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The Times catches on to Ask Gothamist's slight obsession with subway etiquette. (*cough* We think out complaints are totally legit, though!)
Anyway, the Times and the MTA want you to know that it's not appropriate to put your feet on the seats. This may seem silly, but we've all seen that guy who thinks it's okay to use the adjacent seat as a foot rest.
Perhaps this woman explained it most succinctly:
Stephanie Peterkin, 39, a bartender from Staten Island, said it was common sense that putting one's feet on the seats is rude. "I'm a grown woman, but my mother would still smack me for that," she said.
All this is part of a new set of regulations put together by the state, the first new rules on subway behavior since 1994. Other proposed restrictions include banning the use of skateboards, prohibiting people from walking between cars, and preventing people from straddling their bikes while riding the train.
We are particularly fond of this picture, though. Because... wow.
Other subway behavior that irks us: kids selling candy for their "basketball uniforms", people who feel the need to whip out the cell phones as soon as they're above ground, people who take up space with purses and shopping bags on seats, and people who cut their nails while riding the train.
Photo from the Ting-Li Wang/New York Times
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I loathe pole huggers on crowded trains.
I like candy. Who cares what they use the money for, as long as the package isn't open.
Once on a very crowed F train, a girl was kitting while standing. Seriously, common sense much? (And also, isn't knitting kind of 2001, Ms. Carroll Street?)
Not just pole hugging, but pole HOGging... I hate getting on the train, and seeing some jerk leaning his or her entire body against the pole so nobody else can hold onto it.
On the train I hate yuppies speaking in squeaky, valley-girl accents saying things such as "I am SO there" "like" "totally" and "what EVER."
they need to ban nose picking. i once sat across from a woman picking her nose all the way to queens on the F. i was forced to close my eyes and feign sleep.
Gum snapping. Can't stand it. Beeping phone games, too. The worst.
One subway related behavior that irks me is the people who walk up the subway stairs and when they reach the top, stop and stand there blocking the exit and look around oblivious to the fact that there are other people trying to get up the narrow stairway behind them.
Why do some people have to force themselves down a narrow crowded stairway against the people traffic of a train that just unloaded? To the people who love to force themselves down a crowded stairway... Wake Up! if the stairway is packed, you are not going to make the train that everyone just got off of. Just be patient and walk down when the crowd subsides. You will catch the next train.
Clipping ANY part of one's body on the subway is just WRONG. The noise is like fingernails on a blackboard!
You're all a bunch of whiny fucking bitches
I actually told a woman she disgusting for filing her nails on the subway. She stopped for a while, but then tried to be subtle about it. I think some woman have a compulsion to file their nails all the time. Gross!
Can we talk about the annoyingly loud and upbeat-sounding musicians that think that I'm prone to giving them ANY money when I'm trying to ride the subway in relative peace & quiet on my morning commute? In particular, the duos or trios that are strumming the guitars and singing in Spanish at the top of their lungs. But this basically applies to all of them.
Subway drummers drive me f-ing nuts! I hate when I'm trying to catch a train after a late movie and I'm totally zonked and there's some dude banging away on some plastic pales so loudly I can't even have a conversation. The nerve!
Are you kidding me?
I was stopped by a police officer back in May for having part of my legs in the seat right next to mine on the subway and he gave me a $50 ticket and try to give me a no no talk.
I can't believe they are going to try to reinforce that stupid law. How about people that stink on the subway that is more rude than taking part of the seat right next to yours.
MTA sucks!!!
you people should buy a car
Ryan raises this question (I think): why are there never any MTA employees around to enforce the rules when it matters? You always hear about people bullied for taking up two seats on an almost-empty car, but I've never seen a transit cop reprimand anybody, EVER, for any infraction. For example, the no panhandling/soliciting rule -- which applies to kids selling candy, no matter what they're using the money for.
Two of my pet peeves, inspired by this morning's commute: people listening to music so loudly that you wonder why they have headphones at all (is there anything more annoying than the tinny sound of someone else's hip-hop?), and people who insist on reading even when the car is packed like a sardine tin. I count on my subway time to get my reading done, but if I have to put my book down to make room for you to squeeze in next to me, then you don't get to read your damn AM New York. Get your elbows out of my face and read the ads for Dr. Zizmor like the rest of us.
I'm surprised the guy was reading AM NY, doesn't he know that Metro is a much better free paper?
I hate it when people sitting across from poles, put their FEET on the poles! It's usually tall lanky guys....
"Can we talk about the annoyingly loud and upbeat-sounding musicians that think that I'm prone to giving them ANY money when I'm trying to ride the subway in relative peace & quiet on my morning commute? In particular, the duos or trios that are strumming the guitars and singing in Spanish at the top of their lungs. But this basically applies to all of them."
Yes, these people who are actually competent musicians are horrible. Whatever. They are very entertaining, and if you can't deal with them just plug in your iPod become an iPod zombie and disconnect yourself from the humaniuty and cool stuff that exists underground.
It's public transportation. Not your priavte world. Deal with it. If you can't appreciate stuff like that which adds color and flavor to what New York is, then please just leave this city and leave
ok, i put my feet up on the train. it's my fault. but there are roaches on the F train and i'll be damned if i will let one walk up my legs without a fight.
nextel two way pagers. just too fucking annoying.
the people who start preaching right after the doors close to head into the city from brooklyn. a very long, uninterrupted sermon.
I can't believe no one has yet railed against people who don't take off their backpacks on a crowded train. Especially college kids with white-people dreds and backpacking-across-Europe backpacks.
If the train is empty, it's perfectly OK to rest your feet on the seats. If the car is filling up, put your feet on the floor.
It is never acceptable to speak on a cell phone at all while riding in public transportation, nor is it alright to play your walkman or ipod so high that others can hear it.
Neither is it acceptable to eat anything whatever, loudly clip nails or smack chewing gum.
Talking must be kept to a tolerable decibel level.
Basically, get in the train and keep quiet...
(...and allow everyone to take pictures)
www.forgotten-ny.com
Kevin, Kevin, Kevin. I really enjoy forgotten-ny.com, but I seriously have to disagree with you here. It's no more appropriate to put your feet up on public seats than it would be for me to come to your home and prop my tootsies up on your couch just because nobody's using it at the moment. It's as disgusting as that HSBC commercial where a guy has his bare feet propped up on a table at an outdoor cafe in Thailand, where the ad says showing sole is highly offensive. Feet belong on the floor, same as spit belongs in your mouth and not hocked into the air.
>>>>Kevin, Kevin, Kevin.
[sigh] I get that a lot.
Well, I never rest my shoes on subway benches if I have been in dusty warehouses in Floyd Bennett Field or in muddy park trails in Staten Island.
I see you didn't address my other points...
C'mon, gum snappers, walkmen blasters, fingernail clippers. Defend yourselves, I know you're in here!...
www.forgotten-ny.com
I didn't address your other points because I agree with them. Especially allowing people to take pictures. :-)
(Except when your subject has an objection to being photographed, or there's a compelling security concern.) Basically, give the subway the same respect you would accord someone else's home or office and everything should be copacetic.
A few weeks ago I was riding the Q to Brooklyn, totally packed, on the Manhattan Bridge, when this sad guy shit in his pants. The other rider's outcry was the angriest passive-aggressive mumbling I've ever experienced.
To add to keepnitreal's pleasant anecdote, there's no experience quite like getting in an empty car and finding out why it's empty the hard way, but only after the doors have closed behind you.
Last time it happened to me, the gag-inducing smell was *somewhat* offset by the tragicomical looks of desperation and disgust on my fellow passengers.
Yes, these people who are actually competent musicians are horrible. Whatever.
The competent musicians are fine. What's not fine are the guys who are playing merely so you'll feel compelled to give them money to stop. For instance: saxophone player on the N/W/R line I have seen who plays Pop Goes The Weasel as loud as he could, as fast as he could, over and over and over. This was, needless to say, annoying.
But a week or two later, I was again forced into a car with this guy, and this time no one was paying any attention to him, so he decided to not only play Pop Goes The Weasel a thousand times, but in between each play he would just jam the keys of the sax as fast as he could, creating the worst random noise you've ever heard. (The MTA was obviously siding with this guy, as the train was stuck in the tunnel).
After 3-4 minutes of this, we finally reached the next stop, and he moved to the door and shouted "NONE OF YOU WILL EVER FORGET ME." If nothing else, that asshole was right.
But to add something new to the list of complaints: The endless crowds of tourists that form in highly trafficked areas of the bigger stations (Times Square in particular) upon the appearance of:
-Hip-hop / breakdancing squads
-Robot men
-The flamenco dancer with the mannequin
-The aforementioned bucket drummers
And my #1 subway complaint can be summed up in two words: Falun Gong.