Andrew Cuomo

Looking back on 2011, there was a lot more bad news for New York City transit riders than good news. The Straphangers Campaign released its annual list of the ten best and worst events for subway and bus riders, and topping the "worst of" list are three separate ways that Governor Andrew Cuomo has attacked transit funding.

Despite intense opposition from nearly every local elected official and a total lack of public input on the new design, Governor Andrew Cuomo and the state Department of Transportation are moving forward with plans to build a new Tappan Zee Bridge without transit.

Albany’s latest raid of transit funds could hit New York City particularly hard. To help pay for his upper-middle-class tax cut, Governor Andrew Cuomo and the state legislature are stripping an estimated $320 million a year in revenues from the MTA payroll tax. Although the legislation is said to contain a pledge to find equivalent funds elsewhere, the as-yet unspecified reimbursement mechanism is likely to make the transit agency more vulnerable to future cuts, as Streetsblog noted last week.The potential deterioration in service could easily end up costing drivers and transit riders more in lost time and damaged health than they will gain in lower taxes.

Anger over Governor Cuomo's disregard for transit riders during this week's special session continues to grow. Since yesterday, two new organizations have signed on to a letter calling out the governor for neutering transit lockbox legislation that the State Assembly and State Senate had passed unanimously. The League of Women's Voters of New York City and the Center for Working Families are the new signatories.

Governor Andrew Cuomo and the leadership of the state legislature added insult to injury last night, neutering the transit lockbox bill even after they put hundreds of millions in dedicated transit revenue at risk. While lockbox language did make it into the omnibus legislation passed last night, the governor's office stripped out the meaningful provisions and added a giant loophole.

Even as Governor Andrew Cuomo moves to put $320 million in dedicated transit funding in a precarious position, he still hasn't acted on transit lockbox legislation which would help protect the dedicated funds that remain.

The details of Governor Cuomo's economic plan, which includes both tax reform and a new infrastructure fund, were released today with support from Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos.

According to the State of New York, spending $5.2 billion on a new Tappan Zee Bridge is affordable, but spending another $1 billion for a 30-mile bus rapid transit corridor is a bridge too far.

Call it the mystery of the missing transit. One of the state's biggest transit projects, in the works for nearly a decade, was canceled overnight and no one will explain why, or even claim responsibility for the decision.