MAINTENANCE MATTERS. New York Metro reports that, although the subway is still in good shape, the current budget raises the spectre of future decay. Back to 1975?

A sidebar offers some suggestions to improve the subway, borrowing the best ideas from other cities. One proposal suggests that the way to prevent passengers from being nudged into the way of arriving trains is to equip each station with sliding doors that open opposite the car doors after the train has stopped. The article borrows this idea from the Paris Metro.

The city that does this really well is Piter, where the sliding doors are most practical in the depths of the Russian winter, when the sun barely gets above the horizon and there may be thirty degrees of frost in the tunnels.

London Underground -- and now Washington Metro -- countdown signs to the arrival of the next train get rave notices as well.