Strollers, Escalators and People Who Need To Slow Down

metulj · February 2006

I saw something horrible today. I was riding on the 2nd car of the 2 train headed to GAP from Penn Station. At Park Place there is an escalator that is even on the platform with the 2nd car (tip for anyone who is particularly lazy). So I am in my favorite spot when I can't sit, at the door. The train comes into the station and the doors open. I step to the side and see a crowd of people coming down the escalator. At the front was a woman with a stroller. She starts yelling at me "Hold the door! Hold the door!" She was about 5 steps from the bottom of the escalators. The "Stand Clear" had already been called. The lady standing with me yelled for her to wait for the next train, which I guess was the sensible thing to do. As the doors close, the woman pushed the stroller down the last three steps in some desperate move to get on the packed rush hour train. She trips and get tangled on the stroller with her baby spilling out onto the platform. Behind her, the whole line of people fall down and pile up on top of her and the kid. No shit. What a mess.

So I feel like shit because we could've held the doors (maybe), but had no time to react as she was shrieking for us to hold it and it was too late. Sick to my stomach. I hope they are all OK, but it looked nasty. I have two kids who are no longer in strollers, but we manhandled them all over the city in strollers. This was a nightmare scenario. Kids, subways, and not taking it easy.

jamesondean · February 2006

If you are in the subway, fold your fucking stroller and hold your child. Darwin was doing his best there. Grr.

It's just bullshit on multiple levels. She's so special the entire train should wait for her, and people should hold the doors for her, and she shouldn't have to fold her stroller 'cause she's special.

I have very little sympathy here.

metulj · February 2006

JamesOnDean: We always took it so slow and steady with our kids. Now they are 4 and 5 years old and I still take it easy whenever we get on the train. Hold hands tight and all that. I still hope those people are OK, but, damn, slow down.

carnivore · February 2006

JamesOnDean wrote: I have very little sympathy here.

I just feel bad for the kid. I totally agree about the mom.

vanilla · February 2006

if you had held the doors, you then would have had to ride with them in your train car, more shrieking? no thanks. :evil:

the 2/3 comes so often, it's not like the L on weekends or ten years ago or something. :roll:

alafairnadia · February 2006

Carnivore wrote: [quote=JamesOnDean]I have very little sympathy here.

I just feel bad for the kid. I totally agree about the mom.

right there with you. I can't handle this kind of thing. that sort of behavior child endangerment. it's a crime. people behaving that way obviously need an intervention on some level. and you were right not to hold the doors, original poster on this subthread, it would have been incredibly dangerous. do people not see the huge gaps between subway cars? do they not comprehend that an adult could fall to the tracks with a train in the station - a small child would be easily bounced into those gaps?
all terrifying.

stevieshamrocks · February 2006

I have a 16 month old and I totally agree with you metulj. I am also a parent that probably over stresses about how people will react to a screaming child on a subway. I will always wait on the platform before i enter a packed subway (with hopes that there is an empty one just 2 mins behind). I take my child to daycare 5 days a week down to Wall Street on the R train. Yes people, I am that guy! But people that feel they can lance there kids down the stairs and into a packed subway are endangering there child. I feel like I am on the slowest train in NYC and I think that by waiting I am safer than if I rush.

That being said, I also have a buisness that allows me to not worry when I clock in. That is the only reason I don't say anything when I see this happen on the subway.

metulj · February 2006

Humorous aside: When recounting this to my wife, she noted that the woman, after I described her appearance, probably has so little experience caring for her own child that she doesn't know how to be safe on the subway. To quote: "Her nanny probably had to go to the dentist and the au pair was at her English class. She was just pissed because she couldn't go to the Mahnolo sample sale." Additional snark, after expressing concern over the kid, was to wonder why she was headed downtown on a rush hour train AND what hard times had befallen her that she just couldn't call a car? So the speculation ran to her origins and we decided UWS, but was on the way to hang on a playdate with an old friend from Vassar in Brooklyn Heights. She HAD to take the train because her personal assistant blew it and tried to order a town car at rush hour in downtown. But why was she at Park Place?

I guess the only way to ease the shock is with being smartasses. KISS YOU KIDS!

meganlibrarian · February 2006

Isn't this exactly why the MTA tells us over and over (and OVER and OVER and...) to not take an in-use stroller onto the escalator? Makes sense to me that something like this would happen! The poor kid.

From my end, my experiences with strollers on the subway at rush hour (like this morning...) usually involve the adult shoving the stroller into the packed car like a battering ram . Yes, I understand that babies in strollers need to get places during rush hour, too. Still, I hate feeling that I'm being targeted for a Maclaren hit-and-run.

stacey · February 2006

I have seen it once too many times and as a parent, every time I see it my heart breaks! People have no sense. I find it just as horrifiying when I see a person standing on a corner with them safely on the sidewalk and their stroller in the street! I have seen so many kids come so close to being hit by the buses on Vanderbilt and those dollar vans on Flatbush.

isa · February 2006

Jesus Christ if I had a nickel for every time my mom threw me down a flight of subway stairs. And look at me, I turned out just fine!

hal · February 2006

Must be 10 or 15 years, ago some lady pushed her stroller into garbage truck on 6th ave in the village. Her child killed, she unscratched. Pretty awful.

On another occasion some years ago, I was seated on a train in a station, and as the doors were closing, a guy rushes in with his bicycle, but the bicycle gets only halfway into the car, with the back half including the seat outside. The frame of the bike was thin enough so the doors registered as closed, and as he frantically tried to pull the bike in, the train proceeded to leave. Apparently the conductor was unaware. I can't imagine what was happening on the platform as the back half of the bike swept along, but at the end of the station as we entered the tunnel, the back of the bike was sheared off. He then pulled what was left of the bike into the car. I imagine the rest of the bike landed on the tracks. Man was that guy bummed out. Despite the obvious danger, no one seemed to have been injured, so I quietly enjoyed this asshole's misfortune, thinking he may be more cautious in the future.

The MTA also tells us that most of the injuries people suffer in the subway is from running and falling.

Strollers, Escalators and People Who Need To Slow Down

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