Subways are for sleeping: NYC Transit survival thread

Walk the bridge

About to jump on the E/M line towards Queens, which MTA does not say is fucked up. P sure it will be fucked up anyway, even on half of good days it's fucked up.

Hurting, did track fire at 36th affect you this morning?

an F train went out of service at bergen this morning, so Fs and Gs were stacked up in a holding pattern. got on a packed F at carroll, sliding past this ian holm-looking motherfucker who was, of course, camped in the doorway like a bbenbag. ('it's cool; he was there first!') everyone's sardined in their coats and it's getting warm. ian holm -- who was carrying a briefcase despite not being dressed like a briefcase carrier -- pulls a scrambled-egg sandwich out of his coat pocket, tears it in half, and starts eating it.

or trying to -- he's high, or drunk, or somehow otherwise disabled, and there's egg on his face and his shirt and he's wiping his fumbling, eggy fingers all over the pole, swaying over the increasingly alarmed woman sitting beside/beneath him. we're finally moving at this point, and the doors are closed and the moist, eggy smell is becoming overwhelming.

curiously, i don't really question the series of random events that led to my living in nyc. it's cool here. but i can't take much more ian holm

xp: who ever really knows? There were delays. There are always delays. We never know what they are really about. I feel it is unreasonable at some point to call them delays when they are routine.

I blame Cuomo.

xp: who ever really knows? There were delays. There are always delays. We never know what they are really about. I feel it is unreasonable at some point to call them delays when they are routine.

― five six and (man alive), Friday, March 6, 2015 9:51 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hearing this to the tune of a hold steady track

Due to @MTA signal problems @ World Trade Center, MN, service changes & delays on A,C,E,F & G Trains citywide. Info: mta.info.

why is the G, which doesn't go to manhattan, delayed

https://subwayrecord.wordpress.com/2015/03/26/a-guinness-world-record-diary-dr-strangeline-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-about-the-amateur-new-york-subway-riding-committee-and-love-the-mta/

One of my favorite transfers was at Park Place/World Trade Center. I found this transfer interesting due to the layout of the station. In order to transfer normally from the E to the 2/3 train, you have to take the stairs at the far north end of the E platform, walk several blocks north through a long passageway to the A/C platform, and then walk that same distance back south to take a stairway up (followed by several flights of stairs down) to the 2/3 platform (path marked in blue below). However, subway patrons who have unlimited passes, as I did, can ascend those same stairs from the E train platform, exit at the turnstiles, cross the hallway, and swipe back in at the stairs to the 2/3 platform (path marked in red below).

i had to go from the 2/3 to the 4/5 at Fulton in a rush-hour clusterfuck earlier in the week, my god, what a joke

fulton station is my life

that's a fun read caek

I've got it open but can't read if I want to get my work done today

even as someone who knows virtually nothing about the MTA it was a really fun read

I LOVE THIS!!!

http://harpers.org/archive/1956/03/subways-are-for-sleeping

what the

http://cdn-sas.secondavenuesagas.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/63-Street-Tiles.jpg

too much time on ilx + wtf with that font

omg that is my favorite subway station!!

bcz of insane long escalator?

Can we take a minute to talk about the Lexington Avenue-63rd St. station? It is so fucking cavernous and so far underground and every time I use it I feel like I'm stuck in some sort of early 1970's version of purgatory. It's amazing that it's so big and used for just one line! Also, apparently it didn't open until 1989 but looks/feels like it was designed much earlier. I mean, those fucking tiles, oh my GOD! And also the way the signs above the (neverending) escalators are designed and how dirty they are; the whole thing just seems so surreal to me. Do stranger stations exist?

― the aztec mystic pizza (Stevie D), Monday, July 12, 2010 5:39 PM (4 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

tbh that typeface matches the gritty dated feel/design of that station quite well

not just the escalator but how high the ceilings are, it feels SO BIG

these signs tho

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tNtrJWoYwjs/TiMcWkV9fqI/AAAAAAAAFAE/xIMCyu-26Is/s1600/IMG_6251.JPG

ok that's a pretty wild piece of signage

and the lights never light up and they're so dirty and the platform tiles are BRIGHT ORANGE

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZCo86g3T5KY/TbyzzOSY4GI/AAAAAAAAE1g/_PCdGDs00kg/s1600/IMG_5531.JPG

Roosevelt Island beats all for depth of pit and late Space Age design sensibility, love that place.

i was at the lex/63 yesterday; it takes like two full minutes of walking up stairs to get out of there, not fun.
plus with the construction on the F line there is basically a single path to walk and if people are leaving and getting on at the same time it feels genuinely dangerous.

i agree, it's horrible, tho i hardly ever have to use it

those orange tiles usta be all over the system

Oh, I've never not taken the escalators. Forks, it was the stop I got off at every time I went to SummerStage.

i try to avoid that one whenever possible. i do get your appreciation of the scope of the place. sometimes on the escalators i wanna take a flying leap and glide into the bowels of new york but that's prob not the way physics works.

any station that urges you to do that is doing something magnificent imo

i had my first "on the tracks" moment today: an older woman did a header onto the tracks on the F line at East Broad. There's a noise that a platform full of people make when there's somebody about to get hit by a train that I heard once before, it's pretty unmistakable. This time, the train came to a complete stop about thirty yards away and as soon as it was clear that it wasn't moving, me and another guy jumped on the tracks and got this poor lady outta there. She landed right on her face in a puddle, busted up her nose and chipped her teeth pretty bad but nothing obviously broken. Once we got off the tracks, I realized she was using my backpack as a headrest so I waited down there with her until the firemen and EMTs came. Her name was Maria and she was super scared and crying and I mostly just held her hand and used some baby wipes some lady tossed at us to clean her face and stroked her hair and told her everything was okay. I got a lotta blood on me which i guess should make me worried or something? I'm not for some reason. One of the other guys who stayed around found out she had high blood pressure and apparently just passed out. I put a couple of dents in my shin and got a definite perspective rearrangement; Maria got taken out on a stretcher with her head in a neck brace and lashed down. I hope she's okay.

Hoooly crap forks

God bless you man

That's terrifying. a lot of people would have been paralyzed but you stepped in. good job!

honestly the hoi polloi was really pretty with it and handled things intelligently. everybody flagged the train down the whole length of the platform, nobody got on the tracks until the train was completely stopped, people helped her out and then helped us out and put down water bottles and ran to let the cops know, gave her room to breathe and asked if there was anything they could do. New Yorkers mostly will do the deed to keep the herd safe; what was interesting was that no one wanted to hang around after because we all have appointments and stuff to get to. Honestly, I wouldn't have stuck around if she didn't have her head on my backpack but I'm glad I did, she was pretty terrified and I think she wanted to know people were there for her. Though again, there were three of us there until the EMT came; she was never alone.

Holy geez. Well done, forks.

Jesus, dude.

Out of curiosity and a desire not to die or see anyone die, how DO you signal a driver to stop short??

everybody up and down the platform waves their hands frantically; the conductor is in the front car so as long as he/she is paying any kind of attention, they can stop as soon as they see everyone going nuts. apparently one of the best things you can do if someone falls on the track is have people on the end of the platform where the train is coming in signalling and waving as far from the person who fell in as it gets.
I kinda always thought if you fell in it would be no big deal but yeah, you really kinda do need a hand to get out... and if, like this lady, you get knocked the fuck out (which isn't very hard to do, it's like a eight foot drop) there's really no way to do anything to protect yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AApmDPjRYb8

get out of here with that empty daytime subway! and the blue stripe still on the R46...

everybody up and down the platform waves their hands frantically; the conductor is in the front car so as long as he/she is paying any kind of attention, they can stop as soon as they see everyone going nuts. apparently one of the best things you can do if someone falls on the track is have people on the end of the platform where the train is coming in signalling and waving as far from the person who fell in as it gets.
I kinda always thought if you fell in it would be no big deal but yeah, you really kinda do need a hand to get out... and if, like this lady, you get knocked the fuck out (which isn't very hard to do, it's like a eight foot drop) there's really no way to do anything to protect yourself.

― Premise ridiculous. Who have two potato? (forksclovetofu), Monday, May 4, 2015 11:11 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

clarification -- the driver is in the front car and they are controlling the speed of the train. the conductor is in the middle car and their job is to operate the doors.

(on the path, which is shorter, the conductor and driver are both upfront. but its still the driver who will be in the cab, looking out into the track, and see people signaling.)

well god bless that guy

mario explains it to you
http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=eShtZSx4kWc

after the first twenty minutes of my F train ride was a crying baby and then twenty minutes of loud chatting teenagers in the seat next to me, i guess i just couldn't handle the sonic pusharound anymore because i just got into a yelling match with a crew of guys who came onto the train and gave the "It's SHOWTIME" and i jumped out of my seat and said "NO SHOWTIME! NO SHOWTIME! NO SHOWTIME PLEASE!"
teenage kids are predictable: first they wanted to know if i was a cop, then they started cursing at me, then they started threatening me, then they started phone taping me and trying to goad me into either making physical contact or saying something sufficiently offensive. eventually i found myself in the unenviable position of no longer having a seat (this went on for like five stops) and being told to go to another car which got my own dander up to the point where i'm puffing up and acting the fool. eventually an older woman jumped into the fracas and told everyone to chill the fuck out. several more flare ups and a lot of bullshit later and one of the kids following me out of the train to maddog me going up the stairs, i'm back at home trying to write a letter to the Rock Steady Crew about their upcoming anniversary show.
i dunno man. i'm on the goddamn selection committee for the MTA's performance wing! i shouldn't be so touchy about this shit! the city fucks with you sometimes.

i yelled at showtimers recently too after THEY ASKED ME TO MOVE MY STANDING POSITION, but i've never believed in even mild forms of hostage-taking

i am gonna go on record as being anti-showtime: it's uncomfortable to have people blaring loud (and generally poor) instrumental beats while people violently fling themselves right in front of you in a captive space and 90% of these kids are not particularly good.
You wanna do it in the station or on the street, no problem but forcing any performance in front of me is exhausting enough; moving your body in such a way that I can't get up from my seat while you're in the middle of your performance is extremely offensive.

yeah, showtime is overall a huge DUD. i kind of count on my subway time being productive time with my reading. or at least being able to just zone out and think about whatever. please don't kick me in the face.