Passing Subway Car Flashing Across the Tracks

New York, New York, it’s a wonderful town,
The Bronx is up and the Battery’s down,
The people ride in a hole in the ground,
New York, New York, it’s a wonderful town.
– “New York, New York” by Leonard Bernstein

I was surprised by this, but 50 people were killed by the New York subway last year. The warning signs seemed to imply that being hit by a train in the station was the primary source of mortality and not crime. This sounds like a lot of people, but if you consider the millions of riders that use the subway each year, then this number of traffic deaths doesn’t seem as horrific as at first blush. If then you compare these fifty fatalities to the number of annual automotive deaths that occur in the city, then the subway appears to be quite safe. When we first arrived in New York, with the rent-a-truck, we took the Holland Tunnel into Manhattan. It was midmorning when we crossed the island and it was a holiday, Rosh Hashanah, so traffic then was much reduced from normal, but the traffic there was still pretty hairy. It was the best that we could do just to cope and inch slowly ahead. By comparison riding the subway was pain-free.

Pokémon Go players, please stay behind the yellow line!

I mentioned this, because I had my own little hole in the ground incident today. My sewer main had backed up, again. There is still 40’ of original pipe, between the house and the main and that’s what was clogged. I had Cordia Plumbing out again. They are the outfit that did such an excellent job replacing all of the line inside the house. They did another fine job today and got ‘things’ flowing again. The Metropolitan Sewer District (MSD) is scheduled to tear up the street this year, but that’s just to put in a new storm sewer. They don’t plan on doing any work on my lateral, I asked. The 40’ that is still original is insured under a county program, but coverage only takes effect if the line collapses. Maybe, I can get a MSD bulldozer to do a little back-and-forth over my front yard? I know that it sounds kind of scorched earth, but you should see it now. A summer of neglect has not been pretty. I’ll have to rebuild the lawn this winter. I’ll probably go with Scotts, but I heard on the business news that Miracle Grow is doing a blooming business these days. 😉