InsideTransit

There is this myth that one day there will be a subway here in NYC that goes up and down second avenue. Apparently work is going on to build it but many wonder if we will see it before the martians arrive to fight us for earth.

NY Daily News writer Pete Donohue notes that his sources told him that the first phase of the Second Avenue Subway won’t be open for riders until 2015. This is two years later than the latest provided date of 2015. And in more exciting news, the LIRR tunnel to Grand Central has been pushed back a year to 2016.

“It will not come as shock to the American people that the Second Ave. subway is behind schedule,” Straphanger Campaign leader Gene Russianoff said. “It’s a big complicated project. I think part of this is bowing to the economic realities of what money is available and when.”

The original date for the subway was 2012. The Second Ave. budget is revised upwards slightly to $4.4 billion from about $4.3 billion.

I will keep dreaming that it will be here one day….

Now this is exciting – if you like to wear cuffs or other jewelry on your wrists, I have something for you. It’s the NYC Metro Cuff made by Tiffany Burnette. You can see a photo of it below – it highlights what looks like most of Manhattan.

So now if you ever get in a jam and don’t know which line to take, you can just look at your wrist and be on the go in a jiffy. It’s like the NFL quarterbacks that can’t remember their plays so they wear them on their arms.

I wonder if they offer attachments for night and/or weekend service. Can I order one with my line on it? It’s pretty neat looking – I have seen more people wearing subway t-shirts and other products so this just might work. Check out more photos here.

There have been loads of people who have created alternative NYC subway maps over the years.  Kriston Lewis has put together one of the best looking and functional maps I’ve seen to-date. The lines are clearly noted, bus transfers are included on the main points, and it’s easier to follow than the current MTA subway map.

Click the graphic below to download the map – note that it’s a PDF file and is 80″x80″ in size.

Over my years riding the subway, I’ve spent countless hours studying where to wait for a NYC subway to make sure I get off at the closest point to where I need to be at my destination. Most NYC subway stations have multiple exits and multiple transfer options and knowing where to wait can mean a couple of minutes savings each day. If you are waiting for a train, why not align yourself before getting onto the train to save time at the exit?

For example, if you are on the #1 northbound and plan to get off at 50th street, there’s only one exit at the back end of the train. Moving down from the front to the back can save time when getting off.

But what happens if you are going to a new station or aren’t sure where is the best place for transferring from one line to another?

A new mobile application has launched to help with this issue. It’s called Exit Strategy NYC and is available for most mobile platforms including the iPhone, Android, Blackberry and even the Amazon Kindle. The price ranges from $2-5 depending on your device. And the Exit Strategy application doesn’t need to have Internet access to be used – this means you can use it in the tunnels of NYC.

Brother and sister team Jonathan and Ashley Wegener created the application and call their idea “platform strategy”. It took two months to grab all of the data and get it into their application. The MTA should integrate Exit Strategy NYC into the official MTA web site.

Now if they can just create an application so I know which subway lines and cars are most likely to have single women that meet my criteria – I’d pay for that!

Here at InsideTransit, we are always on the lookout for people wearing subway and transit-related clothing. This morning one of my friends sent me the image below. As you can see, it’s a woman wearing a NYC subway map as a dress!

It appears to be a map from the 70s. Even the straps on the dress have some subway writing on them (I can’t make out what it says).  The top of her dress is actually most of manhattan which is duplicated from the bottom left of the dress.

The dress is available at Nordstrom for $250! Just get some subway maps at a station and paste them together – then it will cost $0 (but don’t go out when it is raining!

Here at InsideTransit we like to educate new residents or tourists to a variety of cities around the world in how to properly use mass transit. In the video below, you can watch one person (we believe a man) transfer from the L train to the 4 or 5 trains at Union Square. Union Square is an interesting station because the ground moves to meet the train due to the huge curves that the train moves through. So please mind the gap as you enter or exit a subway train at this station.

Bonus: as you watch the video, you may feel a bit woozy – just know that this is not actually how it feels to make the transfer unless you are drunk.

Found via Subchat, here’s a very old NYC subway commercial that’s related to the World’s Fair. The idea was to get people to take the subway to the WF instead of other forms of transportation. Look how clean the subway cars are and how happy everyone looks.

Seriously, sometimes I wonder what is going on here in NYC. Are they putting something wacky in our water? Here we have a person (I assume it’s a person) dressed up like a bird bouncing on a seat in the NYC subway. I think it’s a bird because of the beak. From what I understand this is on the L line — I’d love to see the bird on the 7 sometime!

You know what’s funny about this is that sometimes you just need to smile and laugh – and that’s what this bird did for me today. I’d go for a bouncy ride if I saw the bird.

I found a new blog today called, “People Who Sit In The Disability Seats When I’m Standing On My Crutches”. No seriously that’s the name. And I’d like each of you to click the blog link and go look at the photos. It’s the same story as people who park in handicapped parking spots because they will only be in Starbucks a minute. On this new blog the person says they are currently using crutches and when he/she gets on the subway trains, people don’t move out of the handicapped seats to allow the person to sit.

The blogger says they only take photos when no other seats are available. The signs that are above the seats have always been meaningless to me- they are way too high and do no good for someone already sitting down. Most of these people should know to get up but perhaps the new technology trains could be built with some sort of shock buzzer system where if the seat is needed a light bit of electricity races through the seats to wake them up.

When I was a little kid, my mother would take sis and me on the bus and subway all the time. If we didn’t get up when someone got on the bus who needed to sit, we would immediately get mom’s eye that said with no words “get up now or your butt will be so red when we get home that you won’t sit for a week!” and we got up. Today parents will slap their 4 kids into the handicapped seats without thinking about it. It’s so disappointing….

Get up. I weigh more than anyone and I always get up. If I can, so can you. And teach your kids to get up.

The Newsday is reporting that U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer has reached out to the Long Island Rail Road to get WiFi access for passengers noting, “”make commuting more productive and pleasant.” Apparently Obama’s stimulus funds can be used to pay for the $1,000 per train fee to get the access installed.

Considering that airlines including Virgin America now offer wifi up in the sky, the LIRR along with all of the other suburban railroads should offer WiFi as well.

Now let’s get some tables on the LIRR or even a dedicated car with long tables to stand and work – that’d be hot.

No word on whether passengers will have to pay for the access on each trip.