The Straphangers Campaign released the findings of their most recent “subway shmutz” survey, and it appears that many of our local lines are getting a little gross.
Back in 2011, the group found that 69% of the F train’s cars were clean. In 2013, though, only 37% were observed to be clean. This puts the F alongside eight other lines that experienced “significant deterioration” between the two studies.
The 2 also had a big drop, from 63% clean to just 29% clean, while the 3 went from 63% to 45%, the 4 from 50% to 46%, and the 5 remained steady at 38%.
The G line dropped slightly from 54% to 52%, while the R remained solid at a grimy 36%.
As for the B and Q, in 2011 59% of cars on each line were considered clean by Straphangers standards, but the B dropped in 2013 to a 40% cleanliness rating while the Q dropped to 39%.
The good news? Those are not the worst of the bunch. That crown belongs to the D train, which rolled away with a score of just 17%.
The MTA does its own cleanliness survey of the subways, and during its last in second half of 2013, it found that 92% or trains in service were clean. They argue that the Straphangers’s survey methodology is flawed, telling Metro that they’ll look at 250 cars per subway line over a six-month period, compared to the schmutz survey, which looked at 100 cars on each line in a three-month period.
What are you seeing on your commute? How clean would you say our local trains are?
