At the rate things are going, it’s not going to be too long before New Yorkers start demanding new management at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority – either in respect of Governor Pataki at election time, for the governor has authority over the MTA, or the appointed chairman of the agency, Peter Kalikow. We have no particular gripe with these individuals personally, but if they can’t manage to run this railroad, maybe someone else should be given a crack at the job.

Certainly that thought must have occurred to commuters forced to evacuate the Atlantic Avenue station yesterday morning because a track fire was filling the subway with smoke. Some 30 people sustained light injuries, and four required treatment at Long Island College Hospital. Many more faced delays as the nos. 2, 3, 4, and 5 trains stopped service during rush hour. The Long Island Rail Road also shut down, which left some 3,000 commuters stranded.

This, moreover, is fast becoming an all-too-regular pattern. On Thursday morning, the no. 7 line went down, suspending service between Hunters Point and Times Square. Some 1,000 passengers, riding two Queens-bound trains, found themselves trapped in a smoke-filled tunnel and had to be evacuated. Just a day earlier, on Wednesday, a series of separate power failures shut down the Lexington Avenue line no fewer than three times in a single day.

The 350,000 riders who use the train regularly were out of luck during the morning and evening rush hours and, indeed, for most of the day. Apparently, salt and water had been seeping through a mysterious hole in the roof of the subway tunnel – over the course of several years, evidently – and short out a signaling box.

All of that happened just in the last week. In February, we saw the Grand Central Shuttle derail and a subway fire halt the D train in Brooklyn. And on January 23, a fire – which started in a homeless man’s shopping cart – spread to a signal-relay control room at Chambers Street and shut down the A and C lines for days. The 580,000 New Yorkers who ride those trains daily must have had the same thought: “What is going on here?”

The chairman of the City Council’s Transportation Committee, John Liu, plans to hold an emergency hearing. “Things are getting out of control and no one is taking responsibility,” Mr. Liu, a Democrat of Flushing, told Newsday yesterday. In 2002, the MTA refinanced its outstanding debt, which provided short-term savings to fund its 2000-2004 capital program. But now the MTA faces annual debt service payments of over $1 billion a year through 2031. According to the MTA’s July budget projections, debt service will consume 20% of the authority’s operating revenues by 2008.

Even after fare hikes and service cuts, the MTA faces a $696 million shortfall in 2006, which will grow to $1.2 billion in 2008, according to a study by the New York City Independent Budget Office. The MTA’s pension and health-benefit costs are expected to grow at an average rate of 10.2% through 2008. By contrast, New York City’s spending on those benefits for its employees will grow about 6% a year in the same period.

Now the MTA wants to embark on a new $27.8 billion capital plan for 2005-2009 that contains a shortfall of $16.2 billion, including a shortfall of $11.3 billion for maintenance and repair projects. In December, Mr. Kalikow encouraged Mr. Pataki to raise taxes and fees on businesses, utilities, and mortgages to fund the MTA. The governor included two hikes in his budget: raising the mortgage recording tax and motor vehicle fees. He’s offering Mr. Kalikow about $8 billion less than what he wants. Some in the state Senate have suggested a new tax on businesses in the MTA’s service area as a way to fund the system.

With the prospect of all this debt and taxes, the MTA was still willing to submit to binding arbitration over the Hudson Yards site after the Jets signaled their unwillingness to pay anything close to appraised value. It can’t be lost on voters that they had to pressure the railroad to look for the best price. Mr. Kalikow and his agency are still out stumping for tax increases and new state aid to cover the yawning gap between the MTA’s spending and its revenues. So people are going to start to think about demanding leadership that will finally get the MTA’s fiscal house in order instead of relying on ever-greater taxes and fares – and keep the tunnels clean and get the trains to run on time.