Which New York City Subway Line Is Really the Worst?

A programmer charted out two years' worth of service-change announcements on Twitter from New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority, focusing on problems with the often maligned B, Q, F, G, and L lines.

Here's a hint: It's not the G train. Programmer Alex Barkan has charted out two years' worth of service-change announcements on Twitter from New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority, focusing on problems with the often maligned B, Q, F, G, and L lines. Turns out the much maligned G still wasn't the worst when Barkan divided the number of incidents by the total number of stations serviced, which would make the shorter G and L lines competitive with its longer but still slow brethren.

Check out the "normalized" version of the data, which judges number of service changes per station (we've added the trains' logos to make the chart easier to read):

Compare that with the data that looks at the number of service changes overall:

Without leveling the playing field it's clear that the F train has been delayed the most. With alterations, the also maligned L train takes that honor. In neither case is the G the worst train. New Yorkers, you should probably just go ahead and apologize to the G already. Maybe.