The Subways Are Back, and I Can Hate The MTA Again

The very-hated NYC subway union strike recently ended, and I have had a chance to travel freely around the city once again. Regular readers of my blog know I have been critical of the transit union for going on strike. That's all over now. I can go back to hating the MTA.

Now that I can take the subways again, I can travel with people who have that miserable vacant stare about them. That look of boredom, misery, and resignation that most subway riders have. And with good cause, as with my first post-strike trip on NYC mass transit came my first post-strike annoying schedule change. Luckily, they did not use the very popular "due to necessary track maintenance," opting instead for a pipe leak somewhere.

You see, while the MTA says their on time record has never been better, New Yorkers are a lot smarter than that. The delays are more and more frequent, and service changes are regular.

The MTA makes no effort to do anything about the homeless in the trains, which are now a regular sight in the post-Giuliani New York. Giuliani's tactics of having them constantly move around while enforcing "loitering laws" was not well received by homeless activists in the late 90s, but I can't imagine ignoring them now is a better policy.

We are now back to the Dinkins days when New Yorkers would pretend the homeless person wasn't there and avoid sitting near them.

Another moronic policy of the MTA is the "If You See Something, Say Something" campaign. This is aimed at subway riders, imploring on them to inform the authorities if they see anything suspicious, like a ticking time bomb or a brown paper bag with plutonium in it.

There are some basic problems with this system however, MTA employees are really hard to find. If you're lucky enough to be in a subway car with them, many of them lock their doors so you cannot approach them. If you are in a car without a conductor -- which is most of the time -- the doors to go from car to car are locked, so you cannot find one if you need one. The icing on the cake is this...there is a phone number to call if you "see something," but you are underground in a tunnel and cell phones do not work there.

The MTA are a bunch of idiots. I want "my dignity" as a rider.

With all of my bitching and moaning though, I'm really glad the subways are back. It beats having a car and being trapped at home. You have to take the good with the bad I guess.

I was going to go up to a subway employee and tell them that I was glad they were back to work, but they all looked scary.

So I stayed away.

RELATED LINKS:
NYC Straphangers Campaign

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