"Subways - Going Down Or Up"

You have arrived at your at your chosen station, have to ascend or descend to reach your desired platform but first encounter a sign like this. Huh? What happens now? Where do I go? Is my train running? I have a grandkid in a stroller;where is the elevator? Which entrance is uptown & which is downtown? Is there a ticket booth with an agent here? What will the art work be like in this station? Will the station be new or nicely renovated? Etc.

Unless otherwise noted, the photographs in the blog are of the NY Transit System.

You may be going up...

...to your...

...train's platform.

Or, you may be going down.

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The Santiago Calatrava designed Oculus Transportation Hub - World Trade Center “is home to 12 subway lines, the World Trade Center PATH station, and dozens of retailers, serving over a million people every week.”

Just so classic. Carroll Gardens.

Paris. France.

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This is our "go to" subway entrance when we're visiting Prospects Hts. in Brooklyn.

Barcelona, Spain.

Be prepared.

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That's a lot of choices.

“The Times Square–42nd Street/Port Authority Bus Terminal station complex is the busiest station of the New York City Subway & offers connections between twelve services, the most of all the system's transfer stations.”

Keep going, eventually you will have to pay a fare to get any further.

Fulton St. station is complex, confusing, modern-renovated & old. Think Dante’s Inferno. More later.

The future is now.

In the Oculus.

How to get through the turnstyles?

When I was growing up in NYC, the turnstyle fare was a token. My dad always had a bunch of tokens jangling in his pockets. This bracelet & espresso cups came from the shop in the NY Transit Museum's Grand Central Station location.

An Oppy car poster.

We navigate the turnstyle by sliding through our Senior discount cards.

Now you can just scan your bank card.

Fare evasion is a huge problem We've seen many folks slipping in through a closing exit door.

Here we ended up in shops. It's a decommissioned subway station repurposed into a shopping/eating mall.

Going down into another decommissioned subway station in downtown Brooklyn.

This is the entrance to the NY Transit Museum.

This makes one think of an Escher etching.

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It can be a long way down on stairs or on an escalator. Elevators are not always easy to find, nor always working.

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Stockhom, Sweden.

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Be prepared for obstacles.

Art makes stations more inviting.

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And, somewhere along the way you might have a long corridor ro traverse.

Some corridors are nicely decorated & inviting.

Lisbon, Portugal.

Lisbon, Porrtugal.

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"Shot on iPhone 6" - Apple.com/worldgallery.

They can be crowded. Madrid, Spain.

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Or, empty & dreary.

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A police presence is comforting.

Or fairly empty & nice.

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Sometimes after going down, you have to go up to the platform..

But which side??

Jackie Ferrrara - “Grand Central: Arches, Towers, Pyramids.”

1998-2000 Ceramic Mosaic.

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From shortly after Aretha's demise. This was done officially. I don't know if this is still up.

Unofficial.

Almost there...

Getting closer...

You have finally arrived at your platform!

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Of course, you might have to go to another platform.

When with the grandkids, with one in a stroller, we found the Fulton St. station to be like Dante’s Circles of Hell. This was just to find an elevator.

Oh no, my train's not running today!

OMG, is that my train?!

Now what? When is my train arriving? Which side of the platform? Is there seating on the platform? What end of the train should I be on? Will there be a car with very few passengers? Will the car’s a/c be working? Will there be a homeless person on the car? Will there be acrobats, musicians or beggars in the car? In the meantime, so many things to look at, listen to & be distracted by while waiting. More about this in the next blog…