We've seen rain inside the subway stations—this subway waterfall photo is the gold standard in crumbling infrastructure porn—and witnessed water leaking inside plenty of older subway cars, but this is the first time we've spotted a good gusher inside one of the newer trains. It's always good for a laugh—as long as you aren't the one getting sprayed with scary city juice. This video was taken on an N train this morning by writer Kristina Monllos. Gotta love the defeated expressions on everyone's faces: more ›

We know many things delay the subways—track fires, signal problems—but did you realize that our fine-feathered friends can also fowl things up? For instance, yesterday, there were 45 minutes on the N yesterday because of a duck and a hawk. more ›

Have you been missing the much maligned L train shuttle bus? Good news, its back! Among the many planned service changes for this weekend is the first return of the bus we like to call "shuttLe" since last October. So if you want to get to an L stop between Lorimer and Broadway Junction this weekend, be prepared to bus it. And you'll be happy to know this won't be the buses only appearance, the MTA expects to utilize it on at least six weekends this year to upgrade the line’s “communication-based train control” system. more ›

When the trains and busses stop running, what happens to the people still riding the rails? They wait. During the Blizzageddon we heard all about the poor folks who spent 32 hours on an A train and today the Post already has the story of some angry straphangers stuck in Coney Island who commandeered a stalled N train and, through force of will, persuaded the MTA and the NYPD to turn on the heat while they waited out the storm. more ›

Francis Lusk, the motorman who stopped his train 70 feet before a woman who had fainted and fallen on the tracks, was apparently so modest about being a hero that he didn't even tell his dad about his day when he returned home. His dad told the Daily News, "He went out to get Chinese food, and the phone rang. It was the TA. I said, 'What the hell did he do now?' They said, 'Your son's a hero.'" We feel like most other people would be conducting themselves like Dennis Duffy. more ›

A woman who fell onto the tracks at the 5th Avenue and 59th Street N station yesterday morning is extremely lucky to be alive, after an oncoming train came to a halt just 70 feet before hitting her body. According to the Daily News, Motorman Francis Lusk spotted the woman about 300 feet before his train, and saw folks on the platform waving their hands frantically, so he slammed on the brakes not a moment too soon. He said, "She walked right off the platform. I was shocked. I didn't know what was wrong." more ›

This poor N train is clearly not over the MTA's doomsday cuts. We spotted this masquerade at Queensboro Plaza last night, where a clearly marked N train (note the N logo next to the strip map) was convinced that it was a recently departed W. Or is this the MTA's way of telling us to not give up hope that the cut service could someday return? Cruel joke, guys. more ›

Jose Gomez and Beatriz Briceno, the two struck by an oncoming subway in Astoria last Friday, were reportedly on their first date that night. The two had met when 19-year-old Briceno had waited on 29-year-old Gomez at El Cocotero in Manhattan, and had been out for just a few hours when she dropped her jacket onto the elevated tracks. The jacket, which was valued at $200, also contained her wallet, cell phone and keys. more ›

Last night, a wake was held in Brooklyn for Jose Gomez, who was killed Friday by an oncoming subway while helping a friend retrieve her jacket from the tracks. Gomez, a 29-year-old from Venezuela, was on the 36th Avenue platform in Astoria when his friend, Beatriz Briceno, 19, dropped her jacket onto the tracks. The pair, who had been drinking, jumped down for the clothing and were hit by an oncoming train. Briceno is still in the hospital in critical condition, but Gomez was killed. His sister said at the wake, "He [would] always think about somebody else before himself." more ›

Beatriz Briceno, the 19-year-old critically injured by an oncoming N train that killed 29-year-old Jose Gomez, has been able to open her eyes and move her legs for the first time since Friday night's accident. Briceno and Gomez had jumped onto the tracks at the 36th Avenue station in Queens to retrieve her jacket. Both had been drinking, and weren't able to move out of the way of the train. The MTA says the accident should serve as a warning to anyone thinking of jumping onto the tracks. MTA spokes man Mark Groce told the Daily News, "It's just not worth it." more ›

Jose Gomez, the 29-year-old hit and killed by an N train in Astoria Friday night, apparently tried to save his friend, 18-year-old Beatriz Briceno, before being hit. Briceno had allegedly jumped onto the tracks at the 36th Avenue station to retrieve her coat, and Gomez jumped after her in an attempt to push her out of the way of the oncoming train. "It doesn't surprise me that he tried to save his friend," Jose's sister Kimberly told the Daily News. "He was like that with all of his friends. He was always going above and beyond." more ›

UPDATE BELOW: A man was killed and a woman is in critical condition after being hit by an N train in Astoria last night. Both were pinned under the tracks at around 10:40 p.m., requiring authorities to de-energize the tracks, but the man later fell from the tracks to the street, and was pronounced dead at the scene. According to one witness, the man appears to have fallen in after the woman as a northbound train approached, and it didn't look like either could have survived. "They weren't moving at all. There was a lot of blood on the road." more ›

A one-legged woman wearing only black panties was discovered yesterday afternoon on the tracks of the N train in Besnonhurst. "I heard one of the workers screaming on the radio, 'A woman's body on the tracks!'" said Matt Bencivenga, a dispatcher for a car service company nearby. "She was all mangled." According to the News, her prosthetic leg was found nearby around 3:40 p.m., 100 feet from the Kings Highway station. Authorities think impact of the train knocked it off, and also severed her hand; investigators suspect the cause of the death may be a suicide. more ›

This shouldn't come as much of a surprise. The MTA board voted 11-2 to approve far-reaching service cuts that will eliminate the W and V trains and cut more than 30 bus lines in an attempt to plug a revenue shortfall of $750 million. Despite some alterations to the planned cuts drafted after a series of contentious public hearings, the service reductions closely mirror those proposed last year. more ›

A 16-year-old graffiti tagger was hit by a train in a Brooklyn subway tunnel Saturday night, tagging with two friends. As of yesterday the NY Times reports that Jose Juarez, of Sunset Park, is in critical but stable condition—however, his right leg was severed. more ›

Hey, remember that Twitter account that was posting snarky take-downs of riders on the N Train? Well, sounds like the author behind the account is getting served a little taste of his own medicine, courtesy of some sleuthy Gothamist commenters. They launched their own investigation and quickly tracked him down:

It is very easy to figure out who this person is. Since he's obviously in love with himself, who do you think the first person he is going to follow/be followed by on Twitter is? His own Twitter account, of course. If you look at this person's followers/people he follows, it's simple to figure out his identity (sort of an idiot after all). more ›

Yesterday we saw what douchey dealings were happening underground, on a website that tracks them via user-submitted photos. Someone then pointed out a new Twitter account called N Train Gossip which includes a 140-character takedown of each victim the author snaps a photo of. Consider this a warning N train riders! Seems a little harsh, too — this photo was accompanied by the words, "Ummm... nice Mickey Mouse mp3 player, grown Asian woman." (It's cute!) However, this nose picker had what was coming to him. Seems NYC is no longer the place where everyone is invisible. more ›

[UPDATE BELOW] 8:30 a.m. Eep, NYC Transit is warning, "Due to a rail condition at the Queensboro Plaza Station, there is no service in both directions on the N trains from the Queensboro Plaza Station to the Astoria-Ditmars Boulevard Station," plus the "W train service has been suspended the entire line." There are shuttle trains running local from the Queensboro Plaza Station to the Astoria-Ditmars Boulevard Station and shuttle trains running express from Ditmars Boulevard to Queensboro Plaza, but "As an alternative, customers are advised to take Q69, Q101 or Q102 bus making nearby station stops." more ›

Another musician is missing some treasured instruments, except this time they weren't left in a cab. Jazz musician Matthew Jodrell took the N train home after performing in Lower Manhattan on Sunday night, but an evening of jazz music is enough to make anyone nod off (we kid) and that's exactly what he did. Now he's out one Swiss flugelhorn and a Bach Stradivarius trumpet! more ›

Recently People magazine reunited the cast of Saved by the Bell, but there was one Baysider missing: Screech. They noted that he no longer keeps in touch with his old co-stars, and has since moved on to star in Celebrity Fit Club and a leaked porn video. He's no Mark Paul Gosselaar, is what they're saying. So is it really that surprising to see him on a subway? NYMag reports via a tipster that he was spotted on the N train between 14th Street and 42nd Street yesterday morning. "He was sporting jeans, a white T-shirt, and a sport coat. He is still rocking the Jewfro, a bit shorter in length but still curly, of course. He also still has the goatee with the 'stache. Trying to make sure no one caught on to his stardom, he had a big pair of sunglasses, and was reading amNY." Maybe he was heading out to Brooklyn to see his brother Mike D. Just kidding, he was probably just going to visit with his dad Neil Diamond. more ›

It's a good thing the MTA Bailout saved the W train from saying farewell because it sounds like its neighboring buddy line the R has already had enough dumped onto it lately. The tenth annual "subway shmutz" survey released today by the Straphangers Campaign rated the R the dirtiest line in the system with only 25 percent of its cars clean. more ›

In what has to be a new contender for the most contemporary crime story, a young man was arrested for making graffiti and three other charges after another rider on the N train in Astoria snapped shots of him on her cellphone scratching a window on the train and sending them into Crime Stoppers via text. The vandalism task force was able to connect the cellphone pics to 18-year-old Andrew Morello, who had previously been arrested this summer for tagging "Shelly" on a commercial vehicle in Queens. The NYPD delegated a Crime Stoppers line over the summer specifically for text messages and had previously arrested a driver whose license plate was captured after he hit a cyclist and left the scene of the accident. more ›

Neil Diamond riding the subway shouldn't be too surprising, since he was born and raised in New York, but the crooner is sort of a "big deal" -- so it's nice to see he's still swiping his Metrocard like the rest of us. One fan spotted him Wednesday around 2 p.m. on the N train and reports back, "I was coming from my office on 37th and 5th to take the subway to Union Square...the trains weren't so crowded...I saw a camera crew, and I saw Neil, and my heart leapt!." Alright, so maybe he only goes underground these days when he's got security and a camera crew with him, but the fan said he was quite a gentleman when approached about his show the previous night. He was reportedly talking to a British film crew about his Brooklyn days. [via Urban Prankster] more ›

At least one subway car on the N line derailed near 57th Street and 7th Avenue around 5 p.m. this afternoon. WABC 7 is reporting the incident involved one car while WCBS 2 says two cars derailed and WNBC 4 notes at least three cars were affected. The train was traveling southbound and no passengers seemed injured--just a little shaken up. more ›

A man was fatally run over by a northbound N train yesterday morning. According to the NY Times, no criminal activity is suspected:

A man who said he was a witness, Karriem Torres, said the victim had been running to catch the train and climbed between two cars. He slipped under the train as it began to move and he screamed, Mr. Torres said, adding that by the time the train stopped, the man had been crushed.