Last Wednesday I was walking up the stairs to the #4/5/6 trains at Grand Central Station, happy to be on time for my first student of the day, when out of the corner of my eye I spotted the bottom of a dark green subway car sitting on the tracks. Initially thinking it was one of the “garbage” trains that you see on the tracks now and again, I was surprised and overwhelmingly excited to find that this was a vintage subway car, put back in service in honor of the first day of the post-season at Yankee Stadium!
A little known fact about me is that I’ve always loved the subway. The NYC Subway and I share the same birthday (October 27) and I’ve always had a fascination with old New York subway cars. (One of these days I MUST get to the Transit Museum – maybe I’ll go on our birthday!) For years I’ve been hearing that every now and again they’ll take a really old train out for a ride through town, but I’ve never had the fortune to find myself on one – until now.
Giddy as a schoolgirl, I practically skipped onto the train, sat myself down on one of the old woven seats (leather or plastic? no one could figure it out…) and prepared for the ride uptown. The inside of the car was filled with old-fashioned ads (clearly placed there in the not-too-distant past, but true to the spirit of the originals), ceiling fans, and plenty of rubber/metal straps to hang on to.
Once everyone was on board (and believe me, there was plenty of confusion with those trying to take the train) we were off. The good news? It ran just as fast as today’s cars (or so it seemed). The bad news? It took forever to open and close the subway doors, and when I had to transfer to a local train, service was so screwed up that I had to let two trains go by before I could even find space in one – and was late to my first lesson. Once I told them the story of the vintage subway car, though, they didn’t seem to mind.
