Author: subwayblogger

When will 59th Street Columbus Circle Close?

subwayblogger4 Comments

Honestly, there’s about 20 square feet of the entire 59th Street station complex that’s NOT under construction.

Every time I have to get off there, it is impossible to miss the fact that there’s very little area not walled off, torn up, or fenced. It’s getting a little insane.

They may want to just shut it down till it is done. Why? Because one morning, we will litterally get off the train and have no where to go.

On top of that, they’ve started laying tile in lots of seperate areas without completing a section. So a lot of the areas do not meet up seamlessly. So effed up.

Most Infuriating MTA Official Comments EVER!

subwayblogger5 Comments

David Mack (MTA vice chairman) stop being a dick.

David MackMack:

“If you [the average rider] saw something and called it in, it goes right there,” Mack told reporters at a committee meeting, kicking a garbage can.

“Why should I ride [the train] and inconvenience myself when I can ride in a car?” asked Mack, who has six free E-ZPasses. [New York Post]

In case you haven’t been following, the MTA Board is having a hissyfit because they are going to have their lifetime E-ZPasses and train passes taken away. Mack has SIX free E-ZPasses. However, he now claims to be paying them himself while behind the scenes trying to get board members to fight the proposed ruling.

Keep in mind folks, these jerks are multimillionaires who don’t want to pony up the money.

So his belief is that unless the trains are free, the board members won’t bother to ride…which relates back to his first quote.

The board members need to ride the train because, generally speaking, it is only the board members who get their complaints handled. When you and I report a problem, our complaints are ignored.

Idea: Standing Room only Subway Cars

subwayblogger10 Comments

Let’s kick this one around in our collective minds:  Standing room only subway cars.

What if we made every other car in a train standing room only?  We could get rid of all the seats in the train car, and perhaps add a few more grab rails and holding points.

Think of all the extra people you could fit on the train!  The elderly, handicapped, pregnant, fat, or just plain tired/lazy could go into the cars with seats.  Everyone else could find more breathing room on the seatless cars.

Ok, how would you know which is which from the platform?  Maybe the markings on the outside of the trains could be a certain color.  And always make the first car a seated or seatless car (just pick on and make it standard).

My other idea would be to make the seats all “flipable.”  Have you ever noticed the flip-up seats on the ends of trains like the 2 train or 4, 5, 6 train?  It’s usually just on the end of the train.  There’s a double wide seat that automatically flips upright to allow space for a wheelchair.

What’s nice is the fact that many people don’t bother to flip it down during rush hour.  What if all the individual seats on the train automatically flipped upright?  That would free some space.

Just drives me nuts when I see 350 pound people sitting, taking up 3 seats wide, and the standing room for 6  people.

More Train Problems

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There are mechanical problems at South Ferry, the turn around point for the 1 line. So selected trains are terminating there…whatever that means.

So there are big delays on the 1.

The F train is having issues because of signal problems. So that’s backed up too.

When it rains, it pours.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

More Craziness: Three Separate People Run Over by Trains

subwayblogger10 Comments

The natives are getting restless folks.  In 3 separate incidents, people found themselves under subway trains.

SUWBAYblogger assumes that they were suicide attempts unless other information is available.  Why?  Isn’t that cold?  Well maybe, but there’s good reason.

The media would report if someone were pushed onto the tracks.  That would be a big story.  If someone had a heart attack and fell accidentally, that would be reported too, but probably not as big.

Suicides, however, are very rarely reported (if ever) due to fear of the mentally unstable that my copy-cat the act.  So when people end up on the tracks, and then you never hear anything about it, it was probably a suicide.

Anyway, there was one incident this morning around 3:45AM at the Beverly Rd Q train station in Brooklyn.  Emergency workers arrived on the scene, but the person was already dead.

Then around 8:30AM, there was another jumper.  This time it was on the uptown 4 train platform at Union Square.  No word on that one, but going to assume there was a death there.

Then just a couple hours ago on the F line at Delancey Street, another person was “confirmed” to be pinned under a train.  The patient was removed in an unknown condition.

So yeah, it’s getting pretty crazy.  Next full moon, I’m just staying home.

Is it the beginning of the end?

subwayblogger1 Comment

I’m about one or two more back to back track fires away from taking cover in a bunker somewhere.  Seriously.  Things over the past couple weeks are just getting crazy.

It all started with summer showing up light a white hot freight train.  For weeks, we enjoyed beautiful mid 70’s each day.  Then, overnight it was 96 degrees outside…or 104 if you follow that “Real Feel” bullshit.

**Side note.  What the hell is a “Real Feel” temperature or heat index?  I know what it really means, but lets just make it easy.  Just tell me how damn hot it feels outside and leave it at that.  If it’s 86 outside but feels like 94, I want to know about the 94.  Screw the 86…who cares.  My ass is sweating.

Anyway, the heat showed up, and I started to brace for the subway heat as we’ve discussed at length in the past.  Interestingly, it was virtually the same day it hit as last year.  Also, we’ve discussed that it takes about a day or two for the heat to make it’s way underground.  Then it’s an oven.

So yeah, of course I was expecting the heat eventually, but not all this other crap.

Let’s start with the track fires.  It’s so damn hot that shit just randomly catches on fire on the PATH train tracks almost every week.  Switches, lights, and boxes in the subway blow up or short out.  How hot is it?  Hot enough to bring mass transit to it’s knees.

If there’s ever been an argument for better maintenance of the subway system (including upgrades), this is it.   Gas is hitting $5.00 a gallon all around us, more and more people are taking the trains, and we’re running a system from 1932.  Just wait and see how f-ed up it gets when the rain comes…

Then, there was last night.  I’m sitting in my apartment, and it’s perfectly quiet outside.  All of a sudden it sounds like rocks are being thrown at my windows.  I look outside, and it looks like a tornado is coming up the block.  I watches as a whole tree across the street became uprooted.

Then on the other side of the street, scaffolding started ripping off my neighbor’s building.  You know the scaffolding they put over the sidewalks?  Most usually have blue plywood walls put up around the first story of the scaffold.  Well, this wind started peeling off the 4×8 sheets of plywood like post-it notes.  They flew up the street doing cartwheels over the cars on the block. Read More »

Following an Earlier Incident…

subwayblogger1 Comment

“Following an earlier incident 2,3,4 and 5 train service has resumed with residual delays.”

They kept telling us there was a “track event” at 138th street.  I was stuck on a 4 train for 20 minutes between 59th and 86th st.  I had it good though, the car had A.C.  The people waiting at 86th were not happy.  It was hot and they were packed on that platform.  I can’t even imagine the chaos behind the backup at Grand Central and Union Square.

I love NYC in the summer time!

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