why are the subway systems in Paris and London nicer than the NY system. I can understand some smaller and newer sytem being nicer but Paris' and London's are all from the same time period (older actually) and are similar in size (London's is bigger, I believe). Just curious of there are any tangible reasons. 

I have been to Paris several times and ridden its metro many, many times.  I have not been to London, nor have I ridden the NYC subway.

 

I will say this... Other countries, and Europeans in particular, put a high value on public transportation.  They pump a lot of money into subsidizing the mass transit systems (subway, rail, and air).  Part of it is a national sense of pride (particulary in case of air carriers).  Part of it is a need to help the poor and middle class with basic necessities.  Part of it is the culture that the people in those cities respect the physical structures (there are often bands playing in the larger Metro stations, playing for coins).  Part of it is to minimze cars in the inner cities. Part of it is that France (and many other countries) are basically police states in that there is a large police force and they never seem too be far away. Perhaps part of it is to minimize urban sprawl, I don't know about that last point.

 

The way the public mass transportation systems in Europe are funded is through the gasoline tax.  The roughly $3/gallon tax on gas/diesel goes a long way to paying for the subways, subsidizing the air carriers, and contributing to the national healthcare systems.

 

Just my thoughts.  I don't know the exact answer to your excellent question.

 

LL, I definitely agree that the NYC subway is the pits compared to its Euro cousins.  Some things that occur to me:

 

*NYC lines were built cut-and-cover, as a result of which, the platforms are lined with columns and the stations are generally pretty pourous (e.g., leaky); the London and Paris stations are beautiful vaulted affairs which I'm guessing means they were tunneled.

 

*The MTA has a pathetically paltry station cleaning crew which virtually guarantees that most of the NYC stations are incredibly dirty most of the time. 

 

*NYC's system is 24 hours which makes track and station maintenance slower and more expensive.

 

*NYC's system is largely unchanged in the last several decades while Paris and London have continued to expand service.  As a result of which, there are large chunks even of Manhattan with poor subway service despite extremely high population density.

Having ridden all three systems, I'd say it comes down to the mindset and budget devoted to cleanliness by management. Consider this: There is a second subway system in Paris, the RER, which is actually a regional rail system (think Metro North, Long Island Railroad or Chicago's Metra) and is owned by the French National Railways SNCF. Their attention to cleanliness is quite a bit less, shall we say meticulous, than the Paris Metro's. OK, actually, the RER is more like the New York City subway in terms of dirt and grime. And I didn't think the London Underground was all that clean. Nor was the Manchester Metrolink.

 

Now, if you ride the Washington Metro, that's kept more clean because the management puts more attention to cleanliness. I don't think it's as clean as it was in the 1980s, but it's still better than the MTA in New York, the RER in Paris, the London tube, Manchester's Metrolink or, for that matter, the Cleveland Rapid! All depends on where you go and who's running the show.

Having ridden all three systems, I'd say it comes down to the mindset and budget devoted to cleanliness by management. Consider this: There is a second subway system in Paris, the RER, which is actually a regional rail system (think Metro North, Long Island Railroad or Chicago's Metra) and is owned by the French National Railways SNCF. Their attention to cleanliness is quite a bit less, shall we say meticulous, than the Paris Metro's. OK, actually, the RER is more like the New York City subway in terms of dirt and grime. And I didn't think the London Underground was all that clean. Nor was the Manchester Metrolink.

 

Now, if you ride the Washington Metro, that's kept more clean because the management puts more attention to cleanliness. I don't think it's as clean as it was in the 1980s, but it's still better than the MTA in New York, the RER in Paris, the London tube, Manchester's Metrolink or, for that matter, the Cleveland Rapid! All depends on where you go and who's running the show.

 

kjp, thats certainly part of it but you can't compare DC's to Paris.  It is 1/5 of the size and 100 years newer.

i ride nyc's subway every day and have ridden paris' quite a bit as well. i finally just did london's this spring and rode all over the place.

 

i'd agree with what evryone else said. i'd just add that the european systems are much more supported by their national government than usa systems are. still, i'd guess ours are run more efficently when you look at the total costs.

 

also, its sort of apples and oranges, ny'ers grumble about lack of service in their nabes, but what we lack in comprehensiveness in nyc we make up for in breadth and speed as we have extensive express service. while stations may often be crummy and swampy, at the same time the per-ride fee is much less.

 

i guess i am saying service is much more important to me than cleanliness or looks of the stations. heck, if we are just talking about that all three of those systems lose to moscow, both in terms of costs and in the looks of the stations.

 

 

The New York stations themselves are much, much larger structures than are most stations in London and Paris, which operate shorter trains.  I haven't been to London but the Paris trains are maybe half as long as the typical New York trains.  In short it costs in the neighborhood of twice as much for NYC to rehab and decorate a single station as compared to the other old subways.  And the Boston green line stations are about the size of a tool shed compared to the NYC stations.   

 

 

also, its sort of apples and oranges, ny'ers grumble about lack of service in their nabes, but what we lack in comprehensiveness in nyc we make up for in breadth and speed as we have extensive express service. while stations may often be crummy and swampy, at the same time the per-ride fee is much less.

 

Actually, I think the Paris Metro is about the same price as the MTA, even with the crap exchange rate.  It might be partially zoned though, so the MTA might be cheaper for those who live near the outermost stations.

 

I'm sure we all have our own opinions as to the relative strengths of the three systems (I'm pretty sure I'm not the only daily MTA rider who would happily trade our subway with Paris's), but I think we all agree that the bottom line reason the NY stations are so crappy, even given their innate challenges (columns, length, etc.) is the $$ the MTA doesn't have to spend, or in any case, doesn't spend, on station cleaning and maintenance.  Though who knows if there are any differences in how the populations of each city treat their systems-I guess that could have an impact too.

 

 

The New York stations themselves are much, much larger structures than are most stations in London and Paris, which operate shorter trains.  I haven't been to London but the Paris trains are maybe half as long as the typical New York trains.  In short it costs in the neighborhood of twice as much for NYC to rehab and decorate a single station as compared to the other old subways.  And the Boston green line stations are about the size of a tool shed compared to the NYC stations.   

 

Excellent points.

oh thats right strap, currently the euro is worth less than a dollar. so the ny subway and paris subway are about the same costs (riding london's is expensive). i must have been thinking in british pounds for all of it or something.

 

that reminds me that one good thing about paris is that you an use the rer commuter train system as a form of express service thru the middle of paris (something london totally lacks). ny may have something more like that too in manhattan if the westside nj transit tunnel and the east side lirr access projects ever get built.

 

I am reminded of JSkinner's Stockholm thread: http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=12722.0

The currency conversion isn't an argument about what's cheaper. We don't sit here in the U.S. and say "geez, my lunch, groceries, gasoline etc. would cheaper/more expensive if I were in X country instead" any more than people in Europe or other parts of the world say the prices of their goods would be different if they were in the U.S. The cost of riding subways in a certain nation are usually relative to costs of other goods and services within that same country, or even within that same city.

 

When I was in the UK, a dinner entree at a pub cost about 10 pounds, a can of Diet Coke cost a pound, and 3.8 litres (or 1 gallon) of gasoline costs about 3.60 pounds. If I substituted the word "dollars" for "pounds" for any of those items, the numbers would still seem in line for us (although the gasoline is a bit higher but not terribly so).

 

The point is, even from an American's perspective, none of the costs of living in many other industrialized nations seem out of line in comparison to each other. The only time it seems expensive is when you have to trade in dollars for pounds at the currency exchange. But to someone in the UK, they don't sit around bitching that they're paying twice what Americans are paying for the same things. It's all relative to the cost of living.

oh thats right strap, currently the euro is worth less than a dollar. so the ny subway and paris subway are about the same costs (riding london's is expensive). i must have been thinking in british pounds for all of it or something.

 

Sadly (for us americans anyhow), the euro is still worth a lot more than the dollar ($1.38 last time I checked)- but I think a 10 pack of Paris metro tickets is only 12 euros or so.

 

^KJP, you are of course right that the cost of the system is only relavent when compared to local income levels.  That said, I'm guessing there are still material differences from city to city...and that those in the London transit community do in fact sit around bitching that Londoners have to pay more for transit than their peers in other cities.  Anyone got data comparing subway fare to median hourly wage? 

^ yep,i musta read that backwards. 2 in a row? no more posting drunk!

 

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

 

1 US Dollar = 0.72102 Euro

 

1 Euro (EUR) = 1.38693 US Dollar (USD)

 

 

here's aquick google scan for wages info. im sure there is better:

 

here's the average wages for 2004 in england:

 

Across the UK the average weekly wage in 2004 was £504.90 and the highest average wage was, not surprisingly, in London, where the average worker earned £680 a week.

 

this is all i found for france:

 

With an average net wage of 16 163 Euro per year paid in the private and semi-private sector in 1999...

 

2007 usa wages info from forbes:

 

According to the Census Bureau, "average wages "declined for the third year in a row," and "Labor Department data shows that the average hourly wage has been slipping since February, when it was $17.42 an hour." Moreover, on Thursday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that, "Investment banking paid an average weekly wage of $8,367, compared with $841 for all private sector jobs."

 

and from the us dept of labor:

 

AVERAGE WEEKLY WAGE IN MANHATTAN AT $1,453 IN SECOND QUARTER 2006

 

 

>Sadly (for us americans anyhow), the euro is still worth a lot more than the dollar ($1.38 last time I checked)-

 

Well I'm selling junk on Ebay for a huge profit to people in Asia and Europe as is anyone else with a brain.  You can literally just go into a store and buy something here at retail price, put it on Ebay, and sell it overseas for a 30% markup.  I sold something for $2400 that I bought for $1700.  It's a good deal for you and them.  A weak dollar is actually beneficial for a lot of things, some nations have even devalued their own currency as an economic strategy. 

 

Also whatever that cross-town system is in Paris, you need to buy separate tickets from what I remember sort of like PATH in New York (although I've never ridden Path so maybe it's the same tickets).  It's pretty funny how everyone seems to like the little tidbit about the art museum that used to be a train station but people don't seem to wonder "well where were the platforms and tracks?".  It's that cross-town subway now which runs along the river.  It's something pretty easy to sniff out for a nerd like myself who has spent free time looking for abandoned ROW's and so on but people don't believe me in person when I point things out since I don't wear a uniform or have any official credentials.   

 

 

Well I'm selling junk on Ebay for a huge profit to people in Asia and Europe as is anyone else with a brain.  You can literally just go into a store and buy something here at retail price, put it on Ebay, and sell it overseas for a 30% markup.  I sold something for $2400 that I bought for $1700.  It's a good deal for you and them.  A weak dollar is actually beneficial for a lot of things, some nations have even devalued their own currency as an economic strategy. 

 

 

What's moving the best?

Camera equipment.  Unfortunately I don't have enough time or money to dedicate to it or else I could study the auctions for specific items daily.  The bad part is everybody's doing it which hurts the domestic market for some things.  For example that old camera I bought for $1700 now sells on Ebay for well over $2000 to *everyone*, the US included.  For years they were selling around $1500 and now you can't get one for under $2,000.  There was a brief window where you could, if you had the money, go and buy several dozen of these and turn around and sell one a week for a year and you'd be paying your bills. 

I thought about doing this when I was in York, England and the owner of our bed and breakfast mentioned he buys stuff through a friend in the U.S. and saves a ton of money (even though he friend charges a 10 percent mark-up, plus S&H).

 

So anything else moving other than cameras??

That's what I know the most about and it's really ideal because they're fairly small and lightweight, although people can claim that they were damaged in transit when they weren't.  I had a guy in Japan trying to cuss me out in English (he got the words only half-right) claiming that something broke in transit when for all I know he had photographs of a broken one and he was trying to get another $500 out of me.  A lot of these people ask for no shipping insurance so that the true value isn't declared on the customs sheet and they can avoid import tariffs.  They run the risk of course of the item being damaged.  But it's pretty unlikely to happen considering a package sent overseas probably isn't handled much more than one sent to Indiana.  France has huge import taxes of something like 32% designed to protect domestic companies and dealers from just such a situation but Germany and Japan aren't as bad.