The union and management of the Metropolitan Transit Authority have been rumbling over contract negotiations for a week, and have made scant progress, so the union finally called a walkout at 3 a.m., leaving seven million subway and bus passengers without transit, myself included. It’s the first MTA strike since 1980. Pity I’ve now moved too far uptown to sensibly walk to work anymore.
I walked over to the Dyckman/W. 200th St. station for the 1 train just to see what was cooking. Inside the station, a web of hot pink plastic tape was wrapped around the turnstile gates as if to say, “We’re on strike! No entry! Time to party!” Outside, there was a clot of people wandering around, pondering their options.
Two of them sidled up to me, a cute 20-something Spanish chick and a short middle-aged Spanish guy, and kindly recruited me for carpool purposes. To explain: weekdays during the strike, between 5 and 11 a.m., the city is disallowing vehicles with fewer than three paying passengers to venture below 96th Street. In other words, it’s “buddy up,” or you’re out of luck, buddy. We were able to snag a black livery cab in about 10 minutes, using a combination of waving and gestures meant to indicate that we were indeed a party of three and we were ready to be seated.
Our driver saddled that fine New York line between “ballsy” and “maniac,” taking freshly-changed red lights as mere suggestions to stop, lurching from lane to lane while speeding for better position, and plenty of horn action. He spoke rapidly and jocularly in Spanish with the other two passengers. At one point, the girl apologized to me for them speaking in Spanish; I wasn’t offended and said no apology was necessary. I did ask what they were talking about, and apparently it was just jokes about the traffic and the strike. Whatever the specifics, the girl kept laughing, agreeing and saying, “Oh dios mío!”
She was destined for East 70th Street and Second Avenue, so the driver expertly stairstepped over to the East Side, going down Adam Clayton-Powell Blvd., cutting over to Malcom X Blvd., then over to Fifth Avenue. As promised, at 96th Street there was a police checkpoint that was bottlenecking traffic. After a visual spot check, we were waved through. At East 84th, the driver, mid-anecdote, nearly slammed into a shouting human wall of NYPD, who were pointing vigorously east, disallowing further access down Fifth. Without much of a choice, we shifted over to Park Avenue, where traffic had slowed to a crawl. After we had advanced only one block in 15 minute, the girl paid her fare and got out to walk the rest of her way. It was clear traffic wouldn’t be improving anytime soon, so I gave up at E. 79th, paid my driver with thanks and a $20 bill, and began walking.
A news report in the car had noted it was 26 degrees, but that it felt like 11 with the wind chill. I’d say that was about right. I cut over to Madison, one of several closed streets (except for the stray school bus and emergency vehicle), and it was eerie for a main artery to have almost no traffic at rush hour. The only sounds were footsteps echoing off the buildings and helicopters hovering low in the distance.
I stopped at the Hilton New York near Rockefeller Center for a restroom break and marveled at the horribly long cab lines. I ended up getting to work at 11 a.m., two hours late. The office was fuller than I expected, but most of my coworkers live upstate or in New Jersey, where transport hasn’t been directly affected.