Hamptons Subway Attempts to Reverse NYC Subway Sale

SCENE ON THE SUBWAY

We spotted Sting, the rock star – it was definitely him – on a subway heading westbound out of Southampton last Friday night. He gave our spotter the thumbs up.

NEW ESCALATOR RAILINGS TO BE REPLACED

Last month, with a little money left in the monthly maintenance kitty, we ordered new railings for the down escalators that take straphangers from the token booths down to the platforms. Unfortunately, these railings failed to move as the escalators move. They remain perfectly still and if you hold onto one of them long enough, you will be forced to fall down where you are standing as the moving steps go out from under you. It’s been found that we ordered the wrong models. As a result, we are taking them out and re-installing the old railings which work perfectly this week. The “new” ones will be returned to the seller since we have not had them more than 30 days. With all the trouble and expense of all this, we used up the money in the kitty so now that’s okay.

TOURING THE SUBWAY

Our new marketing director, Carl Besmith, has kicked off his tenure with the company with a bang. He has designed and written a brochure about the subway, the sights you could see while on it and about its history. The brochure, which he has now had printed up in full color is available at newsstands by token booths on the subway platforms to be given out free of charge.

Besmith assumes that tourists especially would like this brochure as a guide while visiting here. So if that is you, bring your backpack and camera and come along. (Backpack subject to search of course.)

The tour begins in Westhampton. You will see the statue down on the platform there of President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of Russia holding hands, a memorial to the two of them when they visited here together in 2006.

You can come up the new escalators and take a tour in Hampton Bays of the Hamptons Subway offices in the Hampton Subway building, designed in 1936 by German architect Albrect Speer as one of his masterpieces.

You can have the train stop just below the overhead grating and catch basin where, in 2007, a 206 pound raccoon got caught and resisted removal for days by biting and hissing. This is in Shinnecock.

You can take the sharp curve on the Noyac Line where the subway motorman shouts over the loud speaker “hold on tight” as you make the sharp turn underneath Trout Pond.

And you can visit Montauk where all of the 36 subway cars go for maintenance and cleaning every night. Just stay outside the barbed wire. Those German Shepards bite!

You can also see our newest stop, the beautifully decorated by a famous New York interior decorator, Georgica Station, at which the train only stops by advance reservation. This keeps the great unwashed from getting off there. Of course you will have had advance permission to get off there, if you plan ahead. You fill out the form. I’m sure its okay.

Last week, in honor of the publication of this brochure, Commissioner Aspinall announced that he will have the subway maintenance team build a 10-foot square glass skylight in the ceiling of the tunnel beneath the Shinnecock Canal so tourists can see the fish as they pass by below.

QUERY REPLY

Sir, you asked how it happened that in the 1930s, when we were planning our headquarters building in Hampton Bays we chose Albrecht Speer, the architect to Adolf Hitler in the brutal monumental style that he favored.

This was before the war and Hitler had not yet invaded Poland. It was considered a nice gesture on the part of the powers that be here at the subway system at the time, sort of a pat on the back to the Nazi system before it flew too much out of control, which, as you know, it eventually did. As a matter of fact, after the war, local protests were held to have our headquarters building torn down. But after looking at how it was built with its reinforced concrete walls seven feet thick to last a thousand years, it was decided it would be impossible to do that without destroying much of Hampton Bays. Since then, we’ve gotten used to it. Speer did have a point, about architecture anyway. Well, maybe not.

COMMISSIONER ASPINALL’S MESSAGE

I continue to huddle with Mayor Adams in New York City in the hopes that he come to his senses about the fact that he should never have sold the New York Subway System to Hamptons Subway, even for the $1 we paid him. He needs to reverse the sale. We sold the Lexington Line to the Toronto Subway system last week in order to have the money to meet the next MTA payroll. I told him, and this is true, cross my heart, that the beloved A Line will be the next to get sold, to the BART System in San Francisco which has expressed an interest, if he does not relent and take it back by next week. I don’t know what came over me when I agreed to buy this catastrophe. It leaks money like a sieve.

I’m also going to call New York City Mayor elect, Zohran Mamdani, to see if he might get in the middle of this if he is not too busy.