New York Subway Sucks Big Time (2005-12-02)
Those who say the NY subway is good and convenient obviously never rode on the trains in HK or Taipei or in particular Japan.
We spent five days riding the NY subway and found the system chaotic
and user unfriendly.
The trains aren't color coded for a start, making them very difficult
to make out. The letter that marks the line are found on the
front of the train and sparsely throughout the carriages. It is
not easy to see which train has just arrived on the platform if you
happen to just come down the stairs and all you see is an old
gray train that has stopped on the track.
Multiple lines use the same track, so you have to be very careful
not to jump onto the wrong train. The trains also switch
platforms at "late nights". But what time does late night start?
Amateur users would find that confusing. The instructions above
the tracks are ambiguous and easy to be misinterpreted. We were
waiting for a C train one night and saw several A and E trains pass
through without ours. It was only after 30 minutes did we realize
A trains were to be used for all C train riders after we had already
wasted another 30 minutes on the opposite platform. While we were
waiting futilely for our train, I saw two E trains going on opposite
tracks with the same destination written on the trains. How does two
trains going on opposite direction arrive at the same
place? It was utterly confusing. Not that it mattered to us
because we were after the C train that simply never arrived!
One thing that adds to the difficulty in using the subway is the
lack of previous and next station names. You cannot see at first
glance whether you have got on the train that goes the direction you
want. There are information plates on posts on the platform that
tell you the area the train is heading, but they are not readily
visible. For clueless visitors like us, telling us the train goes
to Bronx or Brooklyn means little to us.
Many trains use different tracks during night time and weekends, some cancel their operation altogether outside weekdays. The information regarding such scheduling changes is given few and far between, usually vaguely on signs above the tracks.
To add to the confusion, numerous construction work was being
carried out in their subway system when we were there. There were
sudden changes to a lot of train time, track numbers and
destinations. Announcement was sometimes heard in the PA system,
but most of the time it came out like a swishing sound through a wind
tunnel, resulting in a jumbled mumble. The day we took the train
to Battery Park from our hotel on 81 st, we were lost in the system for
THREE hours because the train that should have stopped at our station
never even passed near it. It made a turn, crossed a bridge and
headed toward Brooklyn. By the time we figured out our train had
cheated us, the station we got out to make a U-turn did not have access
for us to cross over to the other side of the track! We had to
wait 20 minutes for the next one to ride three stations down so as to
cross over to catch a return train, and then get off at some station a
staff gave us so we could hop on to an entirely different line which
normally would not stop at our destination. It was just one
confusion after another. And since the trains are infrequent, if
you make a mistake it could cost you a long time to get back on the
right track (pardon the pun).
Oh, did I mention the subway was filthy and littered with
trash? Fortunately we only saw two rats on the tracks the entire
time we used the subway. It could have been worse.
It's only fair for me to mention the good things I feel about the NY
subway too. Since it charges a uniformed fee of two dollars
regardless of the distance you travel, it is a great value if you go
from one end of town to the other. You can also charge your
tickets, that's very convenient for people who are short on cash.
You can use your credit card on as little as just one ticket of two
bucks, that's unheard of in other parts of the world. The
machines that do the transaction are very easy to use, the hard part is
getting on the right train.
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