A Story of Subways and MetroLinks

I followed my mother urgently onto the platform, through the crowds of fast-moving stiletto heels, backpacks, strollers, briefcases and scrubs that were always running late. I concentrated on staying close behind while simultaneously taking attentive mental photographs of my surroundings: right turn off the train, to the stairs labeled with an “uptown” sign, turn right again. I wrote in my head a map I could reference tomorrow, one I would use until graduating high school.

As a new seventh grader, that day marked a coming of age. Not only was I entering the unexplored territories of middle school and beyond, but I was also embarking on my first morning commute—a ritual that would start and end my days, five days a week, for the next six years. I had ridden the New York City subway as long as I could remember, but always following my parents blindly through the grimy tunnels, never paying attention to the signs or service announcements, my small body ducking under the turnstiles so that we didn’t have to pay another $2.50 fee. But now, I was a twelve-year-old—independent, mature, and capable of navigating this transportation system by myself. Or at least the two lines that would get me from Astoria, Queens to the Upper East Side of Manhattan, where my magnet school was situated 45 minutes away.

It didn’t take long for the journey to lose its shiny grandeur. My glamorous impressions of “going to school by myself” gave way to complaining about delays, commuters lacking basic etiquette, and being physically touched on all sides by a large man’s sweaty armpit, a petite woman holding six Trader Joe’s bags, a mother managing a stroller, and the dirty metal doors that could just barely close shut. But even though my morning commute was no longer exciting, the possibilities that came with this new accessibility to the subway were endless. Along with my free student Metrocard came passage to five boroughs, 24 subway lines, and 469 stations. As I made new friends who lived in different neighborhoods an hour away in opposite directions, I began to memorize avenue patterns and gain an internal GPS.

Slowly but surely, I began to know the different personalities of New York’s neighborhoods: the touristic bustling streets of 5th Avenue, the hip-and-cool cobblestone paths of SoHo, the townhouses of the West Village I dreamed of living in if I ever won the lottery, and the edgy, smoky ambience of St. Mark’s Place. No longer were my parents responsible for accompanying or driving me places—I transported myself to the museum I worked at after school, to the doctor for my yearly physical,  and to work on a project with classmates on the weekends. Following that very first solo ride, it felt like the borders of my city had been pushed wide open, with more to explore than I had time for.

When I moved to Wash U and left behind the spiderweb subway map of my home for the two horizontal lines of the St. Louis metro, I realized for the first time how much influence a transportation system had on my life. I couldn’t relate to my friends’ stories of the liberation that came with turning sixteen and getting your license (I still couldn’t drive) or angsty teenage accounts of making out in the backseat of a car. But beyond personal development, as I began to get to know my new “home away from home,” I could see that the construction of public transportation had huge political and social consequences as well.

[pullquote]Once I moved to Wash U and left behind the spiderweb subway map of my home for the two horizontal lines of the St. Louis metro, I began to realize for the first time how much influence a transportation system had had on my life.[/pullquote]

Public transportation helps facilitate a sense of proximity and community across distance. In New York, the subway acted as a democratizing force within a socioeconomically and racially fragmented city. Though the pristine, majority white-owned townhouses of the Upper East Side felt a world away from the “rough” parts of the South Bronx, on the subway, you didn’t know if the person sitting next you was a hotshot on Wall Street, a small business owner in Chinatown, or were on their way to their shift conducting the train you would get onto next. There was something equalizing about the knowledge that even if you could afford a taxi, there was no method more efficient for getting around than the trains crisscrossing underneath the city streets. The subway is a force that allows for people from all walks of life and socioeconomic, racial, and ethnic backgrounds to identify with being a New Yorker. And while it would be naïve to think that the rich used the subway to engage with areas outside of their elite comfort zones, it did give people in middle class and working class neighborhoods, like myself, access to resources otherwise unavailable. It facilitated my pursuit of a better education than my zone-school could provide, 45 minutes away, despite my parents both working full-time jobs and unable to take me themselves.

[pullquote]Public transportation helps facilitate a sense of proximity and community across distance.[/pullquote]

As I left this environment and began to learn more about the unique history of St. Louis, I began to note the ways in which the construction of transportation influenced the meaning of community and identity within a totally different context. The separation of the affluent neighborhoods surrounding Wash U from East St. Louis felt especially great, knowing that that the easiest way to get from one to the other was by car. Interaction with communities of lower socioeconomic backgrounds would require an intentional decision by the more privileged, as these areas were separated not only socially, but structurally as well by the construction of the city. The city-county divide, which Wash U sits comfortably at the intersection of, is reinforced by the lack of trains connecting nearby suburbs such as Creve Coeur and Webster Groves to the city proper.

As an outsider, the racial segregation of St. Louis I had read about felt even sharper due to the fact that it is unlikely for someone in Clayton to ever need to interact with someone living north of the Delmar Divide, if they didn’t want to. Despite St. Louis being a much smaller metropolis than New York, its divisions felt especially pronounced. In times of racial tension, especially in the aftermath of the Stockely Case, it is easy for white residents to stay comfortably in their white neighborhoods, not having to engage with protests a ten-minute car ride away. In contrast, I remember that following the murder of Eric Garner, protests in New York blocked Times Square—the location of a subway station connecting 12 lines as well as countless buses to Port Authority Terminal.

This is not a personal judgement of the people of St. Louis or New York. In both cities, racial inequality flourishes. In both areas, the wealthy live in bubbles of privilege that too few challenge themselves to break out of. I was keenly aware that only three blocks north of my “elite specialized high school,” the streets transformed into an area where public schools were under-resourced, fancy apartment buildings gave way to affordable housing, and chic cafes were replaced by fast food chains. It was clear why the more affluent rarely seemed to venture uptown of their pristine enclave. New Yorkers do not hold a moral high ground for community engagement. Instead, the construction of their city’s transportation network forces a minimum of interaction across racial difference that people do not necessarily go out seeking, but are impacted by nonetheless.

The impact transportation has on the connectedness of community could be seen in both cities, within the debate surrounding metro expansion. In New York, some criticized the extremely expensive and slow construction of the 2nd-avenue line, which serves the affluent neighborhood of the Upper East Side, as a misuse of funds benefiting the wealthy. Some argued that the 4.5 billion dollars spent on only three stops could have been invested in the infrastructure of existing aging parts of the current system, especially those serving middle and working-class neighborhoods of the outer-boroughs.

In St. Louis, the proposal for the expansion of MetroLink led to debate on if the new line would serve to connect the more affluent county to the city, or if it would take a North-South route that could revitalize the economically neglected area of north St. Louis. As it stands, the system runs East-West, connecting a limited and more well-off section of the community. But a North-South line would connect under-resourced northern parts of the county, such as Ferguson, to the economic opportunities in the center. It’s clear that these decisions would have implications beyond transportation itself. Future development of public transport will reflect which parts of the St. Louis community are deemed as more important and valued. It could either help exacerbate current social divides or help bridge them. Transportation has the power to construct new realities for a community.

[pullquote]Transportation has the power to construct new realities for a community.[/pullquote]

It is important for us all to reflect on the way public transportation shapes us, shapes the places we call home, and defines our mobility without us even realizing. This summer, at the age of 19, I finally began to learn how to drive. I wonder whether my relationship with St. Louis will change once I get my license, or if I will still tie my independence so closely to a system of trains. I hope that in either case, I challenge myself to go beyond the limitations or accessibility of the transportation around me and engage with my communities regardless. Ultimately, the bubble is as big or as small as you want it to be.

Hanna Khalil ‘20 studies in the College of Arts & Sciences. She can be reached at hannakhalil@wustl.edu.

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