New York City Transit is Twittering

It looks like the M.T.A. has finally jumped aboard the Twitter train.

Sewell Chan reports on City Room that the agency's buses and subway arm, New York City Transit, quietly set up the Twitter account NYCTSubwayScoop after the ceiling collapse at the 181st Street No. 1 subway station a few weeks ago.

Initially, the account was used to detail and chronicle repairs and subsequent service restoration at the station. Since then, New York City Transit has used the account to dispatch updates on construction and service disruptions at other stations. Although, it hasn't yet promoted the account, and as of the time of Mr. Chan's posting at 5:25 p.m. yesterday, August 31, it only had 370 followers. (That number had grown to 533 as of this posting.)

From City Room:

“We’ll slowly begin to add other content to the page as we go forward but it’s important to acknowledge here that service and or news related Tweeting is still very much a work in progress, a pilot really,” said Paul J. Fleuranges, vice president for corporate communications at New York City Transit.

In an e-mail message, he noted that several New York City Transit employees — Diane Chehab, Matthew McGevna and Lisa Schwartz — have already been authorized to Twitter about using the MetroCard. Mr. Fleuranges also noted that other M.T.A. entities — like the Metro-North Railroad and Long Island Rail Road — may be twittering on their own.

...

Mr. Fleuranges said, “All in all I do think it has been a success, as it allows us to provide information to customers via a communications platform that allows for direct contact with interested riders.”

Will the updates catch on? Given the intense level of interest in transit (at least among a core, dedicated group of riders and train buffs), City Room images the number of subscribers could quickly grow.

NYCTSubwayScoop's most recent update as of this morning was apparently geared toward anyone heading over to Arthur Ashe Stadium for some tennis: "Take the No. 7 train to the US Tennis Open. Extra service into Manhattan from the Mets-Willets Point station after the final evening match."