Once a train is delayed, any further delay only exacerbates the situation – as the delay grows, the platforms further down the line get more and more crowded, with more and more impatient people trying to cram onto the train they waited so long for.

I also find that the routine announcements are a bit long-winded. At tourist-heavy stations where dwell times are going to be long anyway, they’re fine. But who needs to hear the full shpiel at each and every stop along the Culver line in the middle of the night? Everybody knows where the train is going; it was better the old way, with a brief announcement (“Bay Parkway next, stand clear”) that doesn’t wake up the neighborhood and allows for a short dwell. And it’s even worse when there’s a service change and the computer shouts out the wrong information at each stop.

Those “Ladies and gentlemen” messages are completely gratuitous. I wish they were all removed. Most of the time they’re used, the conductor should be making a personal announcement. And then there are the conductors who kill time by playing 12 of them between express stops (or, worse yet, during a delay, when everybody on the train is already antsy) – they serve no purpose whatsoever except to irritate the passengers.

Particularly, I found the #3 conductor who literally yelled at passengers (“Stop being inconsiderate and step inside of the train! People need to get to where they’re going! If you can’t fit on this train, take the next one!”) much more effective than the #2 conductor who just keeps pressing the “Ladies and gentlemen, for your safety please do not block the doors…” button.