Hamptons Subway Newsletter: Week of August 22–28, 2014
Week of July 18–24, 2015
Riders this past week: 24,811
Rider miles this past week: 152,744
DOWN IN THE TUBE
Scarlett Johansson was seen getting off at the Gurney’s stop in Montauk eating an apple. This was late last Friday morning. Although there is no rule against eating on the subway, it is discouraged. Apples are very neat, however, so maybe that was okay. She was getting off on the westbound side, so she had been coming from somewhere further east, maybe the Montauk Lighthouse? Were there apples at the Lighthouse? Donna Karan, looking very relaxed and happy, was seen going from Amagansett to East Hampton on Wednesday carrying flowers.
STRANGE DIGGING
Historians looking around at the Amagansett station have discovered a skeleton. As you know, Hamptons Subway, which opened in 2007, was originally built in 1932 and remained undiscovered all the years between, after the builder’s cash ran out. Why was a skeleton down there? The historians discovered a narrow tunnel off the main tunnel heading toward Barnes Landing. Speculation is a construction worker was left behind when construction ended in 1932 and he was trying to dig his way out. That the skeleton was found at the dead end of this narrow tunnel with a digging tool would seem to support that. In any case, our Commissioner is considering widening the tunnel and making a new stop at Barnes Landing since it’s been half dug. But we think this a really creepy idea.
NEW KIOSKS
Wi-Fi is now available at the new Wi-Fi kiosks on the west side of each platform. Just bring your computers there and pay the $1-a-minute fee to get some. Children are not welcome to use it, however, since certain things on the Wi-Fi are not suitable for them, as you know.
NEW WIND CUTTING FRONTS
The lead cars of all our subway trains have now been retrofitted with fronts that will cut the air in a more streamlined fashion, resulting in higher gas mileage as the trains go about their daily chores. The fronts have hard plastic pointed tips that taper out as they go back and they are a full subway car wide where they clip onto the cars. The tips are high enough—eight feet up off the tracks—so that if someone were on the tracks by mistake they wouldn’t be speared.
PRESIDENT OBAMA RIDES WITH SUPREME COURT CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS
Various straphangers on the train say they have seen the President talking animatedly to Justice Roberts while riding from Quiogue, where, apparently, both men have rented for the summer, to Westhampton Beach. Are these two, each heading a different branch of government, allowed to talk with each other like that?
HAPPY BIRTHDAY?
Hamptons Subway’s Human Resources Director Damion Hardbaw turned 41 last Wednesday and crowds of employees came to his birthday party in the third floor cafeteria of the Hamptons Subway building in Hampton Bays. Hardbaw reportedly is not well-liked, but he’d invited them and they had to come. When nobody would sing him Happy Birthday though, he stormed out and reported it to Commissioner Aspinall. Many now say they regret not singing.
COMMISSIONER ASPINALL’S MESSAGE
Last weekend was a banner weekend for fundraisers in the Hamptons. We know this because of all the people who dress up for Saturday night and come down to go thither and yon to the various parties and in doing so sometimes inadvertently leave wads of cash on the subway seats. Last weekend was a record haul for us. But of course we donate it all to charity. These folks would want nothing less.