The New York Subway turns 120 years old, waiting for better times

As a ubiquitous symbol of a city, underground transportation runs through the heart of the city, uniting residents and visitors of all classes, ages, origins, colors, religions, genders, passions, emotions, ideologies and political conditions.

Subway is New York the largest public transportation network in North America: last year he moved to 1,150 million passengers. In the middle of chaotic traffic, this is the fastest and cheapest way to get around, but it is full of surprises that are not always pleasant.

Say 472 underground and aerial stations with 28 lines, over 6,000 vehicles, over 52 thousand employees and over 800 miles traveled is a direct reflection on the city 24 hours a day, every day of the year: fashion, music, vocabulary, rats, trash, crime, lust, nudity, noise, plastic art, food, drinks, marijuana, anarchy, homelessness and the habits that came from typical New York arrogancean expensive and fast-paced city, where everyone is in a hurry and says they have rights, but few want to accept the obligations of civil coexistence.

Love, hate, desire and fear – fatal events are not uncommon–the NYC Subway turns 120 on October 27to be one of the longest surviving underground systems in the world. In addition, It is home to hundreds of people in a city where the cost of housing is the biggest concern: last year it was estimated that Around 3,400 homeless people were living in train cars and stations.

In May 2021, then Governor Andrew Cuomo even said the subway was not safe for childrenin the middle of a long time “mental health crisis” in NYC. Since then the situation has not improved. Last week the NYC mayor’s office announced new measures to deal with homelessness. At the same time the face of MTA a million dollar loss due to the number of users accessing Metro and buses without paying.

Many fear the return of the chaotic 70s, with cars full of graffiti and violence, when going into the New York subway literally descended into hell. Others prefer to remember that time with certainty everything can improve when there is direction and responsible leadership, something that is present LaGuardia Airport (LGA) is the best local example.

Credit: Andrés Correa Guatarasma | With permission

Credit: Andrés Correa Guatarasma | With permission

Credit: Andrés Correa Guatarasma | With permission

He was born after a historic snowfall

The idea of ​​transporting passengers underground was a concept, according to Concetta Bencivenga, the director of the New York Transit Museumwhich had some meteorological origins. “The reason we have Metro is because there was a strange hurricane, called the The Great White Hurricane of 1888. It was a snow storm. Did he arrive in the spring and paralyze the town? That was the kind of trigger that made us think maybe it wasn’t a bad idea to go underground,” he recalled. CBS News.

after that a storm that left about 400 dead on the east coasta plan to build the Metro was approved in 1894 and construction began in 1900. The Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT), a private railway company, decided to undertake the monumental project when the 20th century.

Jodi Shapiro, curator of the Transit Museum, says the Park Avenue townhouses began to move as the IRT tunneled beneath them, drilling through bedrock, marble and shale.

Four years later, on October 27, 1904, the New York City Subway opened its doors to the public with the same promise as today: to move more people in less time. The original price for a board was five cents ($0.05). it offered only one nine-mile stretch from City Hall in Lower Manhattan to 145th Street in Harlem. Now it runs through five districts of the city, almost entirely.

The first line was part of what today is the equivalent of sections 4/5/6 and 1/2/3, Shapiro recalls. Little by little the Metro spread and evolved. To travel in vehicles that were circulated in the first half of the last century with ceiling fans and wicker seats you only need ride the ones that the MTA circulates every December as a Christmas tradition on his show “Holiday Nostalgia Train.”

Currently the ticket costs $2.90 dollars and there is only one Active extension plan: take the Q line from 96th St to 125th St, on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

Imperfect, it is always possible to improve, because the New York Subway is a constant miracle of logistics and engineering. For the rest, day and night, the quality of the journey depends a lot on the behavior of the users.