Disability advocates told an MTA board committee Monday that AccessRide's paratransit reservation cutoff of 5 p.m. the day before travel makes it impossible for riders to handle last-minute plans, and urged the agency to extend it to 11:59 p.m.
"It is virtually impossible for me to schedule my appointments on a daily basis until five," said Veronica Johnson, who described using AccessRide for daily work, school and medical needs.
Rachel, who oversees paratransit, told the committee the agency needs reservation information the day before so it can build a schedule for the roughly 50,000 trips it runs each day. "We need that information so that we can get everybody picked up and on time," she said. Board member Garadnik asked what the rationale was for 5 p.m. specifically rather than a later time, and Rachel said the deadline reflects the hours needed to build routes and assign vehicles, not a fixed moment in time. She did not commit to changing the cutoff.
A speaker identified as president of the nonprofit Passengers United, Charlton DeSouza, told the committee the Omni fare payment system was down again, saying card purchases and reloads were unavailable at vending machines, online and at retailers, and called for the return of unlimited MetroCards.
Later in the meeting, the New York City Transit president led a moment of silence for Moet McCollum, a flagger who was killed while working on the tracks. He said the agency has roughly 400 flagging instances a day and described safety measures underway, including a program called SHARP that reviews hazards by job title. He said the incident remains under investigation by the NTSB, FTA and PTSB.
Senior Vice President of Operations Planning Heather Ferguson told the committee a track switch replacement project north of Marcy Avenue will affect J and M service on weekends and weekdays from Oct. 16 through Nov. 23. She said the 29-year-old switches were last replaced in 1997. The J line will be partially suspended between Myrtle Avenue and Jamaica Center, with free shuttle buses replacing service between Myrtle Avenue and Delancey/Essex Street on five weekends.
Board members raised concerns about the timing of materials sent ahead of votes. One member, David, said he has asked for materials at least a week in advance "for 11 years," and said board members cannot properly review spending decisions involving billions of dollars without enough lead time. The committee chair said she had asked President Critchlow's chief of staff to bring in another board representative so she could hear the concern directly.
David also questioned the agency's approach to bus fare evasion, in which enforcement teams identify riders and remove them from the bus. He suggested allowing riders to pay on the spot, possibly with a surcharge, rather than removing them. Critchlow said the agency is piloting new approaches, including tap verification on moving buses, but that fare evasion remains a bigger challenge on buses than on subways.
NYPD Transit Bureau Chief Shine reported that subway crime in August fell 7.3% compared with August 2025, with robberies down 28% and grand larcenies down 10%. Year to date through August, subway crime was down slightly, from 1,443 incidents last year to 1,440 this year.