Compared with all this, the T is really a sweet-natured transportation system. True, my first ride on it made me want to throw up, but that was just a matter of mechanics: the grinding, irritable progress of an old-school Green Line train, its jolting stop-starts and near-senile querulousness with traffic, was not something I was used to. As far as passenger manners go, well, people are rude all over. They are also nice all over. The blaring hegemony of a student-stuffed late-night B train is not something I enjoy, but it’s better than a carriage-load of soccer supporters coming down London’s Jubilee Line. And one can have some interesting conversations here in Boston: on the Red Line once, a man who looked like Santa Claus’s distressed younger brother offered me a swig of something he was drinking from a Gatorade bottle. It appeared to have lumps of pineapple, or melon balls, floating in it. I asked him what it was. “This?” he said, surprised at the question. “This is cuckoo juice. Ah, you’re a good man.”
I do not wish to overstate the savagery of the London Underground, or the gentility of the T. There are pockets of civilization on the former, and pockets of anarchy on the latter. But London is a smoldering First World capital, and Boston is a tight-assed Northeast conurbation. And if you don’t believe me, go through a hole in the ground.
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A legal setback for Charlie, A real cool hand, Patrick's latest train wreck, More 
- A legal setback for Charlie
Free speech has won in the struggle between the MBTA and three MIT undergrads who claim to have uncovered flaws in the T’s electronic fare-collection system.
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Sad news got to P+J about the passing of American legend Paul Newman.
- Patrick's latest train wreck
There is no doubt that Governor Deval Patrick had — and has — much better ideas about reforming and restructuring the state's transportation infrastructure — including the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority — than the legislature.
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Letters to the Boston editor, May 26, 2006
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These days, the morning commute is hardly complete without a newspaper, coffee, and potential violation of one's Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure .
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The Arborway rail-restoration project’s opponents may toss about unbuildable poison-pill designs, but contrary to what Deirdre Fulton states, the record shows that at no time was removing parking on one side of Centre Street ever officially presented or considered, nor is it necessary to complete the project successfully.
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Photos of the MBTA from the Boston Phoenix archives
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Next time a smirking subway conductor cackles wickedly while closing the folding doors in your face, don’t get angry.
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This article originally appeared in the August 12, 1988 issue of the Boston Phoenix.
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Letters to the Boston editor, June 16, 2006
- A sinking feeling
For years, critics have called the MBTA a contributing culprit in the dangerously declining groundwater levels under the Back Bay and other parts of Boston — a problem that threatens to literally destroy much of the city’s architecture
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Lifestyle Features
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, Culture and Lifestyle, Food and Cooking, Foods, Fruits and Vegetables, Public Transportation, Transportation, David S Bernstein State, London Underground, Flann O'Brien, Nick Drake, Less
