Hey it is a short week for some

January 16, 2007 subwayblogger1 Comment

SUBWAYblogger read in the New York Times this weekend that many employers don’t recognize Martin Luther King Jr. day as a company holiday. So few in fact that the city transit system runs on a normal schedule.

Yesterday, both commutes looked just like normal days. You wouldn’t have known at all that yesterday was a federal holiday.

What’s sad is that there’s a more noticable drop in ridership on Jewish holidays than MLK Day! Not that the Jewish holidays are any less significant, but they aren’t recognized federal holidays.

Live from the subway, back to you in studio…

Update: Electronic Signs

January 15, 2007 subwayblogger5 Comments

Well, it turns out there was a truth to the headline SUBWAYblogger wrote the other day.

The test went…umm…ok? Oh screw it, the signs didn’t work correctly. The signs regularly overestimated the arrival times of the trains!

The crazy part of the story is that the signs won’t make their way to the other subway lines until 2008 or 2009. Wow…talk about not holding your breath. By the time they get these bad boys up and running, the the Tube in London will have a few dozen plasma screens on each platform. The Tokyo subway will beam the location of the next train automatically to your cellphone in real time. Then, there will be NYC, with our hardly reliable, two line, LED screens. Sweet.

To add insult, other lines aren’t ever going to get the signs:

…there is no plan to extend the notification signs to the lettered subway lines, whose nicknames — “Forever” for “F,” “Never” for “N” and “Rarely” for “R” — indicate that such signs might just encourage riders to surface and walk or take a taxi.

Mmm…nice.

Your train will arive in 3 minutes…ummm give or take 3 minutes.

January 13, 2007 subwaybloggerLeave a comment

The electronic message boards have finally arrived on the L line. They aren’t fully operational just yet, but they are being tested. As a matter of fact, many of them are lit up already. You can see what they look like.

Unfortunately, the information displayed isn’t necessarily accurate yet.

“With the introduction of this new system, garbled subway messages are on their way to becoming a thing of the past along the L line and eventually the entire system,” Metropolitan Transportation Authority CEO Elliot Sander said.

The signs were supposed to be up and running back in July. What a shock…didn’t happen. But any week now, they will be up and running in full force. Next step? Outfitting the entire subway system. Let’s hope it all works before 2015.

Look at grandma move

January 12, 2007 subwayblogger2 Comments

It always amazes me how fast old ladies move to get a seat on the subway. Some of these old bags really move! They will dive across people just about if they see just the slightest bit of room on the bench.

These old ladies will knock down other old ladies…even children!

They always look so innocent. Awww, here comes grandma with her earmuffs on in July. Then out of no where, they are plowing their way through the crowded train.

The looks on the faces of people that find themselves in the path of grandma-danger are priceless. It’s like holy hell lady, where’s the fire?

Live from the subway, back to you in studio…

SUBWAYblogger wants an iPhone

January 11, 2007 subwayblogger2 Comments

So it’s official, SUBWAYblogger sweats the new Apple iPhone, and isn’t even out yet!

The New York City subway will truely be the testing ground for the device. Down here is where you’ll probably see the highest concentration of them once the hit the market.

Look at what’s here already. The iPod dominates the transit portable electronic device category. Within 43 seconds of a new iPod version hitting the shelf, dozens of people are using them on the subway. The PSP and Gameboys are everywhere too.

Straphangers love their techno gadgets, and the iPhone will be the master of them all.

Email, Internet (when there’s a signal), games, phone, music, movies…this thing screams subway user.

Do you think if SUBWAYblogger make the iPhone our official device they’ll give us one? Yeah…me neither.

Live from the subway, back to you in studio…

Communist door chimes

January 11, 2007 subwaybloggerLeave a comment

What the hell is that sound? You know the little two tone chime that the doors make as they are closing? Well, I’m on a car that’s making a sound you rarely ever hear.

There’s basically two main chimes that you will find on the subway. The older lines have one sound, and the new express trains play a slightly different version.

Every now and then, there must be a bug in the “chime system” of the older trains. For some reason, the familiar two tone is replaced with some random chime. It’s not even like it is a subtle difference. It is waaaay off.

So how does that happen? Somewhere on this train is a device who’s only job is to play “bing-bong.” That’s it. It only has one purpose in this world. Out of nowhere, it decide to play a different tune. Kinda makes you wonder what else on the train does what ever the hell it wants.

Live from the subway, back to you in studio…

Yep it is cold

January 10, 2007 subwaybloggerLeave a comment

WTF? Did it snow for 30 seconds today? Yeah, yeah it did.

Ok, so it was 73 in Central park 4 days ago, and today it snowed.

This is how January should be in New York. Cold. This is the time of year that makes you appreciate the subway.

How relieved are you to finally make it to the stairs for the subway when it’s 30 degrees out? That’s a good feeling.

Unlike the summer, the platforms are even comfortable. At New York’s coldest, all you need underground is a light jacket. At street level, you’ll need foul weather gear. So screw waiting for the bus. Those shelters don’t help a damn bit. No matter what, the wind always comes from the open side!

Live from the subway, back to you in studio…

How often does this bad boy get a scrub

January 10, 2007 subwayblogger

Did you ever stop and wonder how often a subway car gets cleaned? You’d think that they get at least a walk through to pick up trash on a fairly regular basis, but how often are they really CLEANED?

SUBWAYblogger’s going to do a little homework on this one.

Logic says that each train car probably rarely gets a scrub. You figure that millions of people ride the subway everyday, so how much time is really left to give the cars a good cleaning? Probably not much. Sure, there’s a service rotation that each train goes through, but I’d imagine that they don’t get this kind of service very often.

That’s the basis for why SUBWAYblogger avoids touching things on the subway. It’s not an OCD sort of thing. It’s a “you can feel the grease” on the grab rails kinda thing. You can write your name in the “hand juice” on the poles. Ewww.

So I wonder if the MTA can get out a wetnap from time to time.

Live from the subway, back to you in studio…

Random Stabbing on J Train in Brooklyn

January 9, 2007 subwaybloggerLeave a comment

Following up on what we posted earlier, there was a stabbing on the J train in Brooklyn. However, the victim is 17 years old, not 15 as we previously had heard.

At this point, there isn’t much else that is known. Police say they may have a suspect in custody.

The weapon was a scary looking filet knife, about 8 inches long and curved.

The kid that was stabbed is in critical condition.

How he got stabbed is anyone’s guess at this time. The police aren’t really letting much information out, so that’s it for now!

The cold is back and there is a stabbing on the “J” train

January 9, 2007 subwaybloggerLeave a comment

How’s that for a badly written headline?

Getting the formal business out of the way, there has been a stabbing on the J train. A 15 year old was involved. That’s all SUBWAYblogger caught before hitting the streets to head home. We will have an update later tonight.

Otherwise, the cold is quite the smack in the face, huh. The funny part is that is really isn’t that cold! It’s just a hell of a lot colder that it has been the last few days. Going from 73 degrees to 43 degrees in a day is a bit of a shock.

The subway had been empty during the warm snap. I guess many people just decided to walk instead!

Now things are getting back to normal, and the volume on the train is back to its normal “pack.”

All for now, and a follow up on the stabbing in the near future.

Live from the subway, back to you in studio…