Today's post on Infrastructurist about the D-Train Murder had a line that caught my eye:
Cramming the population of a city like New York into a maze of underground cars creates a forced melting pot that’s a perfect breeding ground for class and race divisions.
There's no question that the NYC subway is a forced melting pot -- but it's the assertion that it's a breeding ground for class and race divisions that I take issue with. In fact, I'll say it's the exact opposite. Most (all?) of the above-ground city is actually divided by race and class. It's the subway where we all come together each day; the subway is perhaps the only place where people from all races, classes, and neighborhoods really mix. In my experience, that is not cause for further division; rather, it's a uniting force that gives us shared experiences on a human level. One of the commenters on the Infrastructurist post summed it up nicely:
I think the necessity of sharing space with strangers is what makes cities the diverse, creative, wealth-producing places that they are. Far from being a necessary evil, it is the most distinctive feature of urban life. The elimination of this feature was one aspect of modernist city planning, but we reject that now. So we want mass transit for the type of civic interaction it creates, not just for sustainability and practicality.
Well said. (Photo my moriza on Flickr)
In doing some photo hunting for a side project, I came across this gem of a photo on Flickr. Riding the subway all over the city, I often think about the fact that most great subway moments (and many great city moments, for that matter) go unrecorded. Perhaps this is part of the beauty of it -- there are only participants; no watchers -- but I often wish I had a camera built into my eyes to catch the great little moments that happen almost every day. Musicians on the train are a real special treat; I love the fact that for just a few minutes, perhaps just the distance between two stops, a little concert takes place. For that short period of time, riders goes from being disconnected strangers to inadvertent partners, with feet tapping and heads nodding. This photo has an almost Rockwell-esque quality to it, and you've gotta love the angry glare from the woman in the corner.