Spielberg Drop Opens in Southampton Without Hamptons Subway

SEEN ON THE SUBWAY

Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore were both seen traveling from Montauk to Amagansett last Thursday afternoon around 2 p.m. on the same train but in different cars. Sean “Diddy” Combs was humming a tune while riding from Southampton to Water Mill last Tuesday morning.

THE PLUG

Riders have asked us if we are worried about flooding on the subway considering global warming and everything. I can report that Hamptons Subway was built in 1928 with a giant rubber plug in the floor at the lowest spot in the subway, which is a dip along the tunnel between the Wainscott and East Hampton stations. It was originally installed to let water from rainstorms drain out. We’d just lift the plug.

Today, according to Commissioner Bill Aspinall, there is no danger of flooding because global warming is just a myth created by the Democratic woke people. However, he does agree that there has been a patch of bad weather in recent years and so he’s hired the plumbing firm of Aspinall & Aspinall of Noyac to look into the matter.

As a result, after determining that during heavy rains there is water trying to get up into the tunnel from under the plug instead of down through it the other way, he ordered, on a dry day a month ago, that a magnetized steel plug replace the rubber one and that it be attached to the subway tunnel floor equipped with other magnets which, according to the commissioner, will pull against one another with continuous force all the time.

He’s also ordered, in a bow to environmentalists, that the wooden suggestion boxes on the walls of all the platforms be painted green. “That ought to hold things,” he said. Nevertheless, last week, a banging noise was heard coming from under the plug which sounded like somebody trying to get in or up, so we have been ordered to look further into that.

YAHOO!!

The Spielberg Drop, a sensational new theme park ride in Southampton, had its grand opening this week. The ride, which was built originally by Hamptons Subway to be an underground spur between our Lobster Inn and Shinnecock stations, was sold last week to Two Brothers Enterprises, which has, in just five days, converted it to a ride for children of all ages. It debuted this Wednesday in one of the most fantastic grand openings in the history of American amusement rides, featuring Roy Rogers, Mickey Mouse, Peter Rabbit, Harry Potter, Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

The ride is three miles long, underground in a tunnel, and patrons board subway cars at the Lobster Inn entrance to enjoy the 10-minute experience. The cars go slowly down the tracks toward Shinnecock, then, at the halfway point, appear to get into trouble.

A storm comes up, rain batters the windshield outside and the wind whistles, and as the voice of what sounds like E.T. warns all passengers to hang on to each other — there are no seatbelts on the subway car — there comes the drop, 20 feet down a slippery water-lined flume to a splash at the bottom in a deep underground tank.

The car then bobs to the surface, rights itself, and the ride continues on uneventfully for another 10 minutes to its conclusion. At the stand at the underground end of the ride, patrons can buy pictures of themselves to see what they looked like as they survived the Spielberg Drop. (Note: Steven Spielberg has no connection whatsoever to the Spielberg Drop.)

After the ride is over, subway cars decked out to look like ambulances take the patrons on the parallel track back up the long climb to Lobster Inn Station and their parked cars.

“What a treat,” said Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman as he came out at the end of the ride at the parking lot across from Lobster Inn Station with his kids.

COMMISSIONER ASPINALL’S MESSAGE

These are good times for the Hamptons Subway. Our Deluxe service in the front subway car of each train is a big hit among A-listers.

The experiment to try out an alternatice fuel may have resulted in some overheating of train engines and a few blown pistons, but otherwise it went pretty well, I think.

And our regular straphangers who commute by the thousands in the rear cars every day may be complaining a bit about the loss of their Deluxe front car and their inability to get past the velvet rope and into it even though they have the proper number of euros. But to them I say, you’ve still got the joy of rubbing shoulders, maybe not exactly the shoulders you might like to rub against, but, well, it was just a matter of speaking, there you are, in the cars right behind some of the most important shoulders in the world, and that in and of itself is such a blessing.

As for the Spielberg Drop, which my brother Biff built so badly — so it was really not his fault, it was the architectural specs — that when the workmen dug the two ends toward the middle they didn’t meet up.

It has been an absolute dream for him and me. After the $10 million subway spur had to be abandoned just one week after its opening by order of the U.S. Department of Transportation, which claimed that the big drop was unacceptable, he and I bought it for the bargain basement price of $50,000 it was worth, and now look at it.

Along with Splish Splash in Wading River and the Long Island Aquarium in Riverhead, it’s now taken its special place in the annals of East End amusements. And the money is rolling in. Hooray for free enterprise — lemons to lemonade!

As I did say last week, I can still perform the duties of being your commissioner here for the Hamptons Subway. It’s my day job. My night job is with the Spielberg Drop, where I am in attendance for the 6 p.m. to midnight shift, if you’d like to come by to shake my hand.

And my hat is off to the Lone Sharks for writing “Doing the Spielberg Drop” and then figuring out those jerky moves to the dance accompanying it.

I hear that Nancy Atlas is coming up with something too.