In general, subway and bus workers are paid less than their colleagues on the suburban railroad.

"Everybody thinks of both those railroads as suburban railroads."

Mr. Conway proposed the fare increases because the city transit system and suburban railroads are facing a budget gap of $388 million next year.

But in January 1992, the M.T.A. raised the city transit fare to $1.25 from $1.15, while leaving fares on the suburban railroads untouched.

A strike ostensibly protesting a traffic overload closed the extension of the R.E.R., the suburban railroad that makes Paris a 45-minute ride from the park.

The Montclair Branch was the first fully electrified suburban railroad, wired in 1930.

His aides said that one way to settle the question might be to cut state aid to the suburban railroads next year.

Equalizing the rate of subsidies by using state funds could transfer tens of millions of dollars from the suburban railroads to the city's mass transit system.

The defendants in the case are the state and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the umbrella agency that oversees the city transit system and the suburban railroads.

The reduction in capital programs for the Transit Authority would be $299 million and for the suburban railroads, $36 million.