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A month after they were proposed, the MTA is adopting a new set of rules of conduct that will see fines being handed out for things like drinking (non-alcoholic beverages) in a subway car, putting your feet on a seat, and riding between subway cars. And you can't ride your bicycle, wear you Rollerblades or be atop a skateboard, either. The MTA says that police officers, who we have been seeing in droves at subway stations lately, will be "reasonable" when asking people why they are changing subway cars; the NY Times has this quote that proves why moving between cars is important:
Mark Page, the city's budget director, who represents Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on the board, observed: "It is, from time to time, convenient to absent oneself from a car or from a particular group of people."She'd probably be able to get the fine thrown out by the judge, but since things like moving away from bad smells or moving train cars to be closer to a subway exit wouldn't be summonsed. However, NYC Transit President Lawrence Reuter would like riders to change cars at stops, using the platforms. The NY Post points out that the MTA is thinking about easing on some other restrictions, like the package limit; when asked by, the MTA noted that a woman was fined for puttin a package on another seat - when she was the only person in the train car. Ha, and New Yorkers are supposed to believe the police don't have ticket quota? The rules will go into effect on October 1, if they are passed; the fines will range from $50 to $100 (we recommend you work on your debate skills).Riders like Beatrice McCants, 30, said they had faced many such occasions. Ms. McCants, who works as a newspaper distributor in Midtown, said she was riding a Brooklyn-bound No. 3 train Wednesday when a man began masturbating in plain sight. "I thought, 'I've got to get off this train,'" she recalled. "Now I'm going to get a fine for that, for running from a flasher? I won't pay it!"
Read the MTA's Rules of Conduct. Check out pictures of life riding the subways from Travis Ruse, and add your own to the NYC Subway group on Flickr.
Photograph by Dan Dickinson, on his Flickr page
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She's got man hands...
Gorilla hands...
Yuppies will be raising hell, because the ban ALSO nixes their morning Starbucks coffee.
Since it's obvious that having any person using a device with wheels on the subway is now against the rules, I really look forward to the inevitable stroller ban.
What's the fine for suffocating passengers with urine stench?
Great more FAKE bullshit crimes created to generate revenue.
I can’t believe safety is the motive for not being able to change cars. It is just another way to soak money out of the already over taxed citizens.
I want to see hard facts and evidence that walking between cars is dangerous.
How many people have died or been injured in the past 40 years?
Until the MTA gets every friggin air conditioner on every train working, this is an absolutely stupid rule. Not to mention the stinky homeless, the perverts, the vomit, etc…
I'm skeptical on how often they will enforce these rules. I haven't really noticed this increased police presence, aside from major stations like times square. And they're usually on the platforms...I rarely seeing policemen patroling the cars.
Remember the good, old days when all the signs said were "No Littering, No Smoking, No Spitting"?
I'm really upset about this open container thing. I absolutely relish my morning coffee on the long D-train ride I take from Chelsea to way up in the Bronx. It brings me joy. In addition, I don't get up early enough to drink my coffee before I leave and I can't stomach the coffee served around my office. The MTA wants to take away the one pleasure I can look forward to every morning? Hateful creatures.
For the record, I'm not a yuppie, and no, I don't drink Starbucks Coffee. I'm going to drink my coffee on the train until I get fined (and, with my track record, I will get fined). I'll probably flout the rules after that as well.
However, for the sake of argument, let me pretend that I will obey this law. Why don't they outlaw all food as well? Why is my coffee worse than my neighbor's McDonald's? Will my coffee, or for that matter my water bottle or Gatorade, create more trash than the crumbs from someone's beef patty or bag of chips? No! If you're going to outlaw drinking, please outlaw food as well!
Maybe set up a portable IV (hidden under clothing) so you can coffee infuse outside of the radar.
I think you can possess your venti starbucks, but cannot drink from it. you can hold it, stare at it, wish you could drink from it, but will not be able to place the cup or straw to your lips.
Meanwhile, someone was raped on a platform while New York's finest were issuing a ticket for somebody enjoying their starbucks.
I think eating on the subway is 10x worse than drinking, as far as propriety goes, but I think officials are probably more concerned about sticky/smelly spills than about crumbs and paper, which can be cleaned much more easily.
"Maybe set up a portable IV (hidden under clothing) so you can coffee infuse outside of the radar."
this is a possible solution for those fond of public urination as well.
It's odd that transit head Lawrence Reuter has introduced micromanagment instructions for beverage drinking riders while he ignores real issues such as the policy that token clerks should do nothing but gawk while people are assaulted in view of their booth. When this happened last month the MTA and Transit Workers Union praised the token clerk for doing nothing to help the victim.... Too bad they don't extend the same tolerance for those naughty coffee drinkers.
One thing I love about New York is that there aren't/weren't rules for everything.
Should you be drinking coffee in a crowded standing room only week day rush hour trip? No and I really don't see that many people doing it. Should you be able to sit back and enjoy coffee with your paper if you are going somewhere on Saturday morning when most everyone else is asleep? Sure. And I can't imagine not indulging.
Now, for the moving through cars: It is really annoying to have to constantly move for people who want to be "closer to the front of the train". Fleeing a wacko or stinker? of course you should be able to.
Starbucks needs local lobbyists for this. I can see revenue diving into say, the few millions rather than many millions.
Then again, I never really get the urge to eat/drink whilst on the subway. That stench of an environment really doesn't play well to my senses.
Maybe there should be a Depends dispenser on each car in case the urination urge hits.
Last Friday morning on the F train: harried mother with kid in tow is trying to maneuver both of them off the train at Caroll St. In the process she bumps into a young woman who was holding a full plastic cup of iced coffee. The cup hit the ground and dumps its entire contents all over the floor of the train. This was really no one's fault; it was a complete accident and the young woman was mortified. Nonetheless, about a dozen people had to stand for a half hour as sticky coffee ran all over the floor. With millions of people riding the subways each day, it only takes a small percentage of passengers to spill their beverages before the whole system is dirty as hell.
The MTA should sell official Subway-issue sippy cups that are spill proof even when dropped. They could squeeze another $10-$15 out of passengers and people that absolutely had to have their coffee in the morning would get a free pass from ticket issuers. Is this a tongue-in-cheek plan? Yes; but these days it almost sounds plausible.
maybe you can still enjoy your coffee... oxo makes a nice thermos mug that clicks shut so it's not an open container until you press the button, sneak a clandestine gulp, and click back into non-criminal mode.
Why not ban coffee drinking and eating food on the platforms? The stations are always ten times dirtier than even the dirtiest subway car. Rats tend to live in stations, not cars, so the benefit would be bigger if they reversed the ban and let you drink while on the train, but not while in the station. As long as they are being Draconian, at least have the rules make sense.
I'm with Dave H. on this one - no, nobody means any harm with their semi-open container, but it's an enormous pain in the ass for all when there's a spill. Spillproof cups are okay, though, from what I can tell, so we can all still drink coffee on the subway. Any public amenity is about small personal sacrifices for the sake of the whole.
I do, however, wish they would restrict NYC schoolchildren to certain cars between 2:30 and 4:00....
I had to switch cars the other day when a lady declared that she had to 'take a dump' and 'that no one could stop her' she then proceeded to drop her pants and bend completely over and take a fucking shit right in the middle of the subway car. i felt really bad for the girl sitting right near her. this is why you need to be allowed to move from car to car!
Samantha T's:
"I do, however, wish they would restrict NYC schoolchildren to certain cars between 2:30 and 4:00" is spot on.
How vastly informative and entertaining...
This is New York, that means do whatever the fuck you want to do, when you want to do it. If you get caught, either run, or suck it up. Thats how it has always been, and will be. The whining and complaining from the people, and the stupid laws of the bureaucracy are nothing new either, so please, continue the ballet that is New York public life.
Drew,
You need to e-mail the MTA with your story. Not that they haven't heard it before but we need to keep them informed!
haywood, your cold hard facts (well, from the MTA, so not sure how factual) were in the same times article:
"Over the last decade, 13 people have been killed, and 117 injured, while riding or moving between subway cars or riding outside them, said Lawrence G. Reuter, the president of New York City Transit, part of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. He said at least two were killed last year alone. Officials said that some riders have successfully sued for injuries suffered between cars, and that explicitly banning moving between cars could strengthen the agency's position in such lawsuits."
"Over the last decade, 13 people have been killed, and 117 injured, while riding or moving between subway cars or riding outside them"
I want hard FACTUAL information on death occurred by riding BETWEEN cars.
Not BS info that includes "moving between or riding outside".
Heck that could have been 12 people killed because they did the stupid "Door Ride" outside the train when only one drunk was killed because he passed out between trains.
My guess is most injuries occurred while riding "Outside" the train, not between.
I think more people get killed a year by trains by getting pushed on the tracks, or retrieving cell phones.
Information that includes 2 different "problems" are usually bullshit statistics molded to get the results wanted.
I Want factual information on injuries that have happened ONLY between cars. none of this 2 completely different circumstance combined status bullshit.
Statistics are easily doctored to sway people to get the "desired results"
Once again these are bullshit rules that make criminals of people doing nothing wrong.
Blame all the litigious assholes who sue because they cant take personal responsibility that they were ultimately the cause of their own injuries by doing something stupid.
I don't want to hear any complaints from the person who said that living in NYC is all about "sucking it up" when the aforementioned old lady's dump lands in his goddamn lap.
Question: The garbage cans are already overflowing on most platforms. Just where does the MTA think passengers will jettison their now-illegal open containers? Say hello again, NYC, to more vermin, stalled trains and track fires from more bottles, cups and cans being thrown on tracks.
Also, remember the MTA disaster trying to enforce "courtesy" with the one-person-per-seat rule (where obese people got tickets and judges threw out summonses by the truckload). These laws will be a similar disaster. Police will not use common sense in handing out summonses because they HATE these new laws (and will enforce them to death in order to scuttle them). If the MTA thinks the lawsuits are bad now, wait till these rules go into effect.
Good point as well on hard evidence of subway deaths. I believe most of these deaths were from daredevils -- who wouldn't pay attention to any new rules anyway. The only thing these rules will do is discourage people from using their self-preservation instinct to change cars when they should.
You all should complain to the MTA -- straphangers.org has great complaint forms.
Um, I just read the rules and they say you may not drink *alcoholic* beverages. This has been in effect for many, many years. They say nothing about non-alcoholic beverages or food. Unless I'm missing something......?
Re drinking a beverage on the subway: New York summers last about six months, and they're worse underground than above-ground. I wait on sweltering, sauna-like platforms day after day, year after year. The only thing that gets me through my 20-minute sweat-bath waiting for an "F" train is a cup of iced coffee or iced tea. I drink it on the platform, and I drink it on the train. In 25 years of subway commuting, I've never spilled a drop on the floor, or on any other passenger. Like one of the other posters here, drinking my beverage of choice is the only thing that makes a subway ride semi-tolerable. The MTA does so many things wrong -- must they deny people this one tiny liberty of rehydrating themselves in their hellish underground?
Bums rule the subway: The ones that sleep,urinate and deficate in it and the ones who run it(e.g. LAWRENCE REUTER, WHICH ONES ARE WORSE?....
Creating new crimes to enhance revenues to justify their cushy salaries.
REVOLUTION!!!!!!
Get that bum LR ride my stinky L & 6, tell him to bring a gas mask!!
CLEAN THE F****** TRAINS!
I am not sure how much enforcement the open containers are getting to date, but i have been drinking my coffee as usual and haven't seen anybody ticketed yet. Maybe my subway line is't posh enough for nyc police to care. I also promise myself that i will keep doing it till caught and it might not stop me from commiting this horrible crime again either. After all what could be worse - me and my empty coffee cup i take with me off the train to be dumped in trash every day - BEWARE!
I agree with Eve on the open container issue... I do drink coffee daily & it is the highlight of my morning routine ... there's only Starbuck's by my school & I like to drink Dunkin Donuts... during my commute... & I take my cup with me. We might be paying for THE SLOBS WHO THROW TRASH ON THE GROUND... & ok understandable. But, it's only fair... why not band food too??? Same "problem", same "mess"... AND WHY SHOULD WE HAVE TO PAY FOR::: THE HOMELESS, SMELLY, DISEASE INFESTED PEOPLE... laid out sleeping on the car-trains... making the smell of certain cars they inhabit unbearable... THE ODIOUS TOXINS OF URINE, VOMIT & FUNK... What happened to the "good ol' days" when the fare was $0.75? and WTF IS MY $2.00 per ride ... $76 per month PAYING FOR???