The MTA’s “Courtesy Counts” campaign, launched in October 2023, is a joke. Not a funny, ha-ha joke. It’s a sad joke on humanity.
Do New Yorkers, the most-evolved of mammals, really need to be taught to not take up more than one seat on a train? Does our species really require a publicly-funded, public-service advertising campaign to lecture us to do unto others as we’d have them do unto us? Sadly, yes.
Isn’t civil behavior in our straphanger DNA? Apparently, not. My beef’s not with the MTA. It’s with uncivilized civilians.
According to the MTA’s Oct. 3, 2023 press release, Courtesy Counts is a “multi-agency campaign reminding customers to follow the MTA’s rules of conduct and treat fellow riders and public spaces with respect.” The 34 illustrations and slogans comprising the campaign feature messages “about different ways to respect fellow riders and encourage courteous behavior in public spaces.”
Digital ads are displayed on subway cars, buses, Metro-North trains, the Long Island Rail Road and station platforms across the mass transit system. The campaign also appears on social media and pamphlet cards handed out to riders.
Reminders include “keeping pets in carriers and service animals leashed, letting people on and off the train without obstruction, not talking loudly on the phone, wearing headphones, giving everyone room to stand, not laying down taking up multiple seats, not smoking or vaping, not holding the doors, not charging electric vehicles, not leaving the emergency exit door open for others to enter without paying the fare, not leaving a bike unattended or obstructing space, and not littering.”
Not littering is proper public behavior 101. “Carry In, Carry Out” works in Central Park; it should work on the subway. Unfortunately, the MTA can’t legislate courtesy. Check out the tracks. It’s a rodent smorgasbord down there.
A few polite suggestions for the Courtesy Counts Don’t List:
Don’t eat stinky food.
Don’t spill beverages on the floor.
Don’t stick chewed-gum on the seat.
Don’t use subway poles as gymnastic equipment.
Don’t throw food or paper on the tracks that will attract a rat pack and could cause a track fire.
Don’t surf between or on top of moving subway cars.
Don’t forget to use deodorant and mouthwash.
Don’t sing, especially off-key, or play amplified instruments. No one on this car bought a ticket to your concert.
Don’t push anyone on the tracks.
Don’t ask Zionists to raise their hands.
Once common courtesy and common decency are today uncommon, regardless of language, culture or country-of-origin. I see subway and bus riders not offer their seats to the elderly or, occasionally, not even to pregnant women. Never saw that disrespect in the old days. And I’ve been riding the rails for 40 years.
At Times Square and 14th St., I disbelievingly watch day after day as rush hour hordes barge on to subway cars before passengers can disembark, causing pedlock and delays. That despite the Courtesy Counts’ campaign reminder to “let people on and off the train without obstruction” and the recorded announcement that “there’s another train right behind this one.” This ain’t the last helicopter out of Saigon, people.
But the single worst act of discourtesy is fare evasion. Citywide, bus-fare evasion is 47% and unpaid subway fare is at 14%, totaling hundreds of millions in lost revenue each year. Not to mention the hundreds of millions lost to bridge-and-tunnel toll evasion. According to the MTA’s Blue Ribbon Panel on Fare Evasion, the agency lost an estimated $690 million in unpaid fares and tolls in 2022.
On May 22, the MTA announced that the blue ribbon panel, convened in spring of 2022, had made “progress on reducing subway fare evasion.” Comprised of education, social justice, business and law enforcement “experts,” the panel was given a “mandate” by the MTA to “investigate the root causes of fare and toll evasion and develop a comprehensive strategy to combat it.”
While the MTA studies the root causes of fare and toll evasion as determined by the panel — “equity, enforcement, customer education and improved physical environment” — the primary, root cause continues to be scofflaws who evade the fare. Courtesy Counts ads should scold fare-beaters to “Pay Your Fair Fare” and enforcement should be further increased.
Civility begins with “holding the door” for someone, said Mayor Adams at the recent “Abate Hate” conference in Gracie Mansion. He’s right. Bad behavior goes downhill from there.
Frydman is CEO of Source Communications, a strategic and tactical communications firm in Manhattan.