Five Years? Did He Say Five Years?

He meant nine days. Silly him. Most service on the A and C subway lines in New York was restored today. NYC Transit President Lawrence G. Reuter had initially estimated it would take three to five years to restore service, and then quickly changed that to six to nine months after bitter ridicule from journalists (and bloggers like me). I said last week that he was probably pulling both numbers out of his butt, and that turns out to have been the case. In fairness, making conservative estimates is probably wise. But estimating that it will take as much time to repair one small portion of the subway line as it took originally to build the whole line makes you look foolish and incompetent, which they apparently aren't. I hope that not too many people moved or bought cars based on the earlier estimate--I know I'd be pissed!

Another thing: the fire was originally blamed on a homeless person burning stuff in a shopping cart to keep warm. Apparently they have backed off that assessment:

On Monday, fire investigators said they had all but ended their investigation into the blaze, concluding only that the cause was "not ascertained."