Byford left because Andrew Cuomo is an evil, incompetent megalomaniac who couldn't bear to see other people be more successful than him.
The subway desperately needs zonal fares. The system is way to big for one single fare to work in a way that is fair. Someone making a short trip in Brooklyn is charged the same as someone commuting from East Brooklyn to their job on the Hudson. Also, the current gate setup means that once you're in, there's no real way to enforce fares. This makes fare evasion much more appealing than on the Tube or Metrolink, where sure, you can get on a train without paying easy enough, but if you do that for a week's commute, your chance of getting a penalty fare/fine are pretty high. It also means that paying a single fare once and never really leaving (e.g. for panhandling) is the norm. I do feel bad for the homeless, but it's hard for random members of the public trying to get around to do anything positive about it. (Doesn't help many regional cities bus out their homeless for the big cities to deal with...)
The fact of the matter is, the cost to ride the New York subway is pretty low, given the cost of living and to an extent, incomes, of the city it resides in. If price rises could be distributed more evenly among passengers (with some zoning, subsidised fares for low income/students, etc), I think the subway could be in a more sustainable state. That said, the state and city need to stop raiding the MTA like it is some municipal piggy bank and start treating it like an organisation that actually matters for keeping the economy of New York moving. - Many of the issues reside with out of touch government, who never actually rely on these services for their day to day lives.
Theatre lol