“We will be coming through with our snack service shortly; the list of items available for this trip is in the seatback in front of you. Today’s Wi-Fi entertainment can be found on the free app, today’s password is ‘JOY.’ The engineer requests that you stay seated and buckled till it is safe to move about. Just a reminder we are one of the few carriers that still does not charge for luggage as long as it fits in the overhead compartments. We are running slightly ahead of schedule today and will be arriving in New York eight minutes early. Have a wonderful day and thank you for riding with New Jersey Transit.”

These words will never be heard on a New Jersey Transit train—maybe the thank-you part. So they are raising our fares again; what’s new. What is not new is that the service does not improve, nor are there any plans for any improvements above. Think of the places I can fly to in the same three-hour commute. I can be on the beaches of the Cape, getting my Cajun on in New Orleans, enjoying the sights of Quebec, or in the water parks of Orlando. This past week alone there were three days of 90-minute delays, which turned the three-hour trip into a four-and-a-half-hour, one-way ride from hell. Add to this two days of poor AC and overcrowding, and I really need to win the lottery, and quick.

The Port Jervis line has a mixed bag of people to blame the delays on. New Jersey Transit operates the equipment, but the line from Suffern, NY to Port is Metro-North’s responsibility. To complicate matters even more, Norfolk Southern Railways owns the tracks after the 1999 split of Conrail, and runs freight on it to Binghamton. In August of 2011, Hurricane Irene devastated the tracks between Suffern and Harriman, and it was up to Metro-North to fix it. They had these mangled tracks back in service by November, as a Thanksgiving present to the riders. In the meantime, for three long months, we took the train from Port to Harriman, transferred to Metro-North buses that took us to the New Jersey Ramsey 17 station, where we then boarded New Jersey Transit trains for the rest of the trip. My trip has me transferring at Secaucus to a train that takes me directly to Penn Station a few blocks from my job. All in all, I think the riders gave the system a pass during Irene, especially when we saw the damage. The regular daily delays are another story.

The biggest culprit of these past weeks and other delays however is Amtrak, which rules the roost over Penn Station and the tunnels coming in and out of New York. If Amtrak is having a bad day, so are the 300,000 daily riders on New Jersey Transit. This week’s excuse was overhead power line problems, a typical excuse, and we were even warned this past Sunday that Monday’s commute would be delayed. Gov. Christie took time off from his campaign trail in Iowa to issue a statement that said in part “New Jersey Transit commuters were victimized by Amtrak’s indifference.”

The governor is calling on Washington to provide the funding for the needed repair and maintenance, but that has already been done. Back in March, the House passed legislation authorizing nearly $8 billion in funding for Amtrak. The measure authorized $470 million annually for the Northeast U.S. routes.

Amtrak’s spokeswoman, Kimberly Woods, said the rail line “regrets and apologizes for the inconvenience… this week.” She then went on to say that the problems, “demonstrate the urgent need for a funding solution so we can build and renew the infrastructure needed to keep the region and the economy moving.” Looks like a real spin zone going on, with the riders caught in the middle.