Presented by Uber Driver Stories
It won’t be doomsday for subway riders quite yet, after the MTA
approved a $17 billion budget holding off on the drastic service cuts it has threatened because of its pandemic-induced financial crisis.
Instead, the transit agency’s
budget assumes — fingers crossed — that it will get a $4.5 billion cash infusion from the federal government. That’s roughly the amount Sen. Chuck Schumer has been
trying to secure for the transit system in recent stimulus bill negotiations. So gone, for now, are the 40 percent reduction in subway service the MTA had proposed. If the money comes through, it would be enough to close the MTA’s deficit for 2021 but still leave an $8 billion deficit in the following years. If it doesn’t come through, the service cuts and large scale layoffs could be resurrected in the new year.