Second Ave. Sagas

Eating on the subway under the microscope

Written by

Benjamin Kabak

in

A few days ago, the following video of a fight precipitated by a plate of spaghetti made the rounds on the Internet. It features some colorful language and a big fight around the 2:30 mark. Check it out:

With increased attention paid to the lack of cleanliness underground and the ways in which passengers abuse subway cars by discarding half-eaten food, some MTA Board members are now mulling an on-again, off-again proposal to ban food underground. It’s worked in D.C. so why not here?

Daily News reporters Pete Donohue and Simone Weichselbaum have the story:

Some board members were concerned not only about the cleanliness of the system, but also scurrying rats and delay-causing fires tied to litter on the tracks.

The MTA needs “to think about the availability of food products to passengers, who then discard some or all of it on the tracks, on the platform,” board member Charles Moerdler said at the meeting. “They’re the cause of rats. They’re the cause of the fires. We have to do something to make it clear that the public has to wake up.”

Board member Doreen Frasca, chairwoman of the NYC Transit committee, showed enthusiastic support for Moerdler’s comments with a hearty “here! here!” Frasca said prohibiting eating and drinking is a “swell idea” but later said she didn’t plan on asking the board to approve a ban.

As the News notes, this isn’t the first time a food ban has come up. In the mid-2000s, the MTA pondered banning beverages, but commuter outrage shelved that idea. Folks need their Morning Joe after all.

Here, the issue is less clean cut. After the board meeting, Weichselbaum took to the subway with what she termed some messy food, and the reactions to it were decidedly mixed. Some riders wondered how she could eat underground with the mess and the germs while others proclaimed it “a free country.” If people want to eat, let them eat as long as they clean up.

In D.C, the food ban was met with commuter outrage as well, but it has stuck after a few high-profile ticketing incidents. Once, a teenager received a summons for eating on a Metro escalator, and despite the negative P.R., the WMATA got the point across. Food in the subway would not be tolerated.

Here, the MTA may be attempting to hide the fact that they’ve cut down on cleaners by attempting to cut down on trash. If people aren’t permitted to eat and the rule is enforced, the subways will be cleaner. Yet, the authority must also balance that demand with the fact that their own stations feature newsstands that traffic in candy bars.

Banning food underground certainly wouldn’t be the worst decision made by the MTA in recent years. But odds are good that the straphangers of New York City wouldn’t take too kindly to it.

Comments

31 responses to “Eating on the subway under the microscope”

  1. pete

    It will turn out like the rule banning moving between cars. Enforced once in a blue moon only when theres a quota. Nothing like 2 TD cops walking by a train car at the terminal while 2 groups of 3-4 teens each are playing hip hop on cellphones full volume, speaker, no headerphones. Aren’t there the stickers about no boomboxes……

    Another case, a TD cop got on board to go to his substation, a bum was drinking a Bud, the cop shouted “I didn’t see that” to the bum, and the bum put it in his gym bag. If theres no quota. They are too lazy to enforce it.

    Reply
    1. David in NY

      But as the article stated, a few high-profile arrests and you’ll see a big drop in violations. It should be a $300 fine, period.

      Just today, two young mothers were feeding potato chips to their toddlers in strollers. As they left the train, a clutter of a dozen broken chips sat in the middle of the flow. What a nice gift they left the rest of us.

      New Yorkers are pigs and continue to thoughtlessly dump on their home. Certain neighborhoods are much worse than others, but you just don’t see this kind of jerk behavior in other big cities.

      It’s time to change people’s bad behavior just like other useful laws do. People hear about someone getting busted and they just make walk over to the garbage can.

      Reply
  2. SEAN

    Banning food underground certainly wouldn’t be the worst decision made by the MTA in recent years. But odds are good that the straphangers of New York City wouldn’t take too kindly to it.

    Nore would the merchants in the stations either. There cry would be “your taking away our right to earn a living!” This will lead to massive legal headaches for the MTA, although it maybe the right move for them in the long run.

    Reply
  3. tacony palmyra

    The problem isn’t eating, the problem is littering food. One would hope that littering food on the train or in the platforms is already illegal, and one would hope that cops and MTA employees enforce this rule. In my experience, they don’t. I’ve been in train cars with a transit cop literally sitting right across from someone who’s eating sunflower seeds and spitting them onto the floor. Disgusting. Nobody said anything. I’ve seen people run into the train with ice cream cones right in front of multiple employees and cops and drop ice cream all over the place (fun! sticky!). Nothing happened.

    If eating is made illegal, will it be enforced? Who will do it? Why is banning food going to do anything to solve the problem when literally banning the behavior itself isn’t being enforced anyway? My aforementioned ridiculous examples are exceptions. Most people, myself included, eat food occationally on the train and never make a mess because we know how to eat food without making a mess.
    Also, I don’t think the in-station newsstand merchants are some huge constituency of well-connected insiders that the MTA is afraid of losing billions of dollars for angering. They’re a bunch of poor immigrants paying low rents for tiny spaces, and as Ben has pointed out before, the MTA could probably make more money off of different types of retail down there anyway.

    Reply
    1. Al D

      Agreed. Does it make any sense to make new laws when the ones on the books are not being enforced? Just have people pay for their littering ways and that’s it. Treat it as a pure economics issue, and have people pay the cost of their own clean up. Perhaps then and just thinking out loud, the ticket revenue can be sent back to the MTA to help offset their cleaning costs.

      Reply
      1. R. Graham

        I really do feel there needs to be a law against all out eating of food. Have you ever been on a train car with someone eating Chinese food? I enjoy chinese food but something about smelling it in the already disgusting odor of the subway seems to bring out a very foul smell in the food itself. Same thing goes for those who eat McDonald’s breakfast with those fake eggs in the subways. I couldn’t eat that crap again and not that I want to eat it or should be eating it but that’s not the point.

        The point is eating food on the train, especially hot cooked food, is disrespectful to others riding the trains. It’s just as bad as the women who choose that time to pull out a bottle of nail polish to paint their nails, with the strong polish scent filling the air. Just as bad as those who insist on playing music loud enough for everyone to hear. Just as bad as those who come walking though the cars to preach from the mid-pole pulpit!

        Reply
    2. Kid Twist

      The problem isn’t just littering. Event the most conscientious people sometimes spill things. I’m sure we’ve all encountered car floors that were sticky from spilled soda. I doubt the passenger poured his Coke all over the floor; he just happened to drop it and spilled. And in a crowded, lurching car, it’s quite possible that food and drink would end up on another passenger.

      Reply
      1. al

        Spill proof containers. Baby bottles fit the bill and so do few other designs that could be mass produced cheaply. Maybe the vendors association could sponsor a contest for a cheap spill proof coffee cup.

        Reply
    3. R. Graham

      Can we just take the time just to realize how disgusting sunflower seeds are after they come out of another human’s mouth. Now imagine sitting in the last seat with your feet resting on the shells. Can’t imagine this? Yep because you wouldn’t sit there right? Exactly!

      Reply
    4. Sharon

      Free the conductors from their un needed door operator role and move the station agents out of the booths and use the money we spend on these guys and phase in code enforcement agents. Issue tickets to people who litter. 90% of those who litter would think twice if the rules were enforced with discretion. (if a pregnant women drops a gum wrapper it is understandable why she would not bend to pick it up) This would bring in new money and provide a cleaner system. With the amount of people on our system and the length of the lines it will never be supper clean .

      Reply
      1. Bolwerk

        If “code enforcement agents” don’t pay for themselves, you’re doing it wrong. There shouldn’t be any need to make cuts elsewhere to pay for that.

        Reply
  4. IanM

    My friends from DC are sometimes a little shocked that people eat and drink on the NYC subway. I can’t say I always love it either. But NYC is not DC, especially in terms of scale. Commutes on the subway tend to be much, much longer than those on the DC metro, and it’s not uncommon for a trip to run over 45 minutes or an hour – maybe more. It doesn’t seem too unreasonable to me that some people feel they need to use that time for a snack or a coffee – it’s a convenience, for some almost a necessity. I for one would be a lot more daunted by a summer weekend trek to the beach (1hr 15 mins +) if I thought I couldn’t even have as much as a sip of water the whole way. Who really wants that?

    People eat on NJTransit, MetroNorth, and so on, and litter doesn’t seem to be as much of a problem. I suspect it has a lot to do with the fact that those systems don’t already look filthy, as the subway (even when actually clean) always does. I don’t think the solution for the MTA is more unenforced rules and limitations on passengers. Passengers just need to have more respect for the subway and not litter, and of course the subway needs to help earn it.

    Reply
    1. R. Graham

      The subways will always look more filty than the commuter rail lines. Commuter rail lines don’t move anywhere near the amount of people that the subways do so this is a mute point. The point is do you want more rats or less rats?

      Reply
  5. Bolwerk

    I don’t see a big deal about food, but I wouldn’t be totally opposed to prohibiting it on the trains either. I think it’s kind of nuts to prohibit drinks, or at least water given how hot the stations can get in the summer.

    I really wish they’d just actively crack down on people littering. Make it an $800 fine to so much as drop a candy wrapper, and see how long people want to litter. It’s not so much the MTA either – the city’s attitude in general should be that.

    Reply
  6. AlexB

    The problem is that the MTA leaves piles of trash bags lying around or in those big black painted metal bins. I see rats scurrying around all the time, but I see HOARDS of them rummaging through the trash bags; it looks like the bags themselves are alive.

    Honestly, how often do you see someone throw food onto a platform or onto the tracks? Most people don’t eat and most who do throw their trash in the trash cans. The MTA needs to do a better job of picking up the trash daily. I think they also only have a couple trains that clean the tracks, and one is probably broken.

    Reply
    1. R. Graham

      And even with those two trains that pick up trash, if somehow you think that even with the two of them operational that they can cover the whole system on a daily basis? If so I have a bridge I can sell you.

      The problem is not the MTA, the problem is the people. Do you know how much money the MTA could save if it didn’t have to pay people to clean up so much trash all the time? Not to mention the fact that the vactrain barely works well. If you’re on a platform of a major station one late night you might be lucky enough to see a track worker team walking the tracks doing nothing but picking up trash and placing them in orange backs.

      Instead of picking up trash I would prefer that they concern train on fixing the rails. What can the MTA do about the fool who throws his newspaper on the track which caused a track fire 15 minutes later do to a spark? Nothing!

      Reply
      1. John

        The problem really is both parties when you think of those black trash bags piled in, I would venture to say, 30% of the stations I travel through. If the MTA can’t even pick up after themselves, why should the common passenger care? I will admit that I occasionally eat on the train; nothing more ‘messy’ than your common bodega deli sandwich, and I wouldn’t dare leave anything behind as I left. I don’t think that’s uncommon among us straphangers, and I don’t think it’s the problem, either. The problem is how we as a riding public generally view our surroundings, how we all interpret that environment, and how a minority of us (although still a large number) treat the system accordingly, magnifying the issue and ruining it for everyone else. Littering is a crime and has always been a crime for as long as I remember. Whether somebody leaves behind an M&Ms wrapper, or an empty styrofoam box and a subway car littered with spaghetti noodles, they are littering, and thus breaking the law.

        Enforce the LITTERING problem, make it known, and get serious. That’s a pretty simple idea to me.

        Reply
        1. Bolwerk

          Hell, they shouldn’t be offering trash pickup services. If you bring something to eat or drink on the subway, hold it until you get to a place to dispose of it.

          Reply
        2. R. Graham

          It’s a sad shame that garbage bags in the subway are dominated by discarded food a person was eating down there. What some people can’t understand is rats will find a way to get to where the food is. Those black containers on platforms are an attempt to keep the trash at bay but rats have sharp teeth and claws and are known for busting up some metals. How about you don’t bring any of the food or the paper or plastic that held it together down into the underground and maybe you’ll see a difference with the rodent problem.

          Reply
    2. Bolwerk

      Trash collection may be imperfect, but it’s not the problem here.

      And to answer your question, I see it fairly frequently, myself.

      Reply
  7. Brian

    Im willing to bet that the person who started this is a high school student wit no discipline at all. Just look at her. I see it everyday taking the 4 or 5 trains from downtown and on the 7 line. Pitiful, and a shame.

    Reply
    1. R. Graham

      “She should calm down, she’s the adult, we the child.”

      Having pointed that out I will have to agree with you. And it doesn’t seem as if she was raised well neither.

      Reply
      1. Brian

        Sadly I have to see something like that everyday coming back from school….if it’s not something with food, it has to do with other kids cursing, screaming, putting their feet on the poles or chairs or just holding the doors…ugh.

        Reply
  8. Alon Levy

    WMATA didn’t just issue a summons to a teenage girl – it cuffed her for eating a fry. And the judge who upheld that is now Chief Justice of the United States.

    Reply
  9. Matty

    Oh dear. As if the Daily News were not already in the pits of journalism, they write “here! here!” instead of “hear, hear.”

    Reply
  10. Blasito

    The PATH does not allow food or beverages, and there are no trash receptacles. I’d say it’s cleaner than the MTA, but still has its share of litter on the tracks. R. Graham makes a good point on the money saved by not collecting trash, and is the main reason the PA got rid of the trash bins.

    Reply
  11. Scott E

    This is too much debate about nothing. Just ban eating (but permit drinking of nonalcoholic beverages) on the subways and be done with it. Yes, enforcement will be selective, but those who choose to eat will knowingly take their chances, and those who make a mess know what penalty may face them.

    There will be exceptions and room for interpretation in citing those who eat. Giving a snack to a child who would otherwise be screaming his head off. A diabetic (such as myself) eating a candy-bar to avoid passing out from hypoglycemia. The police may let this slide.

    Reply
    1. Bolwerk

      I think the NYPD has lost a lot of credibility over the years with its over-the-topyet arbitrary enforcement. A lot of the time, politely asking people not to do something should be enough. Someone deliberately littering is vastly different than someone who is diabetic eating a candy bar, but if that turned out to be anything like bike enforcement or taking up two seats enforcement, they’d be treated the same.

      Reply
  12. Andrew D. Smith

    I’ve nothing new to add but would like to toss my vote in with those who believe the problem is littering, not eating, and that cops should fine litterers under existing rules and leave the rest of us to eat in peace.

    Yes, some food is annoyingly stinky, but that’s pretty rare. Yes, it’s way easier to catch eaters than litterers because it takes minutes to eat stuff but only a second to drop it to the ground, but the point of rules is to ban harmful stuff not to make it easy to write tickets. You could easily stop every subway infraction by positioning cops at the entrances and ticketing anyone who tried to ride, but that would sort of defeat the point.

    Reply
  13. R. Graham

    If you vote for banning eating in the subway, then you have the right to complain about the rat problem.

    If you vote for being able to eat but cracking down on littering then you have the right to complain about the unsightly conditions, but you have no real right to complain about the rat problem. Littering is only one side of a major problem and that’s only half of it. I really would love for the MTA to do a study on their trash collection.

    How many tons of trash collected a week/month/quarter/year?
    What percentage of that trash is discarded food and food containers?
    What percentage of that is non-food related?

    I think the results would surprise a lot of people. Just imagine if the MTA didn’t have to collect so much trash to begin with, how much money would be saved period. Or as Blasito mentions, PATH doesn’t put up with this at all.

    There’s one other point I am failing to mention. What people here are really not understanding is that the Subway itself, it’s not Amtrak. There are no comfy seats with fold down tables so you can rest your dinner. Subway trains have no where near the suspension of Amtrak trains so what happens when the train hits that turn that even some veteran riders don’t seem to expect or if that hard stop comes for whatever reason, it becomes difficult to prevent a food accident. And when it happens at the top of the evening rush, who’s going to clean it up? Not the passenger who dropped the food. Think the terminal is going to clean it up? They barely have time to throw a mop on the floor of one car during rush hours.

    All the more reasons why food should be banned outright.

    Reply
  14. Scott Mercer

    In Los Angeles the subways, light rail trains, and buses ALL ban eating and/or drinking.

    While it is only occasionally enforced, they do ticket some of the most egregious offenders. I have broken the rule myself, but only to the point of an occasional sip of soda or a candy bar. I’m not bringing a spaghetti dinner (or for more fitting LA analogue, a taco platter) on the subway with me.

    And the idea about NYC subway rides being longer does not apply. The full ride on the Blue Line takes 55 minutes, and then if you continue to Hollywood on the Red Line it’s another 15 minutes, so we can have some long rides here too, especially on buses.

    In all, I thnk Los Angeles trains and buses are somewhat cleaner due to this rule.

    Reply

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