How to Deal With Constant Nightmarish Metro Delays
Even if you don’t live in New York City, you’ve probably already heard us complain about the dramatic collapse of the nation’s largest public transportation system under the careless rule of Governor Andrew Cuomo.
In addition to lost wages, erratic transfers after school, and missed appointments, the system-wide MTA’s colossal disruption has also forced urban commuters to be more strategic about commuting. Here are the tried and true tactics to arm yourself for the daily battle with the cumbersome and unreliable daily tedious work:
Use the bathroom ahead of time
Self-explanatory. You never know when a 20-minute ride can turn into a two-hour odyssey, so impose on yourself the same toilet policy you would do for any young child about to take a long car trip.
Stay up to date with the Transit Apps and Twitter Beefs
In addition to checking the current service status on the MTA website , it is wise to supplement additional information from apps like Kickmap , which will show delays and work offline, or the city Transit app, which additionally shows your best route options and arrival times of future trains. to information about delays.
But usually, the real dirt can be found on Twitter. NYCT Subway’s Twitter feed remains quite relevant, but it’s a professional move to dive into their mentions to see what other passengers are saying about delays on your line:
The same advice should simply be tweeted on the line of your choice to see if anyone has any pertinent news about the train you’re about to take:
Leave very early … or very late
In terms of commuting to work on a daily basis, most people we know now leave 10-15 minutes early to buffer small delays, and an hour earlier if you can’t miss appointments such as an interview or wedding.
You can also switch to the other end of the spectrum and leave late enough to avoid rush hour if you have hours and work schedules flexible enough to accommodate. (Should be good!) This doesn’t mean your train won’t get stuck indefinitely, but it does mean you won’t be jammed with so many people when it does.
Pack water and snacks
While subway food is a controversial topic – and food could soon become smuggled – perhaps bring at least water and ideally small snacks such as nuts or granola bars as a precaution. (It is possible to get stuck without light or air for so long that people become dehydrated or faint !)
Note: This does not mean that you can break the “no cooked food ” rule in the metro rules. This is not true.
Bring additional reading materials and a backup charger
Even if you don’t run into a century-old dilapidated transportation infrastructure, generally, if you leave your home without anything to keep you entertained, you end up stuck in a queue, waiting room, or stuck in traffic indefinitely. … To tears.
Download additional podcasts and articles to listen to or read offline, take a few books with you, and consider a backup power such as a battery compartment or power bank to keep you on your toes when a few extra hours are suddenly added to your home.
Meditate
The horror and humiliation on the subway has been known to catalyze spiritual awakening even before service quality plummeted. Mary Carr, for example, cited “the desire to kill everyone on the subway” as one of the factors that pushed her to convert to Catholicism as an adult.
For a less focused spiritual experience (and a way to calm yourself down if you start to feel irritated or on the verge of a panic attack), consider turning to deep breathing exercises or better yet, guided meditations focused on transit. Youtube has avariety of options designed forpassengers under stress, and the Headspace and Buddhify meditation apps also manage transit meditations.
Verbal abuse by Andrew Cuomo
Although Albany has been systematically underfunded by APSA for years, Governor Cuomo has prioritized relatively low priority glamorous projects such as adding Wi-Fi to every station in a subway station earlier this year.
This means that while you’re stuck in an increasingly overheated and crowded subway platform, you can enter directly into the network TransitWirelessWifi and start to publish tweets @MTA and @NYCGovCuomo, telling them in very specific detail, how they ‘do you think how do you feel about it and how you will vote in the next elections.
It may be more of a catharsis than an effect, but it attracts attention: earlier this summer, Cuomo complained: “They write nasty things about me, racers all day, but we can’t figure out how to communicate with them.” Alternatively, call his office at 1-518-474-8390.