Try Tokyo. Maze doesn't begin to describe it.

There are the JR lines *Above ground*, the the Tokyo Metro lines*subway*, Then to TOEI lines *Separate subway system*. Then you have the 40+ private companies that own 6+ lines each. My line, Keio, alone has 5 lines. Keio, Odakyu, Tokyu, Seibu, heck... I'm forgetting some!!

The entire railway map in tokyo looks like someone cooked some spaghetti, threw it on the floor, and then made a system after it.

One line in particular, Chuo-Rapid, has suicides daily. They jump in front of the trains, and cause a mess (literally).

I mention this, because incidents are everywhere. Even in Japan, we have incidents on the train-lines. For NYC? I think it's just par-for-the-course.

Or Beijing. As clean as the subways are (immaculate compared to NYC), they make the US's subway systems seem quiet and empty in comparison. At any given time, especially on the line that runs to the Forbidden City, there will be a 20 minute wait and line from the entrance to the subway, down the stairs, leading to the train. I love the subway system there; clean, efficient, cheap, but simple and empty, it's not!

Another amazingly poorly written, useless article on MSNBC. Virtually no information is reported, no names of victims, etc. The entire article is written in one sentence paragraphs. Writing of this quality would have resulted in a failing grade if it were written for a middle school English class.

UMGator - I passed high school with that method! Some English teachers are clueless.

LOL!

What did they order from that New York .."Subway"...??

Substance abuse, and joblessness,......that's what leads to this, and substance abuse increases in poor economic times, because government services shrink when the economy is in trouble and voters demand government cutbacks.

.......and don't forget about trains running over you! That's a cause too! Might even be number 1!

When are they going to outlaw subway transportation? It starting to rival the already outlawed guns in NY.

To Sirlafalot. Recently myself, along with 9 others, were tourists in New York and found your hospitality exceptional. We had a great time and look forward to visiting again in the future. I sympathize with your frustration on how people stereotype your State. Being from Kentucky, we still get the "no shoes" and the "married to your cousin" etc. thrown at us. tsk tsk tsk on these small minded people.

Every visit to New York for me must have missed all those polite people. I found the residents universally rude and self-centered. It is NYC that is stereotyped (for good reason), most of the rest of the state (I am originally from Buffalo) would like the city to sink into Long Island Sound.

KY.Pickle - I am from NYC and just recently took a trip to Winchester, KY to meet my father-in-law for the first time. They had a family reunion at Boonesborough Park. What a beautiful state you have, I will admit that I probably wouldn't have thought to go to Kentucky for a vacation, but I am so glad I did and I would definitely go there again. Even though I was born and raised here, I am an outdoor person and there is plenty to see in Kentucky. and the people were just wonderful and so polite and friendly. I am glad you had a great time in my city :). I love to be a personal tour guide for friends when they come into town.

What they need is a good lesson in train control. Maybe a 5 day waiting period before crossing and then only after a complete background check.

"Sir Tasteless" should be your new handle....tasteless and insensitive and undoubtedly you're a Republican.

"Less filling".

I thought it was funny. But, I too have been acused of pushing the envelope or being just a little too soon for good taste.

liam has the only post of this grouping that is a blatant attempt at offending someone.

What got liam's bloomers in such a bunch?

Liam seems a bit confused. First he insults Sirlafalot with talk of being tasteless and insensitive and then he turns right around and compliments him by calling him a Republican. I'll never understand.

NYC drivers kill plenty of pedestrians/cyclists with cars, way more than the subway "death toll," a hit and run is on the news almost weekly

Southern California is so behind the the Public Transit game... Love our trolley system, but they need to spread it out more to cover all the areas. Instead they upgrade our freeways with more lanes so people keep using their cars.

Ummm, how else would you get to the other side?

Sirlaflot,

Your on a roll again ... LOL

Ugh..I have to just say that the whole NYC stereotype is so tired already and not even remotely true.

I'm an NYC gal born and bred and I'm neither rude or uncaring. Most of the people I know are fellow NYC folks and aren't a gaggle of unfeeling, crude a-holes either.

There is NOTHING in this article that talks about people walking over dead people in the subways. If someone falls down a flight of stairs at 2am, I can bet that no one even saw the guy until hours later. With the budget cuts of the MTA, there's no one in the booths anymore. As for the folks that got hit by trains, they either jumped or just tragically got too close. In either scenario, there isn't too much ANYONE can do about it when it happens.

NYC folks will help out anyone at anytime. I, myself, was a to seeing a man fall ill, get dizzy and faint onto the subway tracks. 4 so called "uncaring" NYC guys jumped down without thinking and worked to get the unconscious guy onto the platform, while the rest of us worked to get the 4 guys out of there before the train came.

We also pull tourists back when they aren't paying attention at the cross walks. Many a life has been saved by us "NYC bastards"

We stop to take pictures of your whole flippin' family in front of the Empire State Building for all of you who ask...even though we are in a rush.. And even give you a little quick advice about not handing over your expensive electronics to strangers...as we hand the camera back to you.

We also give directions to anyone who asks. We love our city and we want people to enjoy it.

This type of "rude" stuff happens all the time here. Just because we may not ask about your day every 10 minutes doesn't mean we don't give a crap about people.

time to get over yourself and your apparent constant need to be validated...and I say that with total love!

Bookem' Dano, and don't slip in the gutpile!

You are so off base about New Yorkers. It's clear you've never lived or been there.

si123 - I have to admit that when my mother and I visited New York City a few years ago, I was pleasantly surprised at how friendly and helpful most people were. I was expecting the worse, but realized that was probably a result of negative publicity that NYC received during the last couple of decades of the 20th century. My mother was walking behind me in Times Square because it was too crowded to walk side-by-side. She took a bad fall without my knowing it. People rushed to help her and ran after me to let me know of her mishap. I'd love to live there for a full calendar year just to experience the city during the different seasons.

Si123... I Have been to NYC many time and have always found the people to be pleasant , courtious and helpful. One paticular time my wife and I got rain storm on 5th avenue no less. We went in looking like a coule of drowned rats. The sales people came over with paper towels and helped us dry off. The store was Tiffany's .

Every time we have visited NYC, the people have been great. We love the place..........................been all over the world. There' no place like it. Anywhere.

I visited NYC a few years ago with my then 15 year old daughter. We had a blast. We found the people to be very friendly and very helpful. My daughter loved it so much she considered going to college there. She ended up in Miami - can't beat the beaches or the weather :)

si123 - I was born and raised in Staten Island and I totally agree with you - I am tired of the sterotyping of NYers also. I moved to Vegas for a time, well actually Henderson, NV because of the weather and the people were nice when I first moved there. But, because people from all over started moving there, it went downhill, very fast. The people that lived there and the tourists were getting worse, very inconsiderate. But I think you will find that anywhere, there are always a few that seem to make such an impression on someone that they think the whole city is like that, which is a shame. I moved back to NY a few years ago and I am so happy I did. Besides seeing my family more often again, this is such a great city and the people are great and for the most part friendly and considerate.

I also want to thank all the posters that visited NY City that had a great time and told it like it is :)

Are you as tired of the NYC stereotyping as I am tired of the middle of the country hick stereotyping?

It all depends on what part of the City you are in and which people you meet - pretty much like anywhere else.

You know ... I used to think that. However we've been in the city 3 times in the last year (we live in FL) and the attitude there is entirely different than it was. I asked my cousin who lives in Athens ... she said the attitude in the city was different since 9/11. I agree. Friendliest town I've seen in a long time. Not the NYC I remember from the last century.

When I visited NYC several times in the 1990s I always found the people to be very friendly - when approached. People in the city seem to be focused on what they're doing and not so much on others, which personally I like because I prefer to be left alone in public and that's exactly what my experience was in NYC. But when I needed to talk to someone it was not a problem. I was impressed.

Also best to keep in mind, in NYC "f*ck you" means "have a nice day". But in California "have a nice day" means "f*ck you".

"New Yorkers so rude and obnoxious don't care about anything. Good place for obnoxious actors to live as they do in lower Manhattan."

"In NYC you could be bleeding to death on the street in the subway. People will walk over you."

-Raymond-1126037

First off Raymond, I love your show (but doesn't everybody?). So if you be so kind please explain why you harbor so much disgust for New Yorkers. I live here and would have to say I encounter just as many rude people anywhere else in the country. As far as walking over dying people. I have not seen that either but have seen people huddling around someone injured, calling medical responders and waiting until they arrive. There's so much hate in your posts complaining about obnoxious people but it seems like you are only describing yourself.

LOL @ UdunnoBro! And I moved to NYC from Indiana 20 years ago and was really surprised at how friendly people were. Truthfully, people don't hold the door open behind them quite as often, but when (or IF) you look someone in the eye, you're likely to get a smile. People are helpful. It's a nice place to live, and visit!

There's rude and then, there's Noo Yawkah rude. Noo Yawkah rude involves pushing and shoving to get to first place. Noo Yawkah rude expects a little more than anyone is getting. Noo Yawkah rude accepts paying outrageous prices just because there's a hotcha name attached to a label. Noo Yawkah rude then complains about high taxes...until they move to Noo Joisey. They make no bones about howmuch they all hate Noo Joisey.

Yet, they turn my state into a Noo Yawkah rude parking lot. They won't work for the cheapo salaries Noo Joisey employers pay. So they keep their Noo Yawkah jobs and then spend their extra cash on amenities no one on a Joisey salary can afford, not to mention jacking our property taxes with their oversized houses with accoutrements up the wazoo. Come property evaluation time, their lavishments then jack the taxes for everyone else.

Noo Yawkah rude is a Manola Blahnik, Dolce & Gabbana show off who can't possibly wait in traffic congestion like everyone else in NJ. Oh no...they sail ahead of 20 cars to first place driving on the shoulder of the road to do it. Or else, they come first and pull out of strip malls and parking lots as if they are the only ones on the road.

In Joisey, you can always tell who the Noo Yawkahs are and who the Joiseyans are. Worse are the "Stetinylandahs" mouthy and about as obnoxious as a Tony Soprano on steroids.

We have a lot of those "traffic Noo YawkahS" where I live - that's how they drive in Atlanta too, and they bring it along with their fancy cars when they go off to college.

Actually MTA funding comes from Albany, not the city.

"Mangling Train Accident" funding? Interesting.

The major complaint we in the rest of NY had was that NYC paid 40-50% of the revenue and sucked up about 80%, so they were sponging off the rest of the state.

I think it's pretty much par for the course. I've heard statistics like there being at least 2 deaths per day on the Subway system. From natural causes, suicides, accidents, murders, etc.

I'm from Dallas but everytime I go to NY the people are friendly and the subway is easy to get around. I agree if you don't step in front of the big silver things moving at a high rate of speed you should be ok.

Suicides, and/or public intoxication are usually the reasons people get hit by the trains here.

Maybe New Yorkers have a sixth sense to determine if a stranger is from NY state or some other state. They obviously use this to treat tourists nicely and fellow staters like crap.

I think you nailed it Killerdrgn...

As did the train engineer.

They're actually doing that on the 7 line extension stations. Personally, I think they should do this on all the stations in addition to starting a system wide upgrade to maglev/noise free/modern trains... but then they'd have to clean the entire system to keep it working and given that people(mostly teenagers) are jerks about their garbage(seriously, they stand next to the garbage can and rather than toss their empty bottles and wrappers and even fast food bags in the damn can I've seen them leave them on the platform, stuff them in the platform camera housings, and flat out throw them at the tracks)they would never finish.

Not to mention most people would just complain and complain because now they have to take an extra train to get to work. It's amazing how when the MTA finally does try to make something better people complain but then when the MTA leaves it alone they complain that the MTA isn't trying to make it better.

I dont know about other countries but this is how it is in Hong Kong... and by the way, in Hong Kong you pay for the distance traveled rather than paying a flat fee. One of the best public transportation systems in the world IMO.

LI is not New York City!

....fyi....gas stations are no longer required to provide public access to restrooms. Only employees must be provided access. I rebuild service stations, and with all the ADA regulations it was simply too costly to provide accessible (public) restrooms (ramps, h'cap stalls, sinks..etc).

...so...the rude answer you got is pretty much the standard of gas station etiquette.

Long Island (alias Nassau County) is an exception to most of the driving rules in NY state (or at least it was when I lived in Buffalo). The people on the eastern two thirds of the island consider themselves superior to everyone else so of source they are rude. Probably comes from realizing they are living on a sinking sand bar.

jdm3, "Did they die from the filth?"

Nope, pretty sure it was the train hitting them that did it.

Sir,

prolly meant a 5th/.....lol

Or instead of bystanders warning the victims to "Get off the tracks!", they pled the 5th?

You obviously have never been to NYC before... The combined city sales tax is 8.875% not 14%. And that's easy enough to look up online.

Example, Charges for parking services in New York City are subject to sales tax at a higher rate than most other sales. The tax rate of 10 ⅜% is due in Bronx, Brooklyn (Kings County), Queens, Staten Island (Richmond County), and in the borough of Manhattan for Manhattan residents. Parking within the borough of Manhattan for nonresidents is subject to an additional 8% city sales tax for a total tax rate of 18 ⅜%.

Family has been there 150 years. I lived and worked in NYC for 30 years.

Raymond, The problem is people like you don't realize Big Brother knows best. If you are paying higher taxes, it because the government knows best what to do with your money and they need it more than you. The American people are either too stupid or incapable of making their own decisions and need government to make decisions for us. Be happy you get to keep any of your money since it is really their money.

What?

Hi Houston,

Just to clarify another vague point in the story, the "L Train" in this case is the route designation for a line that runs between 14st & 8th Avenue in Manahattan to Canarsie in Brooklyn. It runs only as a subway in Manhattan but in Brooklyn runs as a subway, an elevated line, then finishes at grade level! Many NYC subway lines go in and out like this for various reasons, often because they've been created by adding newer subway trackage to older elevated railroad rights of way.