The post-Super Bowl party clean-up got the best of me on Sunday. So I didn’t have time to write up a full post with additional reaction to the Brooklyn-Queens Streetcar and the realpolitik behind the mayor’s developer-backed initiative. As you might guess, that’s coming later tonight. In the meantime, two links for you to browse today.
Gothamist takes on subway slashings
If you listen to NYPD brass talk about the subway, it’s a dangerous place where too many riders are creating unsafe conditions because they keep jostling each other and also it’s not crowded enough at certain times. In other words, none of it makes much sense, and the contradictions are laid bare in this unsigned editorial that relies on anecdotes from unnamed police officers to make it sound like the subways are more dangerous than ever. They’re not, and in fact, despite a spate of recent slashings, the subways are safer than they’ve ever been. A small uptick in crime numbers this year and last hasn’t kept pace with massive ridership gains, and the crime rate underground is at a record low.
As I wrote last week, the NYPD refuses to get serious about sexual assault underground and instead are using slashing as a scare tactic. Over at Gothamist, Jake Dobkin tried to do away with this argument once and for all. As Dobkin notes, nearly all of the subway slashings have come about as a result of an argument between two passengers. These aren’t random attacks but rather avoidable incidents that shouldn’t be treated as a symptom of danger. Prior to another incident this weekend that arose from a fight between two passengers, he writes:
Sure, I understand that it’s annoying to get screamed at by a crazy person, but you have to be pretty stupid, insecure, or insane yourself to get upset by it. Take a deep breath, summon up some sympathy for the poor, afflicted soul who’s causing the trouble, and then feel lucky that you had the presence of mind to avoid a preventable altercation. Seven out of ten of this year’s subway stabbings and slashings happened because people ignored this advice! Don’t let that happen to you…Our subways and our streets are safer now than at any time in the last forty years.
By promoting the idea that the subways are somehow unsafe when they are not, the NYPD is, intentionally or not, undercutting public support for a vibrant subway system. That’s a dangerous, dangerous game to play.
City Journal takes on the Port Authority
For your weekly dose of Port Authority hate, check out Seth Barron’s magnum opus on the agency’s incompetence and corruption. For those who have followed over the years, Barron’s piece treads familiar ground: no accountability on either side of the Hudson, no ability to set priorities or control costs, and no real long-term vision all plague the Port Authority as it has deviated from its core mission. Barron toys with dismantling the Port Authority entirely but realizes there are considerable obstacles to such a plan. But no politician has an appetite for reform. It’s as close to an intractable problem as the region’s transportation structure has right now.