With the Tramway down for what the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation (RIOC) officially describes as an "indefinite" period, after a week with no transit alternative for schoolchildren and the disabled, and facing a 15-month cutback in subway service, the Roosevelt Island Residents Association (RIRA) has called a community-wide Town Meeting on transit for tonight (Wednesday, February 4) at 8:00.

The Tramway is down after last week's accident, but the Town Meeting was in RIRA's plans even before then, responding to a projected cut in subway service slated to start February 22 and last 15 months or more.  That service cut will replace the Q train - which normally runs every ten minutes during rush hour and travels down Sixth Avenue to Brooklyn - with a two-stop shuttle that will offer riders a choice of the Lexington Avenue station with no transfers, or the station at 57th Street and 7th Avenue, where transfers to the N/R line will be available.

Estimates put the transit time increase at about 30 minutes each way for the average Roosevelt Island commuter - more, of course, if a rider arrives at the Island subway station only to find his shuttle train has just left.

Even if the Tramway goes back into service - and some unconfirmed reports from sources in the know, but unwilling to be named, say it could be running again in as little as a week, presuming RIOC authorizes a re-start - even then, Tram riders can't use the Metrocard for free transfers from the Tramway to MTA buses or subways.  And for subway riders intending to use the Lexington Avenue subway line to travel north or south in Manhattan beyond the range of a normal bus trip, even the subway is currently a two-fare zone: Free "walking transfers" using the Metrocard are not available from the Lexington Avenue station of the Q line to the 59th Street station of the Lexington line.

RIRA has invited transit officials, RIOC officers, and politicians to attend tonight's meeting or send representatives.  At press time the list was incomplete.

RIRA's Common Council has also set forth a series of goals for tonight's meeting - among them rallying the community to press for a better transit deal overall: Restoration of Console Operators to the Tramway as a safety measure, the Metrocard for the Tramway, the free walking transfers between subway stations, assurance of continuation of the Island Shoppers' Bus (which the RIOC administration has talked of cutting or changing), and more timely maintenance of transit facilities needed by the handicapped, including the elevators at the Manhattan Tramway station.

RIRA also seeks the citizen backing that appears o be needed to gain recognition, as residents' elected representatives, for the organization's Common Council.  The RIOC administration of Jerome Blue, Ph.D., has ignored the Council's elected status, even referring to RIRA as "your club" at times, and has consistently treated it as just another resident social club.

Members of the Common Council also hope to deal with a fear that Blue will try to use any excuse to cut Tramway service or attempt to mothball the Tram completely.  In a recent New York Times article, RIOC spokesprson Michael Greason dismissed the Tram as a "nice icon" in language suggesting it is obsolete because it can't pay its way.  While RIOC claims the Tramway loses $700,000 a year, virtually all mass transit nation-wide receives government subsidies, while RIOC has claimed financial self-sufficiency for Roosevelt Island and has refused to ask for State subsidy of its operating budget.  Tramway boosters maintain the system could become a profit center if managed properly during the subway cutback, and might become profitable for the long term once Southtown is built, with buildings a maximum of three or four minutes from the Tram station.