By Philip Newman
Straphangers: Has taking the subway in the past year often been a bad dream of pushing and shoving bodies on platforms and inside trains all ending in late arrivals?
It wasn’t your imagination and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority says 25 percent of trains were late, according to statistics covering the year ending in October.
Repairs, construction, maintenance and many more riders were big reasons for late arriving trains, MTA officials said. Much of the work is part of the still progressing recovery from Hurricane Sandy, which struck more than two years ago.
The MTA said weekday late trains have increased by more than 51 percent with weekend delays increasing more than 40 percent in the last year.
The number of subway riders hit 5.9 million in October, up from 5.7 million in the same month last year.
Meanwhile, the No.7 train extension from Grand Central Terminal to Manhattan’s far west side has been delayed once again.
MTA officials said the new opening would be postponed until sometime in April or June 2014.
The $2.4 billion project will allow passengers to ride to 11th Avenue and 34th Street on the No.7 train, which originates in Flushing.
Much of the delay has had to do with trouble with elevators in the station at the new station at the final stop of the No. 7 at the Jacob Javits Center.
