprieties of legal practice say when someone does something accidental, it isn't a topic of discussion. It gets made invisible. The bottom line here is whether it was in response to whatever they're talking about internally, whatever Secretary Duffy is tweeting or saying on Fox News, we have always been absolutely confident that congestion pricing could not be taken down unilaterally by the federal government, that they're not entitled to terminate the program under the terms of the federal value pricing program, which is what it's called, or just basic legal realities.

Look, we have a contract with the federal government. They want to terminate the contract, and it's now in front of a judge. We're going to let the federal judge in the Southern District decide whether they're right or we're right. We're very confident in our position. Whatever they're saying internally is not where my head is focused.

Brian Lehrer: All right. I'm going to take a Jersey question for you, and then a Connecticut question for you. Listener writes in a text message, "I don't think you mentioned NJ Transit access to Penn Station. What are the plans for improvements which are desperately needed?"

Chairman Lieber: Our approach was to actually fix the New Jersey Transit side of Penn Station. New Jersey Transit's, the southern end of the existing Penn Station. Notwithstanding what The Post wrote today, they have a really cramped area that has a lot of problems as well. They also are tenants of Amtrak. I think we would all like to see the federal government fix something that works for the Long Island Rail Road and the subway customers were the biggest customers' base.

Also, NJ Transit. We were planning to deal with that side of the terminal, the existing terminal as well. New Jersey Transit does have a lot of riders, but they've been in free fall economically and in terms of their service over the last year or so, because New Jersey has not prioritized mass transit. They've been underfunding it. They haven't dealt with the decaying physical infrastructure. Chicago is in free fall financially and may have to cut service dramatically. SEPTA in Philadelphia is talking about cutting service 50%.

Brian Lehrer: Wow.

Chairman Lieber: Kathy Hochul, with support from the legislature, dealt with MTA financial issues coming out of COVID two years ago. We're in a solid position. We're increasing service on bus, on subway, and especially on commuter rails. Unlike the rest of the transit world, we're in a strong position financially. We just need to get through some of these federal dramas.

Brian Lehrer: Michael in Greenwich, you're on WNYC with MTA chair and CEO Janno Lieber. Hi, Michael.

Michael: Hi. I just am curious if Mr. Lieber could comment on the Effective Transit Alliance's report on through running. I know that you have already-- not you personally, I know the MTA has dismissed it. I'm just curious if you could give some more reasons about why through running isn't going to work for Penn State--

Brian Lehrer: By through running, you mean taking the New York lines that go into Penn Station and continuing to New Jersey without having to change to NJ Transit?

Michael: Thank you, Brian. Yes.

Chairman Lieber: Listen, your info is a little wrong, my friend. We actually think through running is a positive, and we want to configure Penn Station at the track level and through any expansion of the tunnel capacity, and so on, to accommodate future through running. We're not the decision makers, frankly. A lot of this is being driven by Amtrak and NJT's desire to deal with station capacity by building a whole new terminal, which would, in their view, tear up a block of New York City. Governor Hochul said that she doesn't prefer that approach.

We are actually interested in through running now. Some of the constraints are real. We don't have that much more tunnel capacity right now across the East River that we could magically-- In the peak, you're full up. We are interested in doing that. Obviously, New Jersey Transit has big infrastructure issues that would need to be dealt with before we could contemplate cross-state transit. In principle, we're open to the discussion, especially as we're trying to plan for the future.

Brian Lehrer: Barbara in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with Janno Lieber. Hello.

Barbara: Oh, hi. Mr. Lieber, in March, this March, seven bus stops were permanently removed on Kings Highway in Brooklyn, where I live, as part of a renovation project, including my bus stop. This action has seriously affected the day-to-day life of people in the area, as you can imagine. Excuse me. There's a long gap between remaining bus stops. There was absolutely no advance notice of this removal, no forewarning, no community meetings, no survey of users at these bus stops. The area is a food desert with no close grocery stores. I'm 81 years old. A senior citizen, as are many in the area. I have great difficulty walking, and there's already an express bus on the street. What can I do?

Chairman Lieber: Number one, you've already done the first thing, which is to let us know. I don't know that particular situation, Barbara, but we'll look into it right away and we'll put something on the website in answer to your query. We are engaged in a bus redesign project for Brooklyn so that we can make bus service better. We've done it in Queens. We've done it in the Bronx. We did it for Staten Island Express buses, but this is not from that. It's a temporary condition. I'll have to get to the bottom of what may have prompted it, as you said. Would you know what bus is it that you ride in that area, and we'll look into it?

Barbara: Sure, sure. It's the B82 bus and the B7 bus, and there already is what they call the select B82 bus that's unaffected by this.

Chairman Lieber: Listen, we'll take a look at it. Like I said, we'll put something out on the website and maybe share it with WNYC so they could put it up too, and try to answer your question that way. I just don't have the answer right at hand.

Brian Lehrer: That'll be great. Barbara, thank you for your question. I have a bus question. You know there's a mayoral primary going on in the city right now, and one of the candidates, Zohran Mamdani, assemblyman from Queens, talked on the show recently about his proposal to make city buses free. He says, among other things, "The pilot program that you've had with a few bus lines saw a 38%," I think his number was, "decrease in assaults against bus drivers." I'm curious if you have the same number or an opinion on the feasibility or desirability of that proposal.

Chairman Lieber: Number one, we have reduced the number of assaults against MTA employees year over year, and we're attacking that issue hugely. Nobody who's a public servant who's just out there doing his job or her job doesn't deserve to get attacked or spat on or disrespected. In fact, we're running a public information campaign on all the screens we have about respect for our MTA workers, because it's a serious issue, and I don't want any of our bus drivers to experience that. Here's the bottom line on free bus.

Mamdani is a supporter of transit, and we love having supporter of transit in elected office. We tried his idea of free bus on different lines. Most of the additional ridership was identified cannibalized other lines. You're taking people who are paying on other lines, and they were just getting a free ride, which isn't evil, but my basic principle is I want to target our subsidy to people who need it, which is why we support the Fair Fares program so strongly. It's the program that gives people of low income a half-price ride as if you were a senior.

We have pushed the expansion of that. We push for making the eligibility at a higher income level. We're signing people up like crazy, even though it's not our program, it's the city's program. We're the ones signing people up at our customer service centers because we want people to become eligible who are at the low-income level. Frankly, I don't want to subsidize middle-class and upper-middle-class New Yorkers who are using the system, who can pay, and who get the advantage of the fact that the transit costs 15% of the cost of owning a car.

I don't want to subsidize those people at the cost of not being able to do other stuff. Honestly, that's my view of the Mamdani free Bus agenda. I love the support for transit, but that's my view.

Brian Lehrer: Listener writes in a text, "I am disabled. How many elevators are being built with congestion pricing? Saw some small number. 29% accessible stations, more than 20 out of order at any time," writes the listener. I don't know if you'll dispute the number, but they write, "How many New Yorkers have mobility issues? Also, the closer I get to the Bronx, the more dirty and in disrepair." I guess they mean the elevators. "Unfortunately, I am forced to drive more." What do you say to that listener and others who have disabilities?

Chairman Lieber: Brian, you and I have talked about this before. I'm passionate about accessibility. When I got into this job, we had under 100 stations that are accessible. We're now well over 150, and we're building. I think we have another 70 that are in process. The congestion pricing is paying for a lot more ADA elevators. The new capital program, which is on the verge of being approved in Albany, will pay for another 60 to 70 new stations. We have settled the litigation with the disability groups who were rightfully frustrated that New York was moving so slowly towards full transit accessibility.

We are doing ADA stations five times as fast as the MTAs of the past. I'm very proud of that, very committed to it. The bus system is 100% accessible. The paratransit system accessorized, which is now mostly through black cars for hired vehicles, is now wildly more popular than it was before, with the highest customer satisfaction rate of any service that almost anyone in the New York area operates. We're 120% of where we were just a year ago and double where we were a couple years ago. We're trying to deal with the needs of folks who have disabilities and mobility impairments.

The transit system, bottom line, should be accessible to everybody, whether they're in a wheelchair or they have a stroller, whether just a regular old senior who doesn't like to climb stairs. We got to make the system accessible. We're on the road to get there.

Brian Lehrer: Listener writes, "Yonkers and the Bee-Line no longer have free transfer because of OMNY cards." I guess that's when people are coming in on buses from Westchester. Listener writes, "What can I do?"

Chairman Lieber: Number one, you do have free transfer. It's true. The Bee-Line in Westchester does not yet have an OMNY system. That's on them, but we push them, and they are on the path to get OMNY implemented by the time that we phase out MetroCard sales at the end of this year. We will get there. In the meantime, the listener's right. You can't use OMNY on Bee-Line, but by the time we have only OMNY at the end of this year, Bee-Line will be on the system based on what they are doing right now, and we're pushing them to get there.

Brian Lehrer: All right. I know you got to go in a minute. I want to thank you before you go for doing these segments with us periodically. You know when you come on a show like this, like any leader who goes to a town hall meeting who has a job like yours is going to get a lot of tough questions and a lot of people who are angry about one thing or another, even if they appreciate mass transit generally. I want to thank you for your accessibility to us and to our listeners and to the public, therefore.

Last question, I mentioned in the intro, the statement by Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy that transportation funding may go more to areas of the US with high birth and marriage rates to incentivize those lifestyles that they want to promote. Do you have a reaction to that, or how the MTA region would stack up?

Chairman Lieber: Honestly, to me, that's a head scratcher. What we're trying to do is to provide service to the areas that are most dependent on mass transit, and that's New York, where transit is what makes New York possible. I always say for New Yorkers, transit's like air and water. We need it to survive. I don't know why you'd give the money to Salt Lake City because they have bigger families, even though they don't use transit. Although a member of my staff coined a funny phrase, calling what Duffy's proposing, conception pricing. I dug that and thought I'd share it.

Brian Lehrer: Ending with a joke. The chair and CEO of the MTA, Janno Lieber. Again, we appreciate it. Thank you very much.

Chairman Lieber: You bet.

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Much more to come.

 

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