Coming Through!
ByA friend visiting from London recently asked whether I preferred the Subway or the Tube. I did not have to think for very long to reply. Yes, Subway stations are dirty, draughty and, in summer, deeply unpleasant. But I would take the New York Subway over the Tube every day for the simple reason that its trains are ten times the size of the Tube’s, are air conditioned and, despite the occasional delay, generally adhere to a schedule.
I still have nightmares about morning rush hour in London when I would have to wait for three trains to come through Bermondsey station before I could squeeze into the fourth. Nowadays, whenever I visit London I find myself standing on a platform for ten or fifteen minutes waiting for a train (usually the District Line) which, halfway through its journey, inexplicably changes destination, requiring half the passengers to disembark and wait another ten or fifteen minutes for the next train. I am also exceedingly grateful that for $2 I can go anywhere I want in the city at any time of day and even transfer to a bus for free.
But that’s not to say that the Subway is without its faults or its eccentricities, as A Brit Out of Water recently discovered when a commuter trapped on the wrong side of a crowded platform found an unorthodox way of ensuring he would not miss his train.
First he put his arms in the air and clasped his hands together. An unusual move in rush hour, I think you’ll appreciate, and one that didn’t go unnoticed by fellow travellers. Then swiftly he brought down his still clasped arms/hands at 90 degrees to the rest of his body, taking a pose last seen on the starting blocks for the 50 metresmeters men’s freestyle final at the Olympic swimming pool in Beijing. Having got everybody’s attention, he simply jet propelled himself through the crowd to the door of the train, using his arms to part the Red Sea of people ahead of him.
So far, so rude. Or at least, it would have been had he not been shouting at the top of his voice as he did it, “Ladies and gentlemen, I am trying to get on this train, thank you very much.â€
Rudeness with a smile on its face (A Brit Out of Water)
6 Comments
January 27th, 2009 at 1:53 pm
Thanks for the mention, Paul. I’m still torn on which system is best – like you say, the air conditioning and the size of the New York subway carriages are definitely in its favour. And the London trains feel so tiny whenever I have to go on them now. But on the other hand, I like knowing that it’s never going to be more than 2 or 3 minutes until the next train (not something New York can claim, especially outside Manhattan). Sure, there are breakdowns in service on both systems, that can lead to delays. But a 15 minute wait for an R train, say, can be fairly standard. And the London trains are undoubtedly cleaner…you can sit down without so much fear of what you’re sitting on (or worse, in).
One thing that is absolutely the same in both cities though is the ability of all commuters to complain about their system. At length. It’s only when you use another transit system that you start to pine wistfully for your own!
January 28th, 2009 at 4:49 am
Moscow has the best system I reckon, trains every 90 seconds and stations like palaces. Moscow also has the deepest station. London has the oldest. What records can NYC lay claim to?
The NYC subway stations have been in some pretty good films I suppose, but then again we have American Werewolfe in London filmed at Tottenham Court Road.
January 28th, 2009 at 9:08 am
I always thought that St Petersburg had the deepest subway in the world. So I did a very quick bit of digging (no pun intended) for you, Beau. This according to Gridskipper:
January 28th, 2009 at 10:58 am
Victory Park metro station in Moscow is also 100 metres deep….
January 28th, 2009 at 11:24 am
According to Wiki, it’s actually 84 meters deep.
January 28th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
You can’t have the Korean metro station as it appears to be basically a military only network. As far as I can gather it’s hardly open to the public. So it’s back to Moscow/SPB. It’s difficult to find a definitive answer anyway but I think it’s telling that this Pyongyang metro station is supposed to be the deepest metro station in the world and yet they lay no claim to having the longest escalators… surely you cannot have one without t’other?? Victory Park station in Moscow DOES have the longest Escalator in Europe at least according to your link above which is as one would expect. I know you are thinking: “well hold on there a cotton picking minute Beau, maybe they have tiered escalators” I did consider that but I think when you are going that deep it’s much more practical to only have one main escalator.
BTW, the shortest escalators in the world are apparently at a JC Pennys in Washington…