nw3 to nyc

Observations on moving my family across the Atlantic

Category Archives: Transport


by Leave a comment

Searching for Avonte

Avonte Oquendo is a 14 year old autistic boy who has been missing since 4 October. The reason I know about him is because his face is plastered all over New York (see the snap of the poster on the subway below). It is all over the subways in particular because he has a fascination with trains. He disappeared from his school in Long Island City and hasn’t been seen since. The MTA who run the subways have regular announcements over the tannoy about him; the dot matrix boards interrupt messages about imminent train arrivals with more messages about him. I think by now everyone knows about Avonte and yet he is still missing. I have never seen such an effort on the London Underground and am impressed with this. I see from today’s New York Post that the reward for his safe return has risen to $85,000. I hope it works.

blog pic 39


by Leave a comment

1000 steps to Queens

That may be a slight exaggeration, but not much. I bravely ventured out with J and E to the New York Hall of Science. This rather grandly named attraction is based way out in the Flushing Meadows area of Queens. Practically at the end of the 7 train line, this is a world away from our part of Manhattan. And when you are doing this with a heavy toddler in a buggy in the hot, humid weather of NYC it’s hard work. Not one person helped with the steps all the way there and there are a lot.

The Hall of Science is based in a converted 1960s building that was originally built as a pavilion for the 1964 World’s Fair. It’s a great hands on space for young kids to learn about science and has an excellent playground, which is great for 7 year olds and hopeless for toddlers. Just hope they are asleep so they don’t get jealous.

Next door to the Hall of Science is Flushing Meadows Corona Park, an oasis of greenery and calm in the heart of Queens and home to the Queens Zoo, sister to its more famous sibling in Central Park. It’s lovely. Small, but lovely with a rather impressive elk with the biggest antlers I’ve ever seen. There’s an old fashioned carousel and a petting zoo with some very friendly goats who love to be stroked. And in the middle is the most peculiar building called Terrace on the Park.

blog pic 29

 

 

 

 

 

I have just looked at the website for it and it appears to be much flasher in its Internet form than in real life. From the outside it looks really run down, a bit unloved and frankly a bit of a concrete monster. It completely dominates the park, looming over the zoo. Not sure I’d fancy getting married there, but I suppose the views must be good.

Oh, and on the way back I managed to look pathetic enough to get help with the buggy up all those blasted stairs all the way home. Just don’t be on the subway past 4.30 in the afternoon as it’s as packed as the London underground and deeply unpleasant.


by Leave a comment

Not sure what to think

I follow lots of New York media via Twitter, it’s a great way to get a broad flavour of what’s happening in the city without trawling through websites or buying the papers every day. Yesterday I saw a tweet from the New York Post saying “Never pee on the third rail”. I was intrigued. The tweet took me to the full story on the New York Post website. I’d assumed that someone had been electrocuted whilst actually in the act of peeing, which can never be a good thing. But on closer inspection it was that he had got down onto the track to pee, stumbled when he’d heard a train coming, tried to get off the track and fell on the third electrified rail. It just shows that the 140 character limit of Twitter can create an impression that something has happened in order to send traffic to a website but it’s really not quite the truth when you get there. I see from the Post website today that the story had re-tweeted 47 times, but had appeared on other media Twitter feeds so there were many more re-tweets. More ghoulishly, 209 people ‘liked’ the story as it appeared on the Post website. I wonder if they really thought about that: the fact that this poor 30 year old man died in a freak accident and they ‘liked’ it. Maybe I’m just as bad, as I am blogging about it too.


by Leave a comment

Unwanted conduct

Heard on the subway earlier today “Ladies and gentlemen. A crowded subway is no defence to unlawful sexual conduct. If you believe that you have been the victim of a crime, or witness to a crime, notify an MTA employee or police officer.” That’s a new one on me, but I looked it up and it’s been around since 2011, part of the MTA’s “If you see something, say something,” campaign. Not sure I’ve ever heard anything similar on the London Underground.


by Leave a comment

Bloomberg’s bikes

Launched today, New York now has its own bike hire scheme. London has had one for a number of years and despite it being sponsored by Barclays and the bikes having their logo emblazoned on them, every Londoner calls them Boris Bikes after the London Mayor, Boris Johnson. The New York bikes look super smart all lined up and a very similar blue to the London ones. They are sponsored by Citibank, so are called Citi Bikes. Whether they will be called Bloomberg Bikes it is too early to tell, and given he’s off later this year, it might be one good way to remember him.

Read more about it on the New York Times website:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/28/nyregion/bike-share-program-opens-in-new-york-city-after-long-delay.html?_r=0


by Leave a comment

6 months in and 100 blog posts later

Hard to believe I have been writing this blog for six months now and that this is my 100th post. I thought I would reflect a little on how it’s gone so far.

Well, I now know that I am slightly obsessed by food.  I am in love with brunch and iced tea. There are many posts on various aspects of food and the category cloud shows that loud and clear. Food in New York has been a revelation and continues to be so. My food posts are my most popular and I think I have joined a community of bloggers who are even more obsessed by food than me.

I have made a lot of observations about people. I probably don’t get out and about enough to reflect the diversity of New York but I do like to share the little vignettes about what I do see. I keep getting annoyed about New Yorkers and their manners but I will continue to say ‘thank you’ and ‘cheers’ as often as necessary. The subway has been a rich source for people watching as have the dog owners – I could have done a post a day on the dog lovers of New York.

New York City politics has increasingly grabbed my attention and is likely to be a great source of blog material as the election nears. I suspect this won’t gain my many followers or pique too much interest, but I find it fascinating, so I won’t be able to resist the more bizarre stuff. National politics is less of interest so far but that could change.

And the weather: it’s all about the weather in New York. When you’re British it is comforting to know that New Yorkers are as obsessed by the weather as we are. I’m dreading the humid, hot summer and will no doubt write about it in graphic detail. I am already very well acquainted with the local park and the sandpit as J has his own obsessions too.

So do I like New York? Do I prefer NW3 to NYC after six months? I’d have to say that I still hanker after NW3, it is lovely: the buildings, the history and of course the beautiful Heath, location of the much missed British Military Fitness. If I could export the latter to Central Park, I’d be happy. I’ve enjoyed witnessing the changes to Central Park during my weekly run but it’s not quite the same.

Lots of people have said they would love to have done what we have done and live in New York, but the reality is that you do just end up staying in your own bit of the city, making that your home territory. We explore the city at the weekends, but not always as sometimes it’s nice just to stay put. There’s a list of things to do and places to go and we will do them all before we leave. Just have to remind ourselves quite how lucky we are to have this chance to be in NYC before we return to NW3.


by Leave a comment

All aboard!

So I have discovered Amtrak. What a contrast to taking the train in the UK. Here you go to Penn Station, you sit in a pleasant waiting room until your train is called, with the announcements ending every time with “all aboard”.  You then queue (line) up and go down to the platforms and get on your train. If you need help you can call on a red cap: does exactly what it says on the tin, it’s a little old man dressed in red wearing a red cap. Looks more like he might need you to help him. The trains are comfortable, clean and the seats widely spaced out. I love the ticket collector with his fabulous hat and his charming manner. He calls me ma’am and wishes me a good day. The announcements are helpful, they tell you how long to your next stop; they tell you about the catering but don’t list every item they sell, unlike Virgin in the UK. I laughed when the announcer said at Washington DC, that the train would be there for 30 minutes, so passengers could get off the train and stretch their legs but warned, “you left the train, the train did not leave you: it will go with or without you!”. On the return journey to New York the train is packed and the announcer keeps wishing us a happy holiday. I keep thinking, what holiday? I didn’t know there was one, maybe it’s a Washington DC thing. I ask the lady next to me who knows that he means Mothers Day! How nice, I will definitely be using Amtrak again..


by Leave a comment

Blast off to a new subway

The Upper East Side of New York is not well served by the subway. Everyone treks to the Lexington Line to get a 6 (slow) or a 4/5 (express) train down town. I don’t commute, but R does and is no fan. Unsurprisingly it is crowded and generally unpleasant for commuters and marginally better for people like me who use it off peak and occasionally.

The first phase of the 2nd Avenue subway is due for completion in December 2016. This has been a very long project for the MTA (Mass Transit Authority) here in New York, which started decades ago, halted due to the city’s failing finances in the 1970s and re-started in 2007 after a vast and long consultation. A new T line will be constructed in four phases and  run from 125th Street in Harlem almost to the bottom of Manhattan to Hanover Square. 16 new stations will be built, with the 86th Street station the most significant in the Upper East Side.

E’s class is doing a project on the subway this semester. They even had a trip to the construction site – dismissed by E as incredibly boring, but I would have loved to have gone. Despite her lack of interest, she came home with a great way to remember how to spell subway (not sure what the proper term for this is):

Superfast

Uptown or downtown

Big and Fast

Where it’s traffic-less

And underground

Yes, it’s great!

I was in the apartment of one of E’s school friends, who lives on 2nd Avenue. Her mother said that the blasts from the construction were so bad sometimes that light fittings fell from the wall. She said that each building has sensors that monitor the impact of the blasting and that there are limits within which the buildings are supposed to move. According to the MTA’s 2nd Avenue March Newsletter, there have been 407 controlled blasts in the area and the cavern beneath is 61 per cent excavated. Blasting can take place any time between 8am and 8pm. I can hear the blasts and I’m at least an avenue away and high up. I can’t imagine what it must be like to be on top of it. Literally. Residents are assured that the blasting will cease by the end of the summer, when no doubt there will be huge sighs of relief equally measurable.

When we went apartment hunting last year we avoided 2nd Avenue like the plague. One realtor tried to reassure us that the construction works going on outside her property just off 2nd Avenue wouldn’t go on forever. I am so glad we didn’t listen as I walk by it regularly and it’s a terrible road with constant noise and terrible pollution. It would take a brave soul to buy on 2nd Avenue at the moment, someone willing to put up with the inconvenience now will of course gain in the long term. Not having to walk to the Lexington line will be a huge advantage for those nearer the East River so maybe an apartment on 2nd Avenue won’t be so bad – in 2017.


by Leave a comment

Smokin’ hot

Another eventful journey on the subway. Deeply engrossed in the New Yorker (a great read, if not a bit too frequent) on the way home on my own, when suddenly there is an uproar in the carriage. A rather relaxed, possibly high, old guy is standing there nonchalantly smoking a cigarette. The smell is over powering and fills the carriage very quickly. The people sitting near him are shouting at him to put it out, telling him that he can’t smoke on the subway. He is getting it from all angles, I have never known so much passion on the subway before. He smiles and seems confused. He looks at his cigarette longingly and drops it on the floor, lightly stepping on it to put it out. The he picks it up, blows on it and in an attempt to re-use it later, he pops it into the brim of  his woollen hat and walks out of the carriage at my stop. His hat is smouldering.


by Leave a comment

I don’t think we’re in Manhattan any more

There are five boroughs in New York, with Manhattan being the most well known. Staten Island suffered horribly in the Hurricane and is often forgotten as the island off the bottom of Manhattan. The Bronx is at the other end of Manhattan and whilst I have discovered there is a zoo and a botanical garden there (to be visited on warmer days) it still makes me think of scary New York of the 70s. Ed Koch, Mayor between 1978 and 1990 died recently and was credited with transformation of the Bronx and other run down parts of New York. This leaves Queens and Brooklyn. The latter is of course well known because the Beckhams called their eldest son after the borough – it’s certainly up and coming now, with Park Slope known as the nappy valley of New York.  I visited the Transit Museum today and got my first glance at Brooklyn. I only saw the civic parts around city hall and the MTA (transport authority) but it was a world apart from Manhattan. Lower built and more interesting to look at than the high rises of the Upper East Side. And as for Queens, well, I wouldn’t go there again unless there was a good reason. We went to Astoria, which is across the East River from the Upper East Side of Manhattan and it is pretty unloved and run down. The Museum of the Moving Image has been there for 20 years but it hasn’t led to any regeneration in the neighbourhood a la Tate Modern in London. The museum is great, hosting a computer games through the ages exhibit (or excuse for middle aged men to play with computer games dating back to their teens) and it did make me laugh to see the Wizard of Oz as part of the permanent exhibition, when the first thoughts I had when we emerged from the subway were “I don’t think we’re in Kansas any more, Toto”.