The ‘ride’ stuff

MTA cuts seats to fit more people on E train

E TRAIN RIDERS are about to have more company on their commute — but there will also be more room.

Remodeled train cars (photo) that hit the E line Tuesday could pack in up to 10 more people apiece, now that the MTA removed seating from each end of the car.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority sent out two sets of 10-car trains made up of the reconfigured R160 model as part of agency chairman Joe Lhota’s $836 million plan to stabilize the subway. By the end of the month, 100 cars will be rolling along the E line, which runs on the secondbusiest subway corridor on Queens Blvd. into Eighth Ave. in Manhattan.

Among the other changes that’ll catch commuters’ eyes — floor-to-ceiling art, digital screens and more poles to grab on the inside. The exterior got a paint job with gold, silver, blue and black stripes.

“Providing a safe and reliable ride is what our customers demand and what the MTA is determined to deliver through our subway action plan,” Lhota said in a statement. “We do not have time to waste when it comes to improving the customer experience and service for our riders.

“This pilot goes directly to the heart of that goal by attacking a significant cause of failures on these cars and making a fast, targeted improvement. We also know that getting more passengers onto trains, in a more efficient manner, is absolutely essential — which is why we’re piloting the removal of select number of seats.”

Lhota, in unveiling his plan to fix the subway in July, raised the possibility of taking out seats on some cars on the L line and the 42nd St. shuttle. As the MTA remodeled the cars, crews replaced the train’s controllers, the accelerating and braking equipment that had been breaking down the most on this model.

“It would fail to control the speed, acceleration or braking of the car,” Phil Eng, the MTA’s chief operating officer, told the Daily News. “So we would have to then take them out of service.”

The R160 model that debuted in 2006 — made by Kawasaki and Alstom — rolls on 10 lines and travels more than 232,000 miles on average before a breakdown. That’s down 24% from a year ago.

Eng said the MTA added crews to its maintenance yards, from five days to seven days a week, three shifts a day.

“All the fleets that we have we’ve identified the components that have failed most frequently,” Eng said.

Officials would not disclose how much the remodeling cost, saying Lhota plans to detail his subway spending later this month to the MTA board.