There's light at the end of the tunnel for the New York subway system.The graffiti, which for years smeared most cars is gone. The air-conditioners work and the interiors are kept clean.The trains run on time and derailments are largely a thing of the past. Even some of the stations have been repainted, retiled and made more secure.

The transportation nightmare that New Yorkers love to hate has been greatly transformed.The new look and improved service stems from a major commitment by the New York City Transit Authority and federal and state agencies to rehabilitate both the subway and city's bus transportation systems. The undertaking is the largest publicly funded capital programme in. the United States and will pump nearly $12 billion into improvements of facilities and rolling stock through the mid-1990s.

A key part to the programme's success has been the ability of planning professionals in the Transit Authority's Engineering and Construction Department to ensure that projects are completed on time and within budget.

They use personal computers running Computerline's PLANTRAC project management software to help make this possible. At any one time, as many as 300 rehabilitation and construction projects with a value of more than $3 billion, are monitored and controlled on the PCs. For the largest projects, the department uses Compaq 386-based personal computers.

Big Problem for the Big Apple

Modernising New York's transportation system is a task of mind-numbing proportions. The subway carries 3.5 million passengers daily, more than all other U.S. rail services combined. Virtually everything in the system - including more than 6,200 cars, 700 miles of track and 460 stations - is undergoing some form of modernisation. The same is true for the City's bus system, which has about 3,600 buses and dozens of depots.

In 1985 the Transit Authority hired Steven J. Manne to assemble a project control organisation to help manage the giant undertaking. The 50-year old engineer and project control professional brought with him nearly two decades of project management experience from the nuclear and aerospace industries.

Manne's philosophy was "he who fails to plan, plans to fail." When he walked into his job in the engineering and construction department, planning was virtually non-existent. No one individual was accountable for projects - many of which had been delayed for months, even years. No clear-cut mechanism existed to determine whether contractors were deviating from agreed-upon schedule or charging too much money for their work.

PLANTRAC answer

One of my first tasks,' said Manne, 'was to find a project management system which could meet both our budget and diverse planning needs.' He evaluated numerous project management programs for microcomputers, minicomputers, and mainframes before settling on the PC-based PLANTRAC system from Computerline.He chose the package because it was the first to take full advantage of the power of personal computers.

It permits his organisation to plan the design phase of a project, set baseline schedules for hid documents and evaluate the proposed schedules of contractors. Money, manpower and materials for each of the thousands of activities ol a project are keyed into the software by planners. Once a project begins, Mamie's department, which now numbers 196 people, can readily monitor a contractor's progress and performance.

Microcomputers are remarkably cost effective' he - said. 'If you were to take the total cost of all our microcomputers and all the software we run on them, it would be at least an order of magnitude less than the operational cost of a mainframe system.' Putting the costs into perspective, he said, 'In the past I worked at a place where we updated our project plans on mainframes. It cost us $3,000 to $5,000 every time we updated a plan. Now you can buy a PC and software lor less than $10,000 and use it 24 hours a day, seven days a week.'

Initially XT- and AT-class personal computers were used in the Transit Authority's Brooklyn headquarters and project field offices. 'We wanted more powerful machines, so when the Compaq Deskpro 386 machines came out, we started buying those and their performance has been impressive, even for large projects.'

Take the refurbishment of the Lexing-ton line that cuts through the heart of New York City. It entails costs of $250 million and involves more than 6,000 activities, ranging from upgrading tracks and signals, to installing new electrical and communication systems. All of these activities and more are scheduled and controlled by PLANTRAC on just one 386-based system. Updates and revisions to plans can be prepared in short order.

Manne lound this approach much simpler than a mainframe solution. 'Even if we could find a mainframe big enough, it just wouldn't be cost effective,' he said. 'If we were to run our project management on a mainframe, we'd have to worry about communications from 30 field offices. We'd have to worry about data security. And we'd have to worry about too many people competing for computer resources at the same time. If all of our offices tried to update their projects at one time on a mainframe, we'd bring it to its knees.'

Many of the people in Mamie's department work in field offices at project sites all over New York City. With the help of PLANTRAC and Compaq portables and other PCs, they monitor work progress first hand and update schedules on a daily basis. If there's a hitch - much of the New York City subway system is over 100 years old, so there are often surprises and 'hitches' during construction - then cost and scheduling [actors can be readily adjusted.

• Cleaner trains. The last graffiti train made its final run in May 1989. The Transit Authority has built new car washing and cleaning facilities. It also added secure storage for thousands of cars when not in service.

 Safer tracks. Five years ago there were about 400 'red tag' areas on the subway system where trains had to slow down because the track was in such a had state of repair. Derailments were common. Today, there are only a few bad areas left and derailments are down to one or two a year.

• Better buses. New York City buses used to be dirty, vandalised and in general disrepair. Now, Manne claimed, there is not a bus on the streets of New York which isn't clean and free from body damage. 'We had to rehabilitate our existing bus depots and build a couple of new ones. Now, every bus is inspected before service, and if it is dirty or if something doesn't work, the bus is taken out of service and fixed.'

• Minimal schedule interruptions. Even with all the construction, commuters are rarely inconvenienced. 'Five million people rely on us to get them to and from work each day,' says John Pantelides, manager of project controls. 'We can't just shut down a subway line or even a single station. How are those people going to get to work? All projects are planned around the needs of commuters at rush hours. The requirement is even placed in bid documents.'

The New York City Transit Authority is changing a negative image to a positive one. Now, officials from the federal government's Urban Mass Transit Administration and other transit authorities are sending employees to New York City to learn how to duplicate the Transit Authority's project management program. Recent authorities represented include the Long Island Railroad, Dallas Area Rapid Transit, Chicago Transit, and the new Los Angeles subway system. 'They look at the size and number of the projects we're currently planning and can't believe we're doing it all on PCs', said Manne.