Members of the City Council would like to see New York City subway stations play by the same rules as its restaurants: post letter grades to tell the public how clean—or filthy—they are.

The idea emerged Wednesday during a Council meeting to discuss the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's budget, to which the city contributes nearly $800 million a year.

Queens Council Member Peter Koo posed pointed questions to transit officials about the crummy ceiling at the Park Place subway stop—the lower Manhattan station many council members pass through on their way to City Hall. Why does it never seem to get any cleaner?

"Do you guys have a budget to clean the stations?" Mr. Koo asked a panel that included Hilary Ring, head of the MTA's government affairs division. "Or we haven't delivered our message?"

Maybe, Mr. Koo suggested, the MTA ought to start rating the cleanliness of its stations for riders to review. The notion grabbed the attention of Bronx Council Member James Vacca, the transportation committee chairman.

"That's a good idea!" he exclaimed, slapping his desk. "I would like every station rated. We rate the restaurants and every takeout place. Why can't we rate stations on cleanliness, rats, water, garbage, graffiti?"

It was of little consolation to the committee that the MTA already conducts a monthly survey of the conditions of its subway stations and cars. The index, compiled and published monthly in advance of board meetings, rates each station by its appearance, the condition of its escalators and MetroCard machines, and the quality of information available to passengers.

But a spokesman acknowledged that the MTA breaks out survey results only by borough and doesn't use them to create a separate rating for each station.

While Mr. Vacca refused to let the matter drop, MTA officials demurred. A spokesman later said the agency wouldn't consider the letter grading system.

Mr. Vacca's interactions with the MTA panel were more vexed than usual because of a remark made by MTA Chairman Joseph Lhota earlier Wednesday. Mr. Lhota noted to reporters after the MTA board meeting that the City Council had little control to exert over the authority because most of the funding contributed by the city to the MTA is guaranteed by statute or contract.

That has helped drive tension between the Council—whose members hear from aggrieved constituents about fare increases—and the MTA, which gets the vast majority of its funding from customers and from the state through grants and taxes.

"What we hear is, 'To keep the MTA doing what we're doing, we need this [fare] increase,' and I don't know if most people accept that," Mr. Vacca said.

An MTA spokesman noted that the MTA chairman had also emphasized his willingness to work with the Council.

In subway stations, riders had a tepid reaction to the idea of assigning a letter grade to each stop. Walking through the Jay Street station in Brooklyn, Jorge Luna, a Ph.D. candidate at Columbia University, said the effectiveness of a ratings system would depend on whether the MTA then used the information to make changes. He previously studied the city's restaurant ratings.

"It depends on how they're going to use it to evaluate the system," said the 30-year-old Brooklyn Heights resident. "If you don't do anything with it, it's just going to annoy commuters with more signs.

"If you're just going to score everything and change nothing, then it's just a huge expenditure," he added.

Also passing through Jay Street was Anthony Walker, who is familiar with the restaurant ratings from another perspective: Mr. Walker is a cook. He didn't see a need for the ratings in the subway.

"I don't really see a point," he said. "It's subway stations—it's not like you eat or anything."

He said safety and making sure the trains are running should be top priority. He added that cleanliness wasn't that important. "As long as they're safe," he said.

Waiting at Brooklyn's Franklin Avenue station, Tony Lichtblau, 52, a grocery-store manager from Kings Highway, called the proposal "a waste of money."

"They are relatively clean," Mr. Lichtblau said. "Who needs a rating? If it has a 'D' grade, a failing grade, are you going to not stop there?"

—Alison Fox and Pervaiz Shallwani contributed to this article.

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