MTA Will Now Tell You Exactly How Your Commute Is Messed Up

NEW YORK — When the subway turns into a dumpster fire, at least you'll know what kind of garbage exploded. The MTA is rolling out new alerts Monday that will more clearly describe how messes on the rails affect subway service.

The MTA has used the vague label of "Service Changes" to tell straphangers that trains were not running normally. Those made it hard for riders to quickly understand which lines were messed up and which segments were feeling the pain, the transit agency says.

That's why starting after the Monday evening rush, the MTA will put "Service Changes" to bed and instead use one of seven labels on service status notices that give more detail about what's not right.

For instance, if an A express train is forced to run along the local C line, the notice will be under the heading "Express to Local." Or it will say "Train Rerouted" if an A train is sent over the F line — possibly putting passengers two long blocks from their desired destination.

Just watch out for "Multiple Impacts," which will be used when several problems roil a line at once or one disruption falls under multiple status categories. "This is a more severe situation so you can plan accordingly," New York City Transit said on Twitter.

The new alerts are just the latest effort to improve communication under NYC Transit President Andy Byford. They will be used on the myMTA app and the MTA's revamped website, new.mta.info.

"New Yorkers live in the 'right now' and deserve helpful information in the moment so they can make the right choices about their travel," Byford said in a statement. "These changes provide customers targeted, at-a-glance information to help them quickly understand exactly what’s happening on their line."

Byford also wants to get rid of two other catch-all terms: "Delays" and "Good Service," the latter of which confounds straphangers experiencing less-than-ideal commutes.

In a blog post, Byford said his agency wants to use real-time subway data to help riders understand how the trains are running and what schedules they should expect based on the time of day and day of the week.

"(O)ur in-house teams are working to determine the best way to provide this information in a user-friendly way so we can remove 'Good Service' and 'Delays' from our collective vocabulary," he wrote.

Transit advocates praised the MTA for trying to give commuters more clarity when their trips are messed up.

"Subway service is getting better, but even on the most modernized systems, delays and breakdowns are inevitable," Nick Sifuentes, the executive director of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, said in a statement. "As the MTA works to reduce delays, this new approach to customer communication is a good step to help riders understand what’s going on and how to adjust their commutes when service interruptions happen."