Information boards providing train arrival and departure times will soon be added to 131 subway stations over the next year, according to the New York Post. (Actually, the article says "stations" but I think it actually means "subway station platforms" or "subway station lines." Hence, the busy Times Square station would probably count as about 10 stations, for the 1,2,3,9,N,R,Q,7 and S lines.) The MTA's Chief Transportation Officer explains what it all means for New Yorkers:

"The new system gives date, the time of day and this one will have more detailed information about where the next train is, how far is it... It's a better system than we have today."

Anyway, it's a bit of clever psychology on the part of the MTA, actually. For the same reasons that some banks post waiting times and some delis hand out numbered tickets to customers, it's been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that customers are willing to wait a significantly longer amount of time if they know "how long" they'll actually have to wait. So now, the MTA will have little or no guilt about admitting that the N and R lines are now running on the W line, and that means that the Q line is now running about 45 minutes late. Anyway, a big one-handed round of applause for the MTA.