Piping Plover, Paul McCartney and More Ride the Hamptons Subway

SEEN ON THE SUBWAY

Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck were seen waiting on the platform in Water Mill for the eastbound train last Thursday at 10 a.m. Neil Patrick Harris was seen boarding an Amagansett train on Friday afternoon headed for Southampton.

IN BRIEF

Delays: Perhaps the biggest delay in the history of the Hamptons Subway took place on Friday and Saturday when, for 38 hours, a piping plover, which is an endangered species of bird, was seen to be standing on the starboard rail of the subway tracks 300 yards to the east of the Amagansett station. The entire system shut down when it was first reported. The hope was that he would leave quickly — it is illegal to pick up a piping plover and just move him away, for he could die — but he just stayed and stayed.

Late Saturday night, at 3 a.m., when the subway shut down for maintenance for one hour, it was determined that the mate of this piping plover was alongside that starboard rail where nobody could see it, dead. Poor thing. Finally, at 5 o’clock in the morning, the surviving piping plover tearfully left, flying up the Amagansett escalator and out into the street.

APOLOGIES TO PAUL MCCARTNEY

Last Wednesday at 4 p.m., one of our security officers saw a man set down a blanket on the Amagansett platform, sit down and begin playing Beatles songs on his guitar while singing the lyrics for passersby. The man had a tin cup on the blanket and the security officer saw several dollar bills stuffed into it.

Approaching the man, the security officer asked to see the permit that the subway issues to musicians who wish to perform on the platforms. This individual did not have one, and so security called for assistance, and when more security officers arrived, they lifted this man up bodily and carted him up the escalator and out to the sidewalk alongside the entrance. In moving him, the officers inadvertently broke the guitar. They also, upon arriving at the subway office, handcuffed him to a bench there — not the usual procedure — until he could be booked and fingerprinted for the upcoming appearance he must endure in the subway justice building a week hence. Then he was free to go.

It turned out that this was Paul McCartney, one of the original Beatles, who lives in Amagansett. Commissioner Bill Aspinall, upon learning what had happened, was so enraged that he immediately fired the security chief and the entire 32-man staff. “We are deeply embarrassed that this all happened,” the commissioner said. “I have offered my apologies to Mr. McCartney. He needs no permit. He is free to play anywhere, at any time he wishes.”

This opens up a huge opportunity for those seeking jobs in subway security. The pay is minimum wage, but you do get to wear a uniform. In the meantime, customers on the subway are urged to travel in groups of three in order to better defend themselves if approached by bad guys. And stay away from dimly lit places on the platforms.

When asked to comment, Paul McCartney said it was no big deal and he would be sure to apply for a permit in the future when he gets the urge to play on the platform.

SHINNECOCK TO LOBSTER INN SPUR CANNOT BE FIXED

The three-mile underground spur of the Hamptons Subway system, put into service between the Shinnecock Station and the Lobster Inn Station, opened to the public just three months ago and then quickly closed. It cannot be repaired, according to engineers from the Department of Transportation.

“We did a complete evaluation of this,” said Engineer Bart Collins of the DOT. “It would be cheaper to build a whole new spur than to repair this one.”

The spur went into service in July as a welcome addition to the emergency transportation effort made necessary by the narrowing of County Road 39 while it was being widened, a construction project that is expected to be completed by Christmas. The spur was not built very well. Biff Aspinall, the brother of Commissioner Bill Aspinall, won the contract to build it and began digging at both ends and worked toward the middle. It didn’t quite meet up. When the service opened, it was built with a 30-foot incline going southbound and a 30-foot decline going northbound from the middle. It came to the attention of the DOT, which closed it, pending an investigation.

COMMISSIONER ASPINALL’S MESSAGE

At the present time, I am on a three-week vacation in the Caribbean, and at this time, I am writing to you from the Atlantis Casino and Resort in the Bahamas, where I have gone with my brother Biff and our wives to get in some fishing and gambling.

The Atlantis Casino and Resort is a fitting place for us to go, as much of it is underground and underwater — this is Atlantis, after all — and it gives us a chance to think about what could be done with this spur between Shinnecock and Lobster Inn that we can no longer use.

With the imminent opening of the extra lanes on County Road 39, we feel that building a whole new spur between these two stations might just be unnecessary. Why spend another $22 million when you don’t have to?

Instead, we are toying with the idea of making use of this tunnel for some other purpose. We are considering a lot of things. A nature walk. A bypass road from the Sunrise Highway to Hill Street. Maybe it could be a sort of fun project for the public — a water flume like they have at Splish Splash in Riverhead, for example. We hope to have this figured out soon.

On another matter, I am happy to report that the nine-week-old strike by the Hamptons Subway flagmen is at an end. Although they didn’t get any raise in pay — we’ve just had to absorb this $22 million disaster for heaven’s sake — they can consider it a victory. In the settlement, we have agreed that they can keep their jobs. And so the scabs we have hired to go down the tracks and wave the red and green flags at the approaching trains will be let go at the moment the regular workers appear.