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Web www.startsandfits.com

Let me tell you something. That's not the way it worked out.

For some reason, when we got to Second Avenue there was an E train sitting there, even though the E train doesn't usually go anywhere near that station. So we took that to West 4th Street and walked up the stairs to catch the C train (Eighth Avenue local), but the A train, the Eighth Avenue express, came right away. The A doesn't stop at 86th Street, but we planned to transfer at 59th Street for the C. Maybe we'd pass a C train on our express ride to 59th Street. No, the exact opposite thing happened. While our slow-poke express train was lumbering up Eighth Avenue, we were passed by a sprightly C train between 50th and 59th Streets. We pulled into 59th Street just as the C train had left. Damn. We missed our connection. But, no problem, we just walked upstairs to the 1 and 9 platform and hopped on a 1 train, which thankfully came right away.

We learned some hard subway riding lessons that night.
1) Local trains are sometimes faster than express trains. Had we waited for the C train at West 4th Street, we wouldn't have had to go through a second transfer.
2) When you descent into the subway, you never know what your eventual route will be. What should have been an F-to-the-C trip ended up being an E-to-the-A-to-the-1.
3) Redundancy is key to successful subway travel. Luckily for us we were going to the Upper West Side, which is served by the Central Park West line and the Broadway line. The Upper East Side, unfortunately, is served only by the Lexington Avenue line, where there is no chance of making a quick change of course like there is at Columbus Circle. All this is by way of pointing out that plans are finished and it's time to start digging. Support the Second Avenue Subway!

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