Dude just standing on the tracks at #42ndGrandCentral no.4 downtown train. @MTA I was going to take that train. pic.twitter.com/z8t8zPur0H— ((((Doug Latino)))) (@DougLatino) September 6, 2018
From the article:
The episode was also far from unusual.... There were nearly 900 incidents last year...
There are many reasons people end up on the tracks: Passengers are drunk, confused or urinating, or they drop something and try to retrieve it on their own. Escaped prisoners have even climbed on the rails. In a small number of horrifying cases, someone is pushed off the platform.From the comments at the NYT:
Subway leaders do not know for certain why the incidents have increased, though they speculate it may be in part because of the many homeless people who frequent the system or the ubiquity of expensive smartphones that drop to the tracks. Last year, only 43 of the incidents were believed to be suicides or attempted suicides....
“I have little sympathy for those who think it’s funny to go run around the tracks or who go down to urinate,” [said Andy Byford, "the subway’s leader"]. “I have no sympathy for them because it causes huge delays.”
[In] China, the subways have a wall of plexiglass between the platform riders and trains, as do airport shuttles in the US. Is it really that much of a reach for the greatest city in the world to adopt this 25-year old technology?
ADDED: In the comments, I'm seeing a lack of sympathy for the people who intentionally go down onto the tracks. But there's still a problem with the extensive delays (and the trauma to the workers who have to remove dead bodies from the tracks).
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72 comments:
Is it really that much of a reach for the greatest city in the world to adopt this 25-year old technology
Less money for graft, corruption, waste, mismanagement, defined benefit pensions.
My trauma center in Orange County used to get drunk Marines who were partying on the beach adjacent to the tracks just north of Camp Pendleton.
They would jump across the tracks as the train was coming. It was a "hold my beer and watch this..." thing. About once every few months we would get one who was too slow. Glancing blows. The full on hits didn't get to us.
So, what kind of injuries do you get when hit by a train (glancing blow)?
Broken arm?
It is not just the issue of being hit by a train. The other issue with this is touching the third rail. The other other issue is peeing on the third rail.
Greatest city in the world, huh?
If Trump is literally Hitler he should be shooting the violators so the trains can run on time.
Can't you avoid touching the third rail by not suggesting any changes in Social Security?
A friend from college died by either falling or being pushed into the subway in NYC right after our graduation. It's a simple fix.
The funny part is that New Yorkers really think their city is "the greatest city in the world"...
Nobody's as provincial as a New Yorker, as always.
Everytime I see a tear jerking story about how horrible it was that some poor person got ran over by a train.....I feel no sorrow.
Trains do not stalk you, jump off of their tracks and run you down. The tracks are a CLEAR indication that a train will eventually be coming this way....and ONLY this way. You can hear and FEEL a train coming from quite a distance.
If you aren't smart enough to stay off of the tracks, drunk or dumb enough to think you can play chicken with a train, you deserve to die. I have no sympathy.
Unless you are blind and deaf at the same time....well....then why TF are you out on the railroad tracks anyway?
Anyone remember Wesley Autrey?
Mensch.
Note: I am not talking about people who were pushed onto the tracks. That is a much different story.
People always object to culling the herd no matter what method is suggested. Stop bitching. The job clearly needs done, and unless you are going to do it yourself, let nature do its job.
When I rode the el in Chicago as a grad student, I never approached the edge of the platform until the train had literally stopped and opened its doors- precisely to avoid getting pushed by any lunatic. Now, I didn't get on at the most crowded platforms in the city (I got on at Bryn Mawr and Howard on the trip to Evanston and on at Noyes and Howard on the way back, for those familiar with Chicago), so it was easy to do it that way.
Is "worrisome" really the best word in this context?
I knew a woman through my job who jumped down onto the tracks a few years ago to retrieve her gym bag, which she had dropped. As she was attempting to climb back up to the platform, a train entered the station. Apparently she panicked, was unable to climb up, and she was killed by the train. The reporting was that her bag contained her house keys, cellphone, and a couple of some items of clothing. She died for nothing.
(When this happened, we had had no dealings with her for several years, but I remembered her when I saw this reported.)
Remember the movie "Ghost" where the ghost that haunted the subway had been pushed onto the tracks?
I think there have been some real cases.
"Greatest city in the world, huh?"
Well, certainly in America, without question.
This doesn't mean it doesn't have its problems. Every place has it's problems.
"I think there have been some real cases."
Real cases of ghosts? There certainly have been real cases of people being pushed onto the tracks.
I suspect the IQ of the average New Yorker has been declining what with all the immigrants flocking there. And the IQ was probably pretty low to start with.
Even more stupid are "subway surfers," people who ride atop moving subway trains. A number of them have stood or sat up just a little too much and been fatally smashed into the infrastructure hanging from the station or tunnel ceilings.
I've gone down onto the tracks to retrieve dropped keys.
So what? Who hasn't walked along train tracks? Pretending there's a difference does not create one where there is none.
Blood sweat and tears on the tracks.
My grandfather was a motorman (driver) on the NY subways(White Plains Road line, now part of the 2). Whenever someone was hit while on the tracks, fell on the tracks, or was pushed, it was the motorman's job to clear the remains as part of restoring service. He thought is was by far the worst part of the job.
I would vote Hong Kong as the 'greatest city in the world' followed by, perhaps, Tokyo.
Michael K: Remember the movie "Ghost" where the ghost that haunted the subway had been pushed onto the tracks?
I remember the movie, and I'm pretty sure he jumped. He claimed he was pushed, but that's just because he didn't want to admit he jumped. Vincent Schiavelli plays it well.
As disgusting as the pillars in subway stations are, I quite literally hug them because I'm terrified of the edge of the platforms.
Big objects appear to be moving slower than they actually are.
Trains are much larger than cars, so people misjudge the speed.
of course that's RR trains. don't know about subway trains. I assume all you would see is the headlight approaching.
LOL Bagoh. I mean really.
Greatest = what? Size, Wealth, Livability, Culture, all of the above?
Anyway, modesty has never been the New Yorkers strong suit.
NYC has the benefit of being part of the USA, but I doubt many - outside of it - would live there if they could live in Sydney, Hong kong, Tokyo, Paris, Barcelona or Rome.
I always stay away from the platform edge.
And I "mind the gap".
I don't get this thing about "dropping things on the tracks" -
How do you lose something on the tracks? Are you leaning over the platform?
NYC exceeds all others in untamed madmen roaming free and wild on the subway system. Every so often one of them pushes someone onto the path of an oncoming train. It's generally a young woman who gets pushed. Maybe in the era of #metoo this form of sexual harassment will cease and desist, but it's tough to shame the homeless.
rcocean said...
Big objects appear to be moving slower than they actually are.
Trains are much larger than cars, so people misjudge the speed.
of course that's RR trains. don't know about subway trains. I assume all you would see is the headlight approaching.
Because it's in a tunnel, you feel the wind first. Then you see the lights, then you hear it.
You don't have to be leaning over the tracks to drop things onto the tracks. It's enough that you are standing near it (as you almost always are) or are walking so whatever you dropped slides or bounces.
As a frequent subway rider I feel it fair and correct to say the NYC subway needs plastic walls like a hole in the head. The behavior of the nyc crowds are the very least of the systems problems - how about working on 'dependability'? As to people on the tracks - yes, get the homeless and the wackos out of the station and the incidents will plummet. I also fear nyc has its share of drama queens who thrive on grabbing attention - and some idiots cooperate by taking cell photos of them. Jerks who lower themselves to the tracks should be lowered into a jail cell for 2 weeks...word will get around fast - bingo, problem solved. Blame the jerk mayor - where is Giuliani when we need him?
"Blame the jerk mayor - where is Giuliani when we need him?"
Showing he's an ass on national television.
Putting plexiglass walls in all the underground stations would screw with the air circulation so badly I just can't even imagine. They are already ovens in the summer. Comparing them to airport shuttles is inapt. Most airport shuttles I've ever seen are above ground and therefore the train track itself is adequately ventilated. In addition, the platform is inside the airport, so it is also adequately ventilated/air conditioned.
And it completely ignores the fact that a large number of stations are outside. The comment itself betrays a Manhattan-centric view of the subway system. In the outer boroughs, tons of stations are open air, above ground, outside. Tacking a plexiglass system onto that would be... weird as hell, as well as again screwing with the ventilation so badly they'd become unbearable in summer.
The only reason to be on the platform edge, is if you're about ready to push someone on the tracks.
... or, maybe "onto the tracks".
People always object to culling the herd no matter what method is suggested.
I don't. It's long overdue.
Comparing it to an airport shuttle train is inapt in another way. Inside an airport, you've already filtered people with a basic income requirement: they at least can buy an airplane ticket or have someone who cares about them who can. So they've bought into the system, they have skin in the game.
Also, they're trapped inside the airport. No one is going to say, hey, it would be fun to break these plexiglass doors, because 1. they've bought into the system, so they have less motivation to destroy it, and 2. they're trapped, so if they decide to destroy something they have nowhere to run to.
Whereas in the NYC subway, the price of entry is sturdy enough legs to jump the turnstile. It is open 24 hours a day. You can do literally anything you want in any station and even with all the security cameras in the world be long gone before any law officer could get there. Install a sophisticated interlocking plexiglass hoobajoob into that, and watch it get get mutilated/jammed/destroyed in weeks/days/hours. The escalators are bad enough, so that you have a 1 in 2 shot of any of them ever working.
Greatest city in the world, huh?
Thanks to Mayor De Blasio for the policy of letting the homeless and mentally ill sleep and stay wherever they choose, including subway stations.
I've noticed most people are keeping further from the platform after a some horrific incidents a couple of years ago. I know I do.
As to plexiglass, there still has to be an opening for the doors, or doors in the wall itself. Hugely expensive to do in hundreds of stations, but could be done in the more crowded ones.
As to plexiglass, there still has to be an opening for the doors, or doors in the wall itself. Hugely expensive to do in hundreds of stations, but could be done in the more crowded ones.
You need trains that can stop at exactly the right mark. For old U.S. systems, that's the part that seems questionable to me.
The behavior of the nyc crowds are the very least of the systems problems - how about working on 'dependability'?
The MBTA is all ears.
As a kid, there was a train than ventured North-South in the East Bay, Oakland thru Richmond, that bisected the little towns in between. My friend's older brother (who was a worldly 11 at the time), was playing chicken with train, tripped, got caught, and lost his lower leg, but survived.
I remember an article in the SF Chronicle sports page of some Oakland Raiders visiting him in the hospital, presenting him with an autographed game ball. I thought that was so cool at the time. Getting hit by a train, surviving, losing a leg, getting in the papers, meeting some Raiders - it was like a modern day Tom Sawyer story circa 1975.
Way more exciting than Fortnight or Minecraft.
So did Kavanaugh try to push Christine Blasey Ford onto the subway tracks? Oops, wrong thread.
Well I lay my head on the railroad track
Waiting on the Double E
But the train don't run by here no more
Poor poor pitiful me
Oh these boys won't let me be
Lord have mercy on me
Woe woe is me
Brett Kavanaugh's accuser could have written these lyrics.
Poor, Poor, Pitiful Me
Well I met a man out in Hollywood
Now I ain't naming names
Well he really worked me over good
Just like Jesse James
Poor poor pitiful me
Yes he really worked me over good
He was a credit to his gender
Put me through some changes Lord
Sort of like a Waring blender
Poor poor pitiful me
Well I met a boy in the Vieux Carres
Down in Yokohama
He picked me up and he threw me down
He said "Please don't hurt me Mama"
Poor poor pitiful me
For those commenters (Kevin, gg6) who are saying that the plexiglass doors won't work, or would ruin circulation, check out this article about them (and see the photo at the top):
https://www.thetransportpolitic.com/2017/09/26/the-case-of-the-missing-platform-doors/
You can also google "Platform Screen Doors" for the technical term.
All these people are competing for this year's Darwin award. Would they all could win.
More worrisome a statistic is New Yawkers voted for Julia Salazar for State Senate in the 16th District in the recent primary. She is a member of the Democratic Socialist party, who lied about her background, saying she was a poor Jewish immigrant latina of color. Her brother says none of those things are true. There are further episodes of craziness but again New Yawkers voted for her.
I can still hear the gentle voice of the canned announcement to please, "Stand Clear of the Closing Doors."
On the Green line stop at Grand Central there really is not much room to stand back away from the tracks.
Are these platforms barely ledges that you can barely walk? I've used the tube in London. There was plenty of room to stay away from the gap with all personal items until the train stopped. And then the small gap between train and platform was small enough to prevent most items for falling through. Maybe quit messing with keys, phones, and credit cards while boarding the train.
Begonia, that is a good link. I hadn't thought of it just being the door height, or person height, I was picturing every airport tram I've been on where the barrier was full height, but that was likely specifically to keep air conditioning or heat in the airport space.
As a kid, there was a train
Huh.
Re glass walls on the subway: de Blasio spend money on the subway? Surely you jest. He's got a political machine to support.
I am going to guess that there's a linkage between this behavior and the Rise of the Dumbest Generation. Just a hunch.
"...the subways have a wall of plexiglass between the platform riders and trains..."
Alternatively, people could just stay the hell off the tracks. We're probably not losing our best and brightest in these cases.
NYT is preaching religious or behavioral protocol changes, dangerously close to the third rail.
There are those who lean over the edge to look down the tunnel and see if the train is coming. Bad idea.
wild chicken, 2:07:
"As a kid, there was a train
"Huh."
Or, as Christopher Hitchens put it, don't say that as a boy your grandmother used to read to you, unless at that stage of her life she really was a boy, in which case you have probably thrown away a better intro.
My dad says he used to walk through the Twin Peaks tunnel in SF from his home to downtown when he was a kid. He says he and his friends did a lot of stupid things as teenagers.
The guy should have kneeled and gotten paid by Nike.
You can forget about plastic barricades; because plastic.
You can also forget about a wall, because wall.
Profiling is out too.
"As to plexiglass, there still has to be an opening for the doors, or doors in the wall itself. Hugely expensive to do in hundreds of stations, but could be done in the more crowded ones."
For full protection, you'd probably have something like a jetway, with accordion fabric around the doors, and a projection extending out from the platform to bridge the gap between platform and train?
"Fantastically expensive" seems an understatement, considering how expensive it's been to build any new rail infrastructure in New York. And presumably getting the train to stop in just the right place and waiting for the platforms to extend and jetway to move would slow down the trains, which seem to be moving none too fast now.
For that matter, what do you suppose it would cost to make the entire NYC subway 100% handicap-assessible?
Maybe it's just time to admit that we really can't build big things anymore (or, really, even fully maintain or extend already-built big things)? The oldest part of the New York subway (The "H" formed by the 7th and Lex. Ave lines, and 42nd St in Manhattan) was built in four years (1900-1904). I doubt it could be done in forty today, as costs would rise faster than any possible source of funding.
"The only reason to be on the platform edge, is if you're about ready to push someone on the tracks."
No, it's commuters eager to get on first so they can grab whatever seats or opportune positions near the doors are available.
London Underground has similar problems.
"Greatest = what? Size, Wealth, Livability, Culture, all of the above? "
Self-esteem.
"You need trains that can stop at exactly the right mark. For old U.S. systems, that's the part that seems questionable to me."
The trains do pretty much stop at the right mark. The problem is that there are different trains in service throughout the system, and they have doors at different locations. Sometimes trains are diverted to stations they do not regularly serve.
Automated trains would solve the problem of traumatizing train drivers. As well as saving money on operational costs (salaries). And it would fund a lot of computer programmers too - a big win! (For me!) (And the money $$$$$ would come out of capex and could be funded by future generations via bonds. Another big win!)
I wish I had seen this earlier. I've been away from NYC for a few decades but my suspicion is that unwitnessed "walkers" and others whose bodies were found on the tracks were actually homicides.
https://hiddenhomicides.blogspot.com/
I'd love to know the time of day (or, preferably, the-time-of-night) for fatalities n this article.
My own conclusion: any unwitnessed late-night death that occurred between stations was most likely a homicide.
Why Do So Many "Accidents" Occur When There are So Few Riders?
https://hiddenhomicides.blogspot.com/2016/05/why-do-so-many-accidents-happen-at.html
NYC is the only 24/7 system: the only one running all night.
Also it is the largest by track or station count. Thus hardest to police.
Also the one with virtually no anti-crime cameras:
http://hiddenhomicides.blogspot.com/2018/01/reposted-no-cameras-no-problem.html
Cams at the front of every train could cost only thousands (not millions) to install but they would reveal things MTA managers and their lawyers don't want you to know.
Witnessed track homicides: http://hiddenhomicides.blogspot.com/2014/10/witnessed-track-murders-and-murderous.html
Here's a woman who I think was murdered but according to the police fell from a train:
https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20150324/claremont/woman-killed-by-1-train-remembered-as-joyful-mother/
You could do platform doors on the numbered subway lines, because all the cars there are 51-feet long and the doors are in relatively the same position on each car (though not the exact same position). You can't do it on the lettered lines running north-south through the central part of Manhattan, because some 600-foot-long trains have 60-foot long cars, and others have 75-foot long cars, so the doors don't match up.
The 75-foot-long rail cars are all between 30 and 40 years old down, so 10-15 years down the line when they're replaced with 60-foot cars, then the MTA can think about the platform doors (they were going to do a test project on the L train-14th Street line while it's closed next year for Hurricane Sandy-caused repairs, using the lightly-used Third Avenue stop as the guinea pig for the platform door trials. The line is all-60 foot cars, but apparently cut it out of the budget in favor of adding a second exit at the First Avenue station).
"[In] China, the subways have a wall of plexiglass between the platform riders and trains, as do airport shuttles in the US. Is it really that much of a reach for the greatest city in the world to adopt this 25-year old technology?"
Fuck that. Americans don't "protect" each other. Go buy a homeopathic medicine, or find somebody "spiritual" to put coffee grounds up your butt, and remember where you are: Fantasyland, Bitch.
Freedom of fucking Speech RULES!
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