This video needs no introduction. It truly embodies the nightmare of anyone who rides the subway, and it’s not for the squeamish or those who cannot handle rodents. You’ve been warned.
What: A new subway entrance for the Times Square complex.
Where: The southeast corner of West 42nd St. and 8th Ave. on the ground level of the new 11 Times Square building.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve found myself at opposites ends of the block that spans from 7th to 8th Avenues on 42nd Street. Usually thronged with tourists, it’s not one of my favorite areas of the city, but as I got out of the subway last week at 7th Ave., I stared at the Times Square subway entrance. It used to have many bullets welcoming riders to the subway, but over the years, various letters and numbers have disappeared. The 9 train went first in the late 2005, and the W followed suit last June. Now, the bullets are bright white beacons of trains that no longer run.
A few days later, I had to go to the Port Authority area and happened upon the scene above. The developers at 11 Times Square had used the same bullet motif, but this time, they weren’t so static. It’s easy to remove and add train lines as they come and go from the subway landscape. The current map always seems static enough, but over the years, we’ve lost and gained some trains. Today, this entrance features 11 subway bullets. What will it have next year?
Once upon a time, the annual No Pants Subway Ride was a stunt perpetrated by just a handful of people, but then in 2006, six of eight pantsless riders were arrested as cops overreacted to a playful prank. Since then, the No Pants Subway Ride has gone from a small happening to an event that takes over the subway every January.
Today marks the tenth anniversary of the No Pants Subway Ride, and at 3 p.m. this afternoon, thousands of riders will enter the subway from locations in three boroughs, drop trou at some point and ride onward. The full details are right here, and the event is certainly an amusing one. As the Improv Everywhere founds say, “Our aim is to make people laugh, not piss them off.”
The video atop this post highlights last year’s event, and while the shock value of seeing pantsless riders has worn off, a few innocent stranphangers still managed to be surprised when bare legs board their trains.
Brodie Enoch, the leader of Transportation Alternative's Rider Rebellion, urges the city's subway riders to stand up to Albany. (Photo by Benjamin Kabak)
Over the past few months, as subway fares have gone up and service down, Transportation Alternatives has tried to stir up a Rider Rebellion. They’ve garnered press attention and have a website devoted to the cause as they try to pressure Albany to fund transit in New York. Yesterday, they took to the tracks.
For the first time, TA’s rebellion headed underground as activists staged a flash rally. At 10:15 a.m., the group boarded an A train at Columbus Circle and rode to 125th St. Along the way, they asked riders to support the cause and explained how Albany’s actions in stealing $143 million from transit riders in 2009 led to 2010’s service cuts and fare hikes. With a trumpeter playing the famous “Take the A Train” in tow, TA’s operatives found an audience receptive to their message (and free water bottles).
I journeyed on that A train with the group yesterday and snapped some photos of the event. DNA Info’s Olivia Scheck produced a story and video on the rally as well. The organizers were thrilled with their first-time results, but they have a long way to go to convince New Yorkers that their elected officials must be held responsible for the MTA’s precarious financial state. It is a message that must be heard.
With but a day left in 2010, this year cannot end soon enough for the MTA. Its own headlines were dominated by massive service cuts and a steep fare hike, and while 2011 brings more unknown, we have to hope it won’t be worse for public transportation in New York.
As I do every year, I’d like to run down the list of the ten most popular posts here on Second Ave. Sagas. Thanks to everyone who read, shared and commenting on my work this year. I certainly appreciate it all.
1. A subway art project in the abandoned Underbelly
The most popular post of the year was, of course, about the underground street art project that took the city by storm in late October. Few have seen the Underbelly Project’s output, but the street art installation, which began in 2009, will be featured in a documentary and perhaps a book as well. The story is quite the tale of urban adventure.
2. MTA Board approves 2011 fare hike
A fare hike for 2011, which went into effect yesterday, was inevitable. The MTA had gotten permission from Albany in 2009 to raise fares every two years, but when when it become official, New York commuter sighed. For the third time in three years, the MTA had to raise fares, and we would all pay more for less this time around.
3. Debating subway map form and function
Massimo Vignelli, John Tauranac, Eddie Jabbour and Paul Shaw gathered at the Museum of the City of New York earlier this month to discuss their varied approaches to the subway map. As the MTA’s map is an ever-changing, quasi-geographic, quasi schematic representation of the system, everyone has an idea of how it should appear, and few people are ever satisfied with the current cluttered iteration of The Map.
4. The history of a subway shell at South 4th Street
A day after the Underbelly Project story broke, I went figurative underground to highlight just where this street art installation was. After some simple recon and analysis, the online community deduced that the Underbelly Project had gone up in the unfinished shell of a station at South 4th Street in Brooklyn. This post explored the original proposals for the subway expansion plans that would have brought service through that ghost station.
5. New raised storm grates earn architectural praise
Nearly three years after a summer storm and resulting flood knocked out nearly all subway service across the city, the MTA’s new storm grates garnered recognition from the architectural community. New York residents though resent the intrusion into their precious sidewalk space. You can’t please all of the people all the time.
6. With service changes, MTA refreshes its map
When the MTA cut service in June, it also introduced a new version of the map. With stronger route lines, a fatter Manhattan and parks that were shaded a dull khaki green, the new map did away with some of the bus boxes and tried to simplify the presentation of information. The cover is nicer than the map inside.
7. Fire suspends all Metro-North service to GCT
A fire on the Harlem River bridge knocked out Metro-North service for a few hours on a Monday in late September. As breaking news went, this was a fairly tame story with some very impressive plumes of smoke.
8. Service changes could lead to Chrystie St. Cut use
As word of impending service cuts reached the public, the MTA announced plans to reactivate the Chrystie St. Cut. Unused since the K train made its last ride in the 1980s, the Cut allows trains coming off of the Williamsburg Bridge to travel north up Sixth Ave. instead of south along Nassau st. Many believe this was a service change the MTA should have made years ago to meet demand from a growing Brooklyn neighborhood.
9. The shape of Tunnel Boring Machines to come
This was some good old fashioned subway construction porn. A few weeks before launching the tunnel boring machine beneath Second Ave., the MTA introduced it to the world.
10. A launch box and art for a subway in progress
Shortly before I had a chance to tour the Second Ave. Subway launch box, the MTA’s own photograph published photos of the construction site. I explored the work in progress and highlighted the planning for future Second Ave. Subway stations. As 2011 dawns, we have to wait just six more years until the new subway opens
The above video was shot yesterday morning near the Howard Beach station on the currently shuttered A line. The night before, over 400 passengers found themselves snow-bound on a freezing, powerless train, and workers had to face the daunting task of clearing the tracks of snow. There’s something utterly peaceful in the white powder that blankets the train tracks, but in the second video below, that peace is shattered as Transit’s snow removing slowly makes it way toward the Rockaways. It might be fun for snowballs and snow angels, but as New York learned this week, that blizzard can be a powerful force of nature.
At Penn Station, falling snow dusted the underground platforms. (Photo by Twitter user @KaneTakerfan4)
It’s always an adventure in New York City when snow descends upon the area, and after a rough winter in early 2010, the city was ready for the torrential snow that fell throughout the day on Sunday. I had plans to spend a few days early this week in Philadelphia, and my girlfriend and I opted to leave on Sunday morning instead of Monday to beat the storm. A few hours after we arrived in the City of Brotherly Love, New Jersey Transit canceled its bus service, and train schedules through Penn Station will out of whack.
But Monday dawns a new work week. Although many are on vacation during the week after Christmas and before New Years, many industries aren’t shut down, and that includes New York City Transit. Numerous above-ground routes will see reduced or canceled service, and Transit is doing what it can to get everything up and running for the morning rush. Per their statement on Sunday night, trains will operate on a “normal weekday schedule” for the morning commute, but as of this writing, nearly all elevated train service has been suspended.
The MTA's industrial-sized snowblower will help keep tracks above ground free from snow.
As the snow falls and ice builds, the MTA dispatches its fleet of train cars designed to handle inclement weather. These include a snow thrower that can toss the flakes 200 feet and remove 3000 tons of snow per hour, a jet blower used to keep yards clear, de-icer cars that literally grease the rails and a so-called ballast regulator that levels the snow away from the tracks. Somehow, five million people will make their ways to the subway tomorrow and the rails must be clear.
Meanwhile, as the snow falls, I’m struck by how it can change a city in the blink of an eye. In Philadelphia tonight, you would never know the city is home to over 1.5 million people. As early as 4 p.m. today, the streets were utterly devoid of people. A few brave souls scampered to the movie theaters to catch an evening flick, but the urban tundra was sparsely populated. We ventured out to dinner at a restaurant close enough to a stop on SEPTA’s Market-Frankford Line. The trains were running with no problems, and a few people had braved the weather. But this city, getting far less snow and no gale-force winds, was sleeping through the storm.
Snow is shuttering subway routes across the city. (Hat tip to Caryn Rose)
I’ve always loved the snow while it’s coming down. New York is never as quiet and serene as it is during a snow storm. The subways, as the screenshot at right shows, aren’t holding up well, but cars are barely making tracks on the street right now. In 1996 after the blizzard, we walked along Broadway as skiers and not taxis zoomed past us. It’s too windy for those types of shenanigans tonight, and by the time the city wakes up tomorrow, the great melt will turn the pristine snow into grey slush. It’s a fleeting calm.
Nothing can remain that quiet in New York forever, and the show must go on. I’ll be in and out during the day on Monday attempting to make the most of it in Philadelphia as the cultural institutions down here slow to a crawl. Check out the MTA’s weather updates for the latest service advisories, and if you don’t have to go anywhere during the day, just admire and appreciate the snow. It lasts for only so long.
Subway expansions down Utica and Nostrand Ave. should be a part of everyone's transit wishlist.
When it comes to the subway, I love to think big. I started this site to chart the progress of the Second Ave. Subway as it moved from a 75-year-old idea to some sort of reality, and over the years, I’ve explored some of the city’s grander plans from various aspects of the Second System expansion to the proposed Triboro RX line. Even if the MTA doesn’t have the funding or political support to build the system, it’s important to keep an eye toward the future.
Over at City Limits, Samuel I. Schwartz, whom we all know as Girdlock Sam, pens his Christmas transit wish list for New York City. It is dreaming big at its finest. Schwartz has seen Battery Park City move from an idea to a thriving neighborhood. He’s seen cars removed from the streets of Times Square and Herald Square, and he has long been a champion of East River Bridge tolling. He dreams big.
So what does Schwartz want for Christmas? Well, Schwartz has a 40-year plan in mind. Using congestion pricing revenues — he estimates the fee will draw in $1 billion a year as the city’s population reaches 10 million — Schwartz wants everything, and I like it.
First he wants something we all want: a Second Ave. Subway that goes from 125th St. to Hanover Square. Today, the MTA is planning and building only Phase 1 from 57th St. and Broadway to 96th St. and 2nd Ave. The capital plan isn’t funding past 2011, and the authority continues to say it will assess future phases as the money materializes. Despite Jay Walder’s pledge to build if the money is there, few people are optimistic that remaining segments will see the light of day anytime soon.
Next, Schwartz advocates for a subway to Staten Island. He writes: “One could go from St. George to the Battery into the T-line. Another could go from Clifton to Bay Ridge to link with the R train (groundbreaking for this subway was held in 1923; let’s open it for the centennial). Both would originate from the existing Staten Island Railway. While we’re at it, let’s also re-establish the Staten Island North Shore Railroad and attach a West Shore link.”
In the realm of rail, Schwartz advocates for a more trains to planes. He wants a subway the LaGuardia, the PATH to Newark, a rail link to Stewart Airport (I do not) and better integration between the subway and the JFK AirTrain. It’s hard to dispute the need for better access to the region’s airports.
Will we see a full Second Ave. Subway before another seven decades elapse?
Finally, he wants three more “minor” subway extensions. He envisions a Second Ave. extension westward across 125th St. to Broadway; an extension to the South Bronx; and another to Co-Op City. He wants to restore service from Liberty Ave. to the Queens Bypass via Rockaway Beach branch, and he wants to send the L train west and north to reach the 7 at Javits Center. Nothing seems too crazy, and everything seems appropriate for a growing city that has witnessed little in the way of transit expansion since the 1930s.
It’s hard to disagree with Schwartz’s wishlist. If anything, I’d like to see it be more adventurous. I’d like to see plans for Utica and Nostrand Avenues, and the Triboro RX is a relatively low-cost plan that should see the light of day sooner rather than later.
And yet, despite the fun of living in Transity Fantasyland, the MTA has more immediate concerns. Schwartz and I can dream big, but the authority is teetering on the edge of collapse. It’s balance sheet has a razor thin margin for error right now, and if anything goes wrong, the MTA will again be faced with a deficit of hundreds of millions of dollars.
So for my Christmas wishlist, I want a more permanent funding solution for the MTA. I want to see congestion pricing or East River Bridge tolls. I want to see the MTA get a handle on its ever-increasing labor costs, and its skyrocketing pension obligations. I want to see the authority have the money and manpower and political support to maintain an aging system and expand it to meet demands of the 2010s. We have an early 20th — and in some places, late 19th — century system that’s straining under the weight of early 21st Century. As Schwartz writes, “Clearly, city leaders 130 years ago had long-term big dreams for New York and followed through.” They also had short-term dreams to keep the system afloat, and that’s what we need right now.
High Exit Entrance Turnstiles can prove daunting for the uninitiated. (Photo by flickr user Triborough)
As unstaffed station entrances proliferate across the subway system, the 21st century version of the MTA’s iron maiden turnstiles have become the norm around the city. These high entrance/exit turnstiles significantly slow down loading and unloading times at fare control areas, but they effectively combat turnstile jumpers in areas where station agents once roamed. They can, however, prove tricky.
It’s probably happens more often than anyone — not the MTA, not the so-called victims — want to admit, but the HEETs are designed such that it’s very very easy to get it wrong. Swipe a MetroCard, enter into the part at right that’s already begun is whirl around the turnstile. Those who swipe and push the gate that’s sticking out will find themselves stuck on the wrong side of the fare gate with less money — or an 18-minute freeze-out period — on their MetroCards. Consider it a New York subway initiation.
In his column in the Daily News on Monday, Pete Donohue tackles the prickly subject of the HEETs. This subway faux pas, he says, happens very frequently, and among transit workers, the HEETs have earned themselves the reputation of a fare thief. “These are the biggest robbers down here,” one worker said.
Donohue tracked down workers willing to talk, off the record, of the woes they see when it comes to the HEETs. “It happens all the time,” a turnstile repairman said to the News. “Most of the time it’s tourists, but sometimes it even happens to people who live here. Nobody knows. There’s no signs or information.”
Tourists from London where turnstiles rely on the tried-and-true tap-and-go system fall for it; natives from Westchester fall for it; even everyday businessmen in a hurry sometimes take a wrong first step. “If you don’t know what you’re doing,” one suburban visitor said, “you’re going to get screwed.”
For now, the HEETs will continue to pop up across the system. The MTA plans to pay $2.3 million to install 41 more of these turnstiles around the city, and as they can be reprogrammed to take a contactless card, they should survive the death of the MetroCard too.
But the HEETs are a problem. They’re clunky and slow. It takes a decent amount of force to push the door open and an equally strong effort to exit through it. Lines form at stations — the 7th Ave. exit at the 7th Ave. stop on the IND Culver line, for instance — as exiting passengers wait for the door to swing by. It might stop a few fare beaters, but it also stops harried and hurried New Yorkers.
The HEETs, though, aren’t going anywhere as long as station agents continue to disappear, and yet, the fix for them is so simple. If the MTA were to place floor decals with arrows leading into the HEET or a small sign at eye level on the MetroCard reader display, straphangers would find the iron maiden less daunting, and fares would cease to disappear. A small act of customer service can go a long way toward making the system more user-friendly for everyone.
As Phase 1 of the Second Ave. Subway inches toward the finish line, the date for revenue service remains, according to the latest MTA documents, December 2016. We’ll witness at least two more Presidential elections before the trains roll past 63rd St. and Lexington and up Second Ave. Yet, the one question I most often field from readers concerns the identity of the Second Ave. Subway. Now that the Q heads to Astoria and doesn’t terminate at 57th St., will the MTA reroute it to serve as the Second Ave. Subway or will they revive another letter — perhaps the W — to signify and celebrate the new service?
For now, my general answer is “don’t worry about it.” So much can happen in six years that it’s not worth pondering the potential fate of the Astoria-bound Q train. Maybe the MTA will revive the W. Maybe the MTA will reshuffle service into and out of Astoria to ensure that the Q runs from Second Ave. and East 96th St. to Coney Island. Maybe some other Broadway-based service pattern will emerge. Today, that’s the least of the authority’s concerns.
Yet, these questions make me think there’s something more to the train line than just a decal letter on a subway stop and a colored line on a map. As we ride, we form connections with train lines for better or worse. For my entire life, I’ve lived near the West Side IRT trains. Growing up, my local station was the 96th St. on the 1/2/3, and today, I’m just a stone’s throw away from Grand Army plaza — where a green interloper in the shape of a 4 takes up precious real estate on the station entrance sign.
At Grand Army Plaza, a Crown Heights-bound 3 train zooms away. (Photo by Benjamin Kabak)
I’ve always considered the 2 to be my favorite train. When I was growing up, the old redbirds that used to roll along the 2 captured my attention. As a kid waiting to go to Yankee Stadium from the Upper West Side, I would peer into the tunnel hoping to catch a glimpse of the headlights on the 2 — but not the bullet signs on the 3 — so we could be on our way north.
Today, the rolling stock for the 2 consists of the not-so-new R142s, and those are distinctive for the bright red beacon at the top. Generally, the cars are well lit and well air conditioned. They don’t have those too-narrow bucket seats that make you feel as though you’ve encroached far beyond the limits of your neighbor’s personal space, and that express ride up the West Side from Chambers to 96th is among the fatest in the system.
Growing up, I was always skeptical of those other trains. The lines along Central Park West were the far-off ones that we never rode, and the stations nearest us — 86th St., 96th St. — were empty local stops. Other trains — the mysterious F, the J/M/Z, the East Side’s 4/5/6 — were other people’s trains. They weren’t mine. What did I care what happened to them?
Well, 22 years ago this past weekend, something big happened to them for on December 11, 1988. I didn’t know it at the time but for millions of riders who weren’t me, the subways shifted. Trains that used to go over the Manhattan Bridge didn’t; trains that used to run to one part of Queens were re-routed to others. The K train disappeared completely, and a new Z train materialized.
The August 1994 subway map reveals service patterns lost to the sands of time.
Over the next 16 years, straphangers would find their favorite — or just their most convenient — routes changed. In fact, in 2004, Brooklynites long used to the Brighton Beach-bound D trains were in for a shock. The D — which had run down the Brighton Line for nearly 40 years — had become the B, and the B had become the D. Overnight, everything changed, and a Beastie Boys reference had become anachronistic with the stroke of a pen. That’s how fleeting subway routing can be.
New York City subway riders tend to view the map as immovable. It has always looked as it does today, and service patterns have always been what they are today. Does anyone remember the V train? Does anyone remember life before the 6th Ave. M? And where did that W train go anyway? The trains come and go. We form bonds; they become preferred and then favorites; and then we forget about them when they’re gone.
One day later this decade, if all goes according to plan, Astorians will see their service patterns shifted again. The Q will go up Second Ave., and it will become the favorite line of a young Upper East Sider. He or she will never know what life is like without the Second Ave. Subway because it will have always been there, a gleaming beacon of permanent change in a system that shifts whether we notice it or not.