Hampton Subway Adds Tanning Beds & Allows Birds

DOWN IN THE TUBE

East End singer Nancy Atlas was seen on the subway going between Sag Harbor and Bridgehampton, and when asked what she was headed off to do, she burst into song.

BIRTHDAY

Happy 41st birthday to Agnes Pontopolous, our very special restroom attendant in Sag Harbor. Everybody who knows her loves her.

NEW SUBWAY STOP PROPOSED

The board approved plans to create a new Sagaponack subway stop, a second one in that community, with the stairs going down to the platform directly across the street from the Sagaponack Post Office building. The stop will be a dead end, with a turntable underground, and will connect Sagaponack to the Wainscott Post Office and should be open to the public in January of 2029. No permission is needed to do this from the Village of Sagaponack, as you may know, because the subway will be built entirely beneath the ground, which is below the jurisdiction of the village. They would appreciate it anyway, or most of them would. We think.

SMOKE AND FIRE AT AMAGANSETT

Straphangers on our Amagansett platform walked calmly off when smoke and fire appeared from underneath a subway car stopped at the station late Saturday morning.

Two particular people thought it was some kind of terrorist attack, and after rushing up the escalator, arrived outside at the street across from Amagansett Square, where they collapsed either from fright or smoke inhalation.

Police rushed over and took control of the scene, setting up a triage station there as ambulances and medics appeared. And shortly thereafter, the subway system entirely shut down.

The cause of the fire and smoke was soon determined to have been a metal inspection approval plate coming loose from its screws on the underside of the subway car and getting wedged in below the third rail. Inspectors approve the underside of the subway cars, then remove the plate, punch a YES hole through the metal, and then put it back. In this case it was not screwed back in properly. The 600-watt third rail heated up this 3-by-4-inch metal plate until it burst into flames, only finally going out after the system was shut down.

The subway system reopened for business at its regular time of 5 a.m. on Sunday morning after all the inspection plates on all the trains had been inspected. No other loose ones had been found.

The Subway System will consider going back to the cardboard plates they used to use — until it was determined that the cardboard became unreadable after a train went through an underground puddle. The meeting of the Board of Directors to consider the matter will take place on Monday.

The 1/3 that remains of the metal plate that burnt will be sold on e-Bay.

BIRDS NOW ALLOWED

Although pets continue to not be allowed onto the platforms or into the subway cars, this coming month, October, we will, as a one-month-only experiment, try allowing pet birds onto the system, provided of course, that they are caged. It has occurred to the Hampton Subway environmental manager that among all the creatures he could think of, birds alone have never been underground. So here’s their chance.

ARTIFICIAL TANNING SALONS

We have approved an application from the Caribbean Tanning Salon Company, which will begin operating tanning studios in the front car of every six-car train on the system. If you don’t want a tan, just don’t sit in the front car.

Caribbean plans to do extensive advertising. Their slogan will be “if you can’t get it above, get it below.” The tanning salon car will begin offering tans next Monday. Come on Down and Get a Tan.

Incidentally, the motorman’s union has asked if the motormen, who sometimes work 10 hours at a time, could put their train on automatic pilot and take a tan at a reduced rate from time to time. We told them no. If you see a motorman getting a tan, pull the emergency cord and report him immediately to a token booth clerk at the next station.

FILMING SUSPENDED

The management of Hampton Subway is officially suspending all Hollywood-type film scene making on the subway property until further notice. During a filming of a scene from SuperSpider 2 last Tuesday, a person dressed as a spider repeatedly swooped down on unsuspecting straphangers on the Hampton Bays platform and picked their pockets of wallets and other valuables. An explanation by the producer of this film that this was between takes taking place on the Southampton platform and what SuperSpider did on his own time was his own business was found unacceptable by the Hampton Subway management.

The production of SuperSpider 2 has therefore been given the old heave ho and was thrown off the subway on Thursday. After that, Subway maintenance people tore down all the spider webs and confiscated their camera equipment.  We have no idea where the subway scenes from SuperSpider 2 will now be filmed and we do not care. We will protect our customers from this nonsense.

COMMISSIONER ASPINALL’S MESSAGE

I wish to personally thank the 26 men and women and even one child, who, answering our call for volunteer motormen after we ran out of trained drivers, sacrificed their day on either Saturday or Sunday of Labor Day weekend to drive the lead cars of the various trains around the circuit. It was amazing that, after only a 10-minute briefing on how to work the levers, these brave people could operate the accelerators, brakes and sliding doors without incident.