Finally, editors rate our lousy transportation system

Commuters muscle their way through doors at Penn Station in Manhattan.

One Friday night in September, the line at the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Manhattan stretched to the level below where commuters board NJ Transit buses.

Rush-hour traffic comes to a dead stop on the Garden State Parkway.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

Today's front-page story on prospects for a higher gasoline tax is the first in many years to rate the state's transportation system as "among the worst in the country with little money for repairs and improvement."

Typically, the editors of The Record have responded to increasing road, bus and rail congestion by assigning reporters to cover transit-agency meetings.

Today's Page 1 story is tricked out with photos and a graphic, but not a single quote from a commuter experiencing the crush of rush-hour travel.

Christie apologists

Much more is missing. 

Soon after he took office, Governor Christie launched his war against the middle class by pulling the plug on the Hudson River rail tunnels, the first major expansion in decades.

Christie also has shied away from pressuring the Port Authority to expand the bus system by adding a second, reverse lane into the Lincoln Tunnel.

Commuters' viewpoint?

Instead of running inane photos of fender benders to fill the Local news section, the editors could run photos of commuter hell, and actually quote drivers and rail and bus riders on what they experience.

Then, officials may finally be able to muster the political will to pass a higher gas tax, fix our roads and expand our transit system.

Good, bad reporting

Last year, Staff Writer Karen Rouse did tackle the reasons for the big crowds at Penn Station in Manhattan, but that followed a number of anti-light rail takeouts from Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza and his then-pet transporation reporter, Tom Davis.

Turn the page 

One glance at the unflattering photo of Mike Kelly, complete with shit-eating grin, and just a few words like "chortle" and "beery" are enough to turn off readers to whatever he is writing about, as in today's A-1 column on a state song.

Three corrections stand out on A-2 today, two of them from the thin Travel section and the idiotic Readers on the Road feature.

Hackensack news

On the Local front today, head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes presents the first Hackensack news since March 22, a story on plans for a new Anderson Street rail station.

The story makes no attempt to explain why it has taken more than four years for NJ Transit to unveil plans for a new station, which was destroyed by a fire and explosion on Jan. 10, 2009.

And the story fails to note that in its final years, the station's waiting room was closed, and ticket machines were outside, where sun often prevented commuters from reading their screens and buying tickets.  

That meant they had to pay a surcharge to buy a ticket on board the train.

They stand in the way of greatness

Governor Christie mocks Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney for being in shape. (Getty Images)

Everyone on Wall Street and Main Street knows that New Jersey desperately needs more -- not less -- tax revenue, as The Record's front page reports once again today. 

But Governor Christie continues to push for a tax cut that will benefit his wealthy supporters most of all.

Oh, The Record long ago stopped including in its Christie stories who would get the biggest cut in income taxes. 

A middle-class family would save about $80 in the first year, enough to buy a bag of groceries.

Instead, the editors continue to give Christie a front-page pulpit for his ridiculous plan, and regurgitate even the most outlandish B.S. from the GOP bully.

You'll find this illogical statement deep in the text of the main A-1 story today:

"Christie argues that an income tax cut would help the economy by bringing businesses to New Jersey (A-8)."

Marty makes it worse

Editor Marty Gottlieb and his Trenton staff continue to ignore reality: 

It's our enormous governor -- with his rabid, no-tax policies -- who literally stands in the way of New Jersey once again becoming a great state.

At least an editorial today notes "it's the arithmetic that counts, not the politics" (A-12).

But what readers remember is Christie's relentless P.R. campaign -- plastered all over the front page almost every day.

In the newsroom

In the Woodland Park newsroom, two enormous editors stand in the way of The Record once again becoming a great local newspaper.

In the last decade, local-news editors Deirdre Sykes and Tim Nostrand have squelched any meaningful coverage of the obesity epidemic in New Jersey or what state health officials are doing about it.

Look at the story on obesity and health-care costs at the bottom of Page 1 today. It's based on a new "study."

You'd think that after years of staring at their ugly, bloated bodies in the mirror, the lights would have gone off in Sykes' and Nostrand's heads about the need to report on obesity.

Instead, they just sought solace in eating more food.

Screw all commuters

The third major story on A-1 today shows Sykes and Nostrand have given up all pretense of trying to ease the commute of tens of thousands of readers.

A story on Route 3 construction is on the front page, but not because of the continuing inconvenience to commuters.

What the editors are really worried about is the work not being finished in time for the Super Toilet Bowl, a football game scheduled for 2014. 

Lazy news gathering

Sykes and Nostrand are so inept, they squandered their staff on four full days of reporting on the death of Barbara Vernieri, who was murdered on Friday before her East Rutherford home was set on fire.

The story was slowly reported four days in a row on A-1 -- not three, as I wrote earlier -- and Tuesday's account ended up demoting Mitt Romney's insulting remarks to somewhere inside the paper.

Now, a day after the entire country was discussing Romney's campaign, The Record finally puts the controversy on Page 1. 

Laziest columnist

If two lazy local-news editors aren't enough, the lazy Road Warrior columnist continues to ignore the needs of commuters by searching out every obscure story or simply relying on e-mails from readers.

Today's entire column by Staff Writer John Cichowski is about "Route 23 signage" and a single reader's e-mail (L-1).

Sykes, Nostrand and Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza had so little local news today they were forced to lead Local with Christie's remarks on the state Supreme Court.

Editors seem to be on vacation, too

The Record waxes poetic about grass-fed cheeses from sleepy Hunterdon County, above, but doesn't tell readers if any of them are served in Bergen County restaurants.

The Sunday edition of The Record reads as if all of the editors are on vacation -- along with hundreds of thousands of metropolitan area residents.

There is noticeably less traffic, though no fewer maniacs out there, and noticeably less news in today's Woodland Park daily.

Page 1 is filled with an endless he said/she said account of the July 14 death of Gabrielle Reuveni, the 2010 Paramus High School valedictorian.

The story never tells readers whether she used poor judgment by running with her back to traffic and the mentally unstable driver whose car ran her down.

Emergency room

The only news on A-1 is a round of layoffs at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center.

This account omits an important detail. As a non-profit, is the medical center under the same bottom-line pressures as a for-profit hospital?

Crystal-ball news

An A-1 blurb refers readers to more endless palaver on Governor Christie's keynote speech at the Republican National Mindfuck -- a news story on A-4, an Opinion front column and a Margulies cartoon showing our obese governor shoehorned into a "Jersey Comeback" race car that is going nowhere (O-2).

Neither story discuss whether voters would ever elect a candidate who can't control his many food demons or even if he is healthy enough to be president.

No local news

Readers looking for municipal news strike out again today in Local, the section under the lazy and incompetent direction of head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her deputy yes man, Dan Sforza.

Road Warrior John Cichowski hangs an entire column on a single intersection in Fair Lawn that he learned about from a reader's e-mail (L-1). 

Commuters can go back to sleep.

Home run for readers

The one L-1 story that shines is the obituary of Nancy Bays, a retired waitress from Elmwood Park who died last Sunday, six days shy of her 89th birthday.

Bays hated the Yankees. Don't miss the punchline at the end of the piece (L-7).

Say cheese

In Better Living, Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung writes an entire column about Bobolink Dairy in far-off Hunterdon County without telling readers whether its grass-fed cheeses are served in Bergen County restaurants (BL-1).

The Real Estate front celebrates the greed of investors who make huge profits off of the misery of people who lose their homes to foreclosure (R-1).

Reader beware. 

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