Hamptons Subway Newsletter: Week of Aug 1–7, 2014
Week of Aug 1–7, 2014
Riders this past week: 17,832
Rider miles this past week: 184,721
DOWN IN THE TUBE
Our spotters saw John Keeshan, the realtor in Montauk, traveling from Amagansett to East Hampton on the subway to get what he said was a lawn chair at Hildreth’s. Village of Westhampton Dunes Mayor Gary Vegliante was spotted on the subway between Hampton Bays and Shinnecock, off to meet East Hampton Village Mayor Paul Rickenbach, he said. Chip Duryea of Duryea’s Lobster Deck was seen at the Napeague platform waiting for the eastbound subway to take him back to his Lobster House after visiting with Cyril at Cyril’s Fish House.
INJURY
For the first time ever, a man was struck by lightning on a platform on Hampton Subway. The man was standing at the Water Mill platform when a huge lightning bolt came down the escalator and struck him in the butt with a big bang. He was taken to Southampton Hospital where doctors treated him for a sprained thumb he injured when he fell after he was hit. Other than that his eye glasses melted and his sneakers flew off, he was uninjured.
THIRD RAIL DELAY
For the second time this summer, somebody stepped on the third rail in the subway system, causing a delay in our service. The system was down for 40 minutes, which is a great inconvenience to the customers trying to get from here to there. It also takes up the time of the flagmen, the emergency vehicles, the ambulance, the subway police and the maintenance department, which has to come in afterwards. The third rail is located alongside the regular tracks away from the platform. Do not step on it.
SUBWAY EXECUTIVE FIRED
Newly hired PR and Marketing Director Horace Harding was thought to finally be the man who would make a career out of being the PR and Marketing man after so many were hired and quickly fired before him. He came with many recommendations and good credentials to replace the marketing director we fired in June. But Harding’s plan to hold a Hampton Subway kite fly on August 3 at 5 p.m. on the Southampton platform has been a financial disaster and a cause for general ridicule. Besides the fact that there is no wind in the subway system and the ceilings of both the platforms and tunnels are less than 15 feet, the strings holding the kites can get quickly tangled up in the trains that come through with considerable frequency, and if the trains don’t stop, entrants can be carried off.
Harding had hired jugglers, men on stilts (another thing not thought through), a band, four judges from England who had already flown over and more than 40 solid silver trophies for the winners all bought and paid for. Also what made no sense was the plan to charge $50 per entry after the people had to pay to go through the turnstiles. The whole thing was a mess. And also there was a free Dan’s Papers Kite Fly that day at 5:30 p.m. on Sunday August 3 at Sagg Main Beach. Needless to say that Horace Harding is gone. Oh, and he put up a temporary bleachers which had to be taken down.
COMMISSIONER ASPINALL’S MESSAGE
The firing of Horace Harding caused special pain to me personally. I think it important to hire relatives, and Mr. Harding is my wife’s sister’s ex-husband and has been out of work for nearly 12 years. Nevertheless, the system has to come first and sometimes you just have to suck it up and soldier on.