The Rise and Fall of the Amateur New York Subway Riding Committee

Copyright © 1980, Peter R. Samson

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“A Flushing youth, who wanted his money’s worth, rode all lines of the subway on a single token. With doubling back as needed, the trip totaled over 400 miles — more than the train journey from New York to Pittsburgh. It took him 25 hours and 36 minutes.”



Things seemed a little dull at M.I.T. during the spring break, 1966, when my eye fell upon the above squib from the back of a New York subway map. Oh boy! What a hack! Well, I thought, maybe we can work the computer at the Artificial Intelligence lab into it somehow as well. It all seemed natural, since four of us at AI were partners in a rent-controlled flat on the lower east side. So I wrote up a bunch of LISP functions based on (ahem) Samson’s Rule of the New York subway: travel takes one minute per station, plus one-half minute per stop, plus five minutes to cross the East River, plus one minute to change platforms, plus five minutes (in the daytime) for a train to come. There was also a function to find a minimum-transfer path from any station to any other. At the same time I worked out (by hand) a route based on all the subway lines shown on the map. The LISP was used to simulate following the route through the system, so I came up with a rough estimate: 25 hours and a half.



The major complication in planning the route was that certain lines only ran at certain hours: the M (Nassau Loop) in particular had only two trains northbound in the a.m. rush hour and three southbound in the p.m. For another example, there is a section of line used by the Rockaway Shuttle (HH train) only between midnight and 4 a.m. To get the details of all of these, including first and last train times, required some visits to the Transit Authority headquarters. These visits aroused the interest of the TA’s public relations people, who the day before our run started spreading the word to newspapers and television stations.



After an incomplete night’s sleep and a 6:30 a.m. rendezvous at Hong Fat, we started off to the Pacific Street station in Brooklyn to commence the run. (Why Pacific Street? Well, a guy who lived in that neighborhood said he’d join us there.... He didn’t.) Our party was six in number: myself, George Mitchell, Andy Jennings, Jeff Dwork, Dave Anderson, and Dick Gruen. Gruen kept a log, which started as follows:



There were various embarrassments. I got left behind once and everyone else had to wait at the next transfer point since I had the route. Later (after copies of the route were passed around) Mitchell, Anderson, and Jennings got left behind in a men’s room; then they got off at the wrong (dead end) platform of the 145th Street–Lenox Avenue station and had to pay extra fares to come back; finally they caught up. There were gratifying moments too. TA policemen at South Ferry and at Coney Island asked for our schedules, and were seen radioing them in to HQ. A New York Post reporter joined us for a while on the A train to 205th Street, getting our candid responses to questions such as “What do you have against the subways?” and “Have you picked up any girls?” Finally, about half an hour later than the initial prediction, we pulled into a platform at Pelham Bay Park that was jammed full of reporters and cameramen.



Then came a dimly-remembered series of photos and interviews. One question, however, stood out: how come we didn’t do as well as Geoffrey Arnold had? Who? we replied. It turned out that a fellow by that name some years before had done a similar run, but in less time. We had no idea, however, what he had meant by “covering the entire subway system,” so the two runs were not strictly comparable (and likewise for the case of the Flushing youth.) There followed a lunch on the TA and a very long nap.



I decided that this sport was being held back by the lack of an organized rule-making body. So I got in touch with Geoffrey Arnold, then a student at Harvard, and with his encouragement Gruen and I developed a set of rules which I then prevailed upon the Transit Authority to take as gospel.





Regulations Regarding Amateur New York Subway Riding



Definitions



This document sets forth the rules of the competition with the name “Amateur New York Subway Riding.”

There are three Classes of Competition:

Class A: Covering all Lines

Class B: Touching all Stations

Class C: Passing all Stations

In general, the object of the competition is to set a record minimum time for a given Class of Competition by

planning a route through the New York City Transit System subject to the qualifications of that Class; and

making a timed run over that route.

These rules, and all records of the competition, are maintained by the Amateur New York Subway Riding Committee, referred to herein as the Committee.

Each person who intentionally participates in the run, or who attempts specifically to expedite the run by his actions during the run, or who participates in the selection of lines and stations to be followed during the run, is considered a contestant with regard to that run.

The phrase “Transit Authority” as used herein refers to the New York City Transit Authority and to its successors.

A segment of right-of-way is defined as:

a group of one or more tracks

all used by scheduled passenger revenue traffic, and

all running roughly parallel for the length of the segment, and

no two of which are separated laterally by a distance greater than one hundred feet;

having at each end a station either

where a passenger may transfer free of charge between trains running on any tracks of the segment, or

which is at One Hundred Forty-fifth Street and Lenox Avenue.

A station is defined as that represented by any single station-designating area on the map portion of a current “Official New York Subway Map and Station Guide,” except that Jay–Borough Hall and Bridge–Jay are two distinct stations.

A station is said to be included in a segment of right-of-way if

it is between the end stations of the segment, or is itself either end station, and

scheduled passenger revenue traffic on one or more tracks of the segment stops at the station.

A platform group is defined as a set of platforms at a station such that there is a segment of right-of-way which includes the station, and trains over that segment can be either boarded or departed, or both, at each platform in the platform group.



All contestants are expected to display good sportsmanship, and to commit no mischief or criminal act while engaged in this competition.

No contestant may at any time affect, or attempt to affect, the operation during the time of the run of any train, signal, or other part of the Transit Authority system by communicating to any employee of the Transit Authority any statement which the contestant does not know to be true, or by suggesting to any such employee the reason for travel of any person aware of the run.

No present or recent employee of the Transit Authority may be a contestant.

Each contestant making the run must pay one token fare upon entering the Transit Authority system prior to the run, and until the completion of the run must pay no further fare nor reenter premises of the Transit Authority by fraudulent means, or be means of any sort of pass.

During the run, no contestant may enter upon any property of the Transit Authority, nor travel on any Transit Authority vehicle, which is not open to ordinary passengers at that time.

During the run, a log must be kept, containing unambiguously the following information describing the run:

each station where the contestants making the run changed trains, and the stations at the beginning and end of the run;

the number of some car, preferably the first, in each train taken in the run, and the name and destination of the train;

each location where a train being taken in the run reversed direction, or turned around a loop; and

the times, measured to the nearest half-minute, of the following events at the beginning and end of the run, and at each change of trains during the run:

the first opening, subsequent to arrival, of the doors of the train being departed;

the last closing, prior to departure, of the doors of the train being boarded.

Such information must be essentially in the order of occurrence of the events described.

Subsequent to the run, if a contestant wishes the run to be considered for a record, he should submit to the Committee a document containing the following:

a copy of the log;

the Class of Competition for which entry is desired;

a list of all contestants in the run, distinguishing those who made the run from those who did not, and giving their names and home addresses;

a description of the timekeeping equipment used on the run, and of the means used of determining its accuracy;

the statement “I certify that to the best of my knowledge and belief the information described herein is correct, and the run described herein was accomplished in accordance with all rules applicable to Class (A or B or C) of Competition,” signed and dated by each of the contestants.



During the run, the contestants making the run must traverse completely at least once each segment of right-of-way of the Transit Authority system. Each segment may be traversed either in one continuous transit or in any number of partial transits between stations on the segment.



During the run, the contestants making the run must, for each platform group in the Transit Authority system, at least once either

board a train from a platform in that platform group, or

depart from a train at a platform in that platform group, or

pass through that station on a train which stops to load or discharge passengers at a platform in that platform group.



During the run, the contestants making the run must, for each station in the Transit Authority system, at least once either

board a train at that station, or

depart from a train at that station, or

ride a train over a segment of right-of-way which includes that station.



The computer at M.I.T. bombed out (parity error in the Fabritek memory).



One of the runners, dispatched to the junction station at Prospect Park to tell the party to change their route at that point, called in to say he had missed his stop and to ask how to get back there.



A report came in that the party had caught the third (and last) p.m. M train instead of the second, as had been hoped, and that furthermore their M train was running late.





