The Submit traveled roughly 100 miles alongside 12 completely different strains to kind a diary of the present subway system.
J.C. Rice
Within the wake of the horrific subway shoving demise of 40-year-old Higher West Sider Michelle Go final week in Instances Sq., The Submit spent three days surveying the troubled transit system, the place crimes have soared by 30% this 12 months in contrast with the primary three weeks of 2021 .
Touring roughly 100 miles alongside 12 completely different strains, and scouring dozens of particular person stations within the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens, a workforce of journalists led by reporter Kerry J. Byrne and photographer J.C. Rice witnessed the decay and depravity — and stored a diary of the grim scenes which have change into the norm on this planet’s largest transportation system.
TUESDAY, Jan. 18
Penn Station, Manhattan – 11:04 a.m.
A person struggles down a near-empty 1 native platform speaking to himself, dragging procuring luggage of belongings behind him. The Submit witnesses individuals who seem homeless at virtually each station.
West 4th Road Station, Manhattan – 12:05 p.m.
A person sleeps on an in any other case largely empty A practice because it stops on its approach downtown. Your entire platform smelled of feces, urine, alcohol and cigarette smoke.
2 practice at Flatbush Avenue-Brooklyn Faculty Station, Brooklyn – 6:57 p.m.
A crew clear round a sleeping man who’s utilizing his backpack as a pillow.
The cleansing crew sits on the platform with vivid yellow mop buckets and plastic bottles of Impartial Q, a business disinfectant, and board the trains as they attain the final cease on the road. In a single case, the crew cleans for just a few seconds, then soar again on the platform when the conductor publicizes the practice is about to move again uptown.
We don't see different cleansing crews vigilantly standing by in a similar way on the terminal platforms of different subway strains.
one hundred and twenty fifth Road Station (4, 5, 6), Manhattan – 9:25 p.m.
A person taunts a trio of transit cops within the mezzanine above the East Harlem platforms.
“Suck my d–okay!” the person yells, earlier than shortly reaching into the fitting pocket of his pants, setting off fears of the worst.
He pulls out a small wad of money and waves it within the face of one of many cops. “See this? Financial institution! I work in a financial institution bro!” the person yelled. 5 younger males soar the turnstile whereas the heated scenario unfolds.
The cops exit the station and let the person stroll.
one hundred and twenty fifth Road Station, Manhattan – 9:21 p.m.
A troubled man in a dirty grey sweat go well with, so soiled it seems lined in oil, stumbles awkwardly across the platform begging for cash.
WEDNESDAY, Jan. 19
forty second Road/Port Authority Station, Manhattan – 8:38 a.m.
Jairo Cardenas has run Alpha Shoe Restore within the station’s essential passageway for 30 years. Enterprise has by no means been worse, he says. He welcomed as much as 90 prospects day by day earlier than the pandemic, now solely 9 to 12 folks per day.
Homeless have made a behavior of stealing his umbrellas, together with his total stash sooner or later final 12 months. The MTA has given him a serious break: he pays solely 25% of his pre-COVID lease. He received’t say how a lot.
“We want folks to return to their workplace jobs,” Cardenas stated.
Grand Central, Manhattan – 9:05 a.m.
Heather Cole, enjoying violin on the passageway to the 4-5-6 platform, says she’s been victimized through the pandemic by homeless males masturbating in entrance of her — the pervs taking revolting benefit of the diminished foot site visitors.
“One man left me $5 when he was finished,” stated the musician. “Then he requested me for $3 again.”
Jackson Heights-Roosevelt Avenue, Queens – 11:56 a.m.
An individual snoozes on a wheelchair buried beneath blankets as a practice rolls previous headed for Manhattan.
A younger Asian couple boards one other R practice minutes later after expressing their issues about security on the rails.
“We trip the subway so much much less due to the hate crimes,” stated Chinese language-American Elvis Li, along with his buddy Ashley Xu, each 21 and from Queens. “I really feel like different races view Asians as extra docile, that they’re much less more likely to get up for themselves. We really feel like we’re being bullied, the aged particularly. We have to take motion.”
forty second Road/Port Authority Station, Manhattan – 1:38 p.m.
Two plainclothes cops method a homeless man who's carrying a brush and carrying a hospital robe below his jacket. The homeless man walks away northbound up the station tunnel after a short dialogue with the officers.
The cops, who recognized themselves as NYPD after the encounter, approached one other vagrant a couple of moments later. They quietly escorted him out of the station and into the Port Authority Terminal.
There's a robust police presence at many stations, together with 5 on obligation Tuesday night time at Atlantic Avenue-Barclays Heart Station in Brooklyn (not a recreation night time); and 9 stationed at Flushing Essential Road in Queens Wednesday morning.
Officers appeared in varied phases of engagement all through the subway system: some staring into their telephone or chatting with colleagues standing by MetroCard machines, others actively approaching distressed people on the platforms.
Herald Sq. Station, Manhattan – 2:28 p.m.
Two cops examine in on a homeless man who seconds earlier was sleeping sitting up on a bench close to two different vagrants. The person declined help from the officers, who then requested him to wash up the particles he had sprawled out on the 2 seats subsequent to him: MetroCards, unfastened change and a cigarette lighter, amongst different private bric-a-brac.
191st Road Station, Manhattan – 3:10 p.m.
A NYPD officer patrolling the 191st Road Station platform steps on the 1 practice to examine a automobile earlier than it heads downtown.
“We’ve had extra cops [in the subways] for some time,” one other officer on the station says. “Not in search of homeless. For medication.”
A minimum of 10 teenagers skip turnstiles on the station in entrance of a pair of officers, who didn't pursue the fare jumpers.
NYPD has issued 3,505 Transportation Adjudication Board summonses this 12 months, by way of Jan. 16, about the identical quantity as final 12 months (3,467), when 1 million fewer folks rode the subways every day, in line with MTA information.
Rockefeller Heart Station, Manhattan – 4:29 p.m.
An Asian lady waits for a practice to her uptown vacation spot on the high of the steps as a result of she’s too terrified to face down on the platform within the wake of the demise of Michelle Go.
“I’m protected from somebody pushing me onto the tracks, however I’m not protected from any person pushing me down the steps,” says the lady.
thirty fourth Road/Herald Sq., Manhattan –4:43 p.m.
Submit editor and columnist Steve Cuozzo spies eight officers standing across the mezzanine stage, close to the thirty fifth Road exit, chatting. However he sees no cops on the platform, the place they're actually wanted.
NYPD reviews that 1,000 further cops have been working the subway system since Jan. 6.
THURSDAY, Jan. 20
West 4th Road Station, Manhattan – 12:19 p.m
A person named Jim staggers across the BDFM platform swigging from a gallon jug of Black & White Scotch. “Yo. New York. New York Metropolis,” he publicizes, after elevating his bottle within the air, then stumbles down the platform.
MD Islam, who runs the kiosks on the platform, reopened in October for the primary time since closing in March 2020. He’s so dismayed by the chaos and the dearth of regular passenger site visitors that he might shut once more.
“No enterprise. No gross sales. No security. It’s very very dangerous,” he stated.
One other man close by sleeps on the identical platform amid a pile of trash.
Myrtle Avenue Station, Brooklyn – 3: 13 p.m
A determined man picks up a McDonald’s bag after any person had discarded it close to the highest of the steps of the filthy elevated practice platform flooring. He sticks his fingers within the bag looking for meals, then rips it open and licks the crumbs off his fingertips.
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