People

Earlier this week, there was good news for transit riders: MTA tax receipts came in higher than expected, providing up to $40 million in additional revenue this year. While the MTA isn't scheduled to update its budget until summer, there is already talk of using the money to restore cuts or expand service.

State Senator Marty Golden, a former police officer and prominent Brooklyn Republican, has joined forces with the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association and AAA New York to oppose speed cameras. Now that Golden has succeeded in keeping them out of the state budget, he says he might be open to the idea, after all.

Electeds and advocates have until June to push speed camera legislation through Albany, as the proposed NYC demonstration program was not part of this year's state budget deal.

As New Yorkers wait to find out if Governor Cuomo is even thinking about finding someone to chair the MTA, his lack of attention to transit stands in stark contrast to another northeastern governor -- one who in the past six months not only named a new transit head, but also released a plan to fund the state's transportation system and made it a focal point of his State of the State address.

If you thought Albany had gotten over the habit of raiding the MTA for cash, think again.

Governor Cuomo's state budget proposal includes hundreds of millions of dollars in discretionary spending for what one administration official has called "transformational projects." It's not clear what the loosely-defined pot of money will be used for, but so far the rhetoric indicates that Cuomo's wide, transit-less, double-span Tappan Zee replacement bridge could be one recipient.

When it comes to Governor Cuomo and the MTA, no news is bad news, and the governor's 2013 budget contains nothing new for the transit agency's operating budget. With debt, pension, and health care costs on the rise, the MTA continues to slowly drown in red ink, relying on straphangers to keep it afloat.

Governor Cuomo's post-Sandy infrastructure commission unveiled its recommendations [PDF] last week, and while it focused heavily on hardening the city's transportation network against future storms, it also offered glimpses of how infrastructure could be more resilient in the wake of disaster, with Bus Rapid Transit playing a prominent role.

Tuning in to this afternoon's State of the State address, you could be forgiven for forgetting that New York depends on the nation's largest transit system -- a system burdened by debt and ravaged by Hurricane Sandy, which is in desperate need of leadership from the governor. Between the inside political jokes and grand pronouncements, Andrew Cuomo barely had time to talk about what makes New York's economy run: its transit system.