Nj Transit

NJ Transit trains and rail stations may soon be Internet hot spots where passengers can access e-mail, browse the Web, and stream video and audio. The transit agency said Wednesday it was seeking a company to provide wireless broadband, or WiFi, Internet service for its 12 rail lines and 165 train stations. Internet access currently is available on Amtrak's Acela trains and on many international trains, but it remains a rarity on U.S. transit systems. In issuing its request for proposals from WiFi providers, NJ Transit said it hoped to award a contract by the end of the year and have the system available to riders by next year.

NJ Transit is eliminating a favorite morning commuter train to Philadelphia from Atlantic City, in a cost-cutting move. Train 4610, which departs Atlantic City at 5:49 a.m. and arrives at 30th Street Station at 7:24 a.m., will be eliminated, as will the return trip, Train 4615, which leaves Philadelphia at 7:54 a.m. and arrives in Atlantic City at 9:24 a.m. The move, effective Monday, will save more than $500,000, NJ Transit spokeswoman Penny...

An NJ Transit Atlantic City Line train fatally struck an 82-year-old woman shortly after midday Wednesday in the woods east of the Atco station in Camden County, spokesman Dan Stessel said. The engineer saw the woman, from Hammonton, N.J., sitting on the tracks and sounded the horn and applied the brakes, but could not stop in time, Stessel said. The woman's identity was not released. Train No. 4620 had left Atlantic City for Philadelphia around 11:18 a.m., Stessel said. No one on board were hurt.

In an effort to reduce fatal train-pedestrian accidents, NJ Transit will increase police patrols at high-risk locations and step up public-education efforts, state transportation commissioner James Simpson said Wednesday. The Inquirer reported last week that at least 91 pedestrians were killed by trains on NJ Transit and SEPTA lines in 2010 and 2011. Many of those who died intended to take their own lives, often to the horror of train engineers, passengers, and bystanders.

POINT PLEASANT BEACH, N.J. - NJ Transit riders are not thrilled about the price of a ride, late trains and buses and service interruptions, and they gave the sprawling statewide system mediocre marks in a new customer-satisfaction survey. Yet the riders realize that few better alternatives exist. About two-thirds of respondents said they used the public transit system even though they had a car, and would recommend the system to friends and relatives. The agency released the first results Wednesday of Scorecard, an ongoing customer-satisfaction survey where riders are asked to rate the system on a scale of 0 to 10. NJ Transit's overall rating was 5.2, corresponding to "acceptable.

Earlier this year, Camden's ship came in. Now a train is headed to town. Gov. Whitman hopped aboard a backhoe Monday not far from where the USS New Jersey will be docked to initiate construction of the long-awaited, hotly debated Southern New Jersey Light-Rail Transit System. With a $604 million price tag, it's the largest public transit investment ever in South Jersey. When it opens in 2003, the 34-mile line will carry an estimated 4,500 commuters a day. Besides giving a needed boost to the cities on each end, this line is essential to promising plans to revive the moribund Route 130 corridor in Burlington County.

Two weeks after changing a bus route to make it more convenient for Audubon shoppers, New Jersey Transit reinstated the old route after borough officials and residents condemned the change. The controversy began shortly after Jan. 6 when the bus company rerouted its No. 450 bus from West Nicholson Road to West Merchant Street between Hampshire and West Atlantic Avenues. Within two days, borough clerk Lee C. Daniels said, he received "between a dozen and 15 complaints" about the change, which sent 18 buses through residential Audubon between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. weekdays.

Amtrak and NJ Transit yesterday approved an agreement to jointly operate passenger trains between Philadelphia and Atlantic City, clearing the last administrative obstacle to laying new rails to the shore. Reconstruction of the abandoned rail line, known colloquially as the "Gamblers' Express," will begin within months, officials said. Amtrak and NJ Transit plan to run 17 daily trains on the line, which is scheduled to start operating in late 1988. Officials of the two government-owned railroads had negotiated since Wednesday to approve the agreement to jointly operate the 76-mile route.

NJ Transit today will announce fare hikes of about 25 percent and widespread service cuts, as the agency tries to close a $300 million budget gap. Acknowledging the anger and financial pain the changes will cause bus and train riders, the agency's new chief, James Weinstein, said he expected the moves to push more commuters onto already congested highways. But he said that he hoped those shifts would be temporary, and that NJ Transit could rebound when the economy did. The fare hikes and service cuts will take effect May 1 if approved by the NJ Transit board.

A New Jersey Transit bus traveling from Philadelphia to Mount Holly came to a screeching halt last night when a robber shot the driver. The victim, 51, who was struck in the abdomen, was critically injured. The gunman got away. He was described as a thin, black man in his late 20s or early 30s, wearing a baseball cap and Army jacket. He boarded the bus in Center City, said NJ Transit spokesman Steve Coleman. When the bus stopped at Route 38 and Church Road about 5 p.m., the gunman rose without a word.