It’s 7:52 AM and you’re on the train to school. You know you’re going to be late, but when you think your morning can’t get any worse, the train screeches to a halt.
Nearly every Harrisite uses a form of public transportation to commute to school. With students being so reliant on public transit, many claim that it isn’t effective as it should be.
Sophomore Madison Bitna, who frequently uses public transportation, said, “I waited 25 minutes in the rain for a bus…. You would think they would be more efficient.” There are countless stories of long waits, and only a few scratch the surface of what horrors lie in public transportation system.
While on the R train, senior Jacqueline Valenti underwent an allergic reaction. “I felt like my throat was starting to close like an allergic reaction so I got a little scared,” she said. “My entire face was red and swollen and I stopped breathing because my throat was closing. I had no service and no Benadryl. For 15 minutes I was just not breathing and my eyes were getting more swollen. Finally the train moved and I had to sprint to the Duane Reade to buy medicine,” she said. “I almost died because of train delays.”
Sophomore Emmily Cipriana recounted how taking public transportation can be a rather embarrassing experience. “I was on the bus and [I] decided to hold the pole with two hands. When the bus jerked to a stop, I promptly swung around a full 360 hitting everyone [in] my way and landing on another person’s lap,” she said. “I had to walk away in shame and couldn’t look anyone in the eyes for the rest of the bus ride.”
With an increasing number of people taking public transportation everyday, social interaction is inevitable. A few students have experienced disruptive passengers on their daily commute. Sophomore Leah Inoyatov stated, “There were these people in the back [of the bus who] were smoking weed. When the bus driver asked them to leave, they went […] from the back to the front of the bus where the driver sat, lit their cigarettes and start smoking in his face. They cursed at the bus driver and the bus driver kicked us all out of the bus.”
Freshman Isabelle Borgstedt has spoken of a similar incident when a bus driver demanded her money after she was short of coins for a half fare payment. “I started panicking because I didn’t have the proper money to pay the fare and was going to be late,” she said. “So I got off the bus as the driver glared at me.”
Despite the numerous issues that students encounter traveling by the MTA, junior Andy Hoo said, “I take public transportation mainly because I just have the opportunity to and I’d rather get to school earlier and not have to walk 2 miles there in an hour…. Not every system needs to be perfect.”
“The MTA is super unreliable and crazy things happen,” said Jacqueline. “But no matter what we do they’re going keep raising the prices and we are still going to have to pay for it because it is our only mode of transportation.”
