Don't Forget the Subway

It used to be a thing, restaurants staying open during hurricanes and snowstorms. We'd reduce the menu to what was on hand and run with whatever crew could make it. Or more to the point, who was able to get home from work. Neighbors and friends would crowd into the dining room; the menu would be small, things would be 86’ed, service would be stretched. But people relished this amazing shared experience, snowed in at the most elegant of dinner parties. 

But Mayor Bloomberg changed all of that when he decided to close the subway system in the run-up to Hurricane Irene in August 2011. Suddenly, the gig was up. While plenty of guests in the neighborhood could still walk to dinner, the staff couldn’t get home. The era of snowstorm and hurricane restaurant services was over. Since then, the Mayor’s office has closed the subway system during severe weather and has succeeded with the intended effect of preventing people from traveling unnecessarily. 

This same dynamic is in play now, and it is one of the biggest obstacles to re-opening New York City. People are afraid of the subway. During a few rides I took last week, there was better social distancing on the train than any of my visits to Whole Foods or my local greenmarket. The CDC has recommended that people avoid mass transit and even carpooling – aren’t taxis and Ubers simply a paid version of carpooling? So those with their own car and a huge pile of parking cash are in luck. From my apartment on Flatbush Avenue, I observe that morning traffic to the Manhattan Bridge is almost back to its previous horribleness, but I share the subway car at 9:30 am on a Thursday with about 10 people. 

Our fear of the subway will slowly subside, or perhaps necessity will intervene. But changing the infrastructure of the subway system makes capacity controls in a restaurant look like child’s play. How to control how many people come in and out of the station? How to get people on and off the trains at the same time? What about the jerk next to you who won’t wear a mask or is late to a meeting and needs to get on the next train no-matter-what? What happens when the state and city budgets get squeezed ever tighter by the precipitous drop in fares, ridership, taxes?

Much has been made of the diversity and breadth of New York City restaurants. There are over 13,000 restaurants representing scores of cultures and cuisines. This was made possible by the subway. The subway allowed cooks and servers, bussers and runners, porters and bartenders to connect with restaurateurs wherever the jobs were. Yes, for better or worse the industry runs on immigrant labor, and the ability for workers to get to and from work from faraway neighborhoods has always been facilitated by the subway.

The same holds true for guests. Neighborhoods have been renewed by restaurants, attracted by affordable rents but powered by diners who could get there easily. Build it and they will come… if it is close to a subway station. Diners can relax and have a few drinks, knowing they can get home reliably for under $3.00. Now the system closes by 1:00 am every night for cleaning and my bet is that it won’t be soon before they reopen again. Restaurants will be pressed to close earlier in order to get everything cleaned up and their staff out the door in time to catch the last train.

Despite our long list of well-earned subway misery, it is the circulatory system that makes this city run. If this pandemic has taught us anything, it’s how interconnected everything really is, with the subway as a common denominator. I worry that the problem to opening is more than just finding the capacity, it will be increasing the demand. Restaurants don’t want to open without some confidence that people will feel safe enough to eat there. What if the bigger problem is getting there? 

I’m not sure how to fix the subway, but if I were governor I’d start there. New Yorkers are studiously avoiding the subway far more than they are avoiding crowded parks, beaches and the few stores that are open. Admittedly the subway seems more fraught, forcing people closer together in unventilated spaces with few options to extricate yourself if things get dicey. But addressing the subway and convincing a skeptical public that it is safe to ride the subway would have the biggest benefit for the greatest number of people and is key to getting New York City back on its feet.