I’m going to share all the wonderful juicy details of our new abode, where it is, how we got it and tips on avoiding the dreaded broker fee, but we haven’t 100% absolutely definitely secured the spot yet and in the sake of both discretion and superstition lets just say… It’s amazing. Details to come after Tuesday. Knock on virtual wood.
Meanwhile I’m going to share a few tips on my new favorite subject – the subway.
New York and it’s affordable and extensive public transportation system was without question one of the biggest selling points for me to move to the city. And make no mistake, it is amazing. Amazing to be able to take a short walk, pay a nominal 2 dollar fee and have immediate access to most of the city. Use the free bus transfer that comes with every train ride and your map of coverage gets even bigger, but then you’re involving buses and things get a lot more complicated. I’ll get to the buses another time, but let’s just say that learning words like “limited” and “express” certainly helps out the process. For now let’s get to the point of business today, a few things one should know before hopping on the closest train.
Getting Started…
Get a map of the subway and hang it up on the wall of your apartment. This is something my roommate Melissa has done for years, and apparently any New Yorker without a photographic memory, or a childhood spent learning the system often does as well. Even though Melissa could rattle off train directions with transfers and even bus info like an auctioneer – she still has it up there.
You know how restrooms have those convenient pictures? The images on the evacuation instructions in planes? Yes, it is true that they come in handy for the illiterate but they also provide visual aid to help anyone really understand. It’s not that I’m suggesting people might take their oxygen masks and wrap them around their elbows in a time of emergency, but, well, yeah… they might. And the pictorial representation might make the difference. I’ll admit that even the pictures might not help the elbow breather, but we gotta do what we can right?
Which brings me back to the subway map that should be hanging on your wall. Look at it, take a little time each day to pay attention to numbers and letters that tend to hang out together, ACE, 456, stuff like that. Get a gist of the thing. And everyday, before you leave to catch a train, even if someone gave you explicit directions, make sure you know where your going, and where that mystery letter is taking you on the way there. When you get to the station this information becomes the same stuff that all information really is – power. And once you’re in that underground steam bath, surrounded by elbow breathers, your going to need all the power you can get.
Get an unlimited metro card, as soon as possible. You’re going to want to put this off, it’s not exactly cheap and it’s daunting to think that your little 2×3 piece of papery flimsiness is one distracted slip away from 80$ down the toilet. Seriously though, ya gotta do it. The amount of time I’ve spent stopped at a turn style, forced to turn around and miss a train so I could refill a card with 7 measly dollars has become impossible to ignore. If you don’t plan on driving in NY, go unlimited.
By the way, don’t purchase the card with cash. If you do happen to lose it, and it’s your first time doing so you can call the MTA and they’ll refund your account in about 2 weeks. Take a wild guess as to how I know this stuff. Oh the joys of being Jill.
Picking a seat in the train might sound simple, but there are a couple of things to take into consideration before you choose where to camp out for the next 5 to 50 minutes. First off, if the seat says that its reserved for handicapped persons, and there happens to be additional seating, don’t take it. And this is more than me being the generous, kind individual always looking to help out the less fortunate. This is primarily convenience factor so hear me out. If, by some strange course of events, an actual handicapped person arrives on the train, you may feel compelled to give them that seat, I know I would. If, by the time that the fated relinquishment of the seat occurs, the train is full, then guess what? That’s right! Now you get to stand.Yay ! Your feet will not be thanking you. And if you invested in that awesome amazing bag, now you get to carry it instead of the comfort of resting it between your lap and your reading material. Which, by the way, you can now no longer read because you’re standing. Fun!
When you do sit down it’s also a good idea to avoid the seat in front of the map. Even though it may seem convenient to be able to answer any directional related questions you may have with a turn of the head, quickly you’ll notice that you’re not the only one on the train that finds the map useful. The guy that just ate what seems to have been a hot dog with relish and maybe some delightful onions is now intimately close to your face, studying intently and, well, breathing heavily. What’s this now wafting in? It seems he also enjoyed some fresh peanuts, yum yum! You’ll have plenty of time to ponder his lunch selections while he debates his route. There’s also the lady with the perfume, the man with the armpit hair, and the lovely young fellow using his phone as a boom box. And all that excitement? Just one ride sitting with my friend the map. Good times.
Choose a seat at the edge of the row, so you can delight in only one neighbor, and make it a seat facing the center of the train if you can. Yesterday someone fell asleep on me and refused to budge. Don’t be afraid to throw a swift meaningful bow when the situation dictates. Sometimes it’s all you can do. Sweet and simple, that’s how it’s done.
I look forward to the next stage of Subway literacy, which apparently involves anticipating the location of the exit I’ll need in the station to which I’m headed. So I’ll say to myself, oh yes, I’m headed to the Bedford stop on the G, coming from midtown. Naturally this means I’ll need to be at the front of the train so I exit at Lafayette and not Nostrand .
I feel a headache coming on just thinking about such things. Remember we are talking about the same girl who managed to get lost on Saturday exiting a bathroom at the MOMA . Not kidding, I had to stop and ask directions. You laugh, I cry, don’t worry it’s cool we’re still friends.
Anyway, I really feel that once I’m at the point of visualizing the station before I get there I’ll be nearing Subway literacy. But my oh my, I’ve a long way to go.
And now for the obligatory pictures of the day:
Last night out on the town with my cousin and a friend.
And the coolest entry to a museum. Evar.
It’s the New York City Transit Museum, if you cant make out the name in the pic, and let me tell you – it’s worth a visit. If just for the credit card pocket sized subway “maplets” as my roommate so affectionately calls them.
Always…ALWAYS
Sit/stand…
by the door.
Fin.
In San Francisco, we don’t have such a wide amount of transit lines like NYC, so they’re much easier to remember. Somehow, I’ve become the know-it-all for “how to get there” by any one of my transplanted friends, or visitors that need to know how to get from Fisherman’s Wharf to Chinatown relatively easy and with the use of their bus transfer.
When I start saying things like, “Take the F train Green and Battery, walk over to Battery and Greenwich, hop on the 10-Townsend Outbound to Sacramento and switch over to the 20-Columbus, hop off on Green and Columbus and you’re totally there.” makes absolutely NO sense.
And we call this, the “Three Bus Crosstown Transfer Dash.”
It’s apparently a new Olympic sport too.