The letter I am sending to the LIRR, NY Daily News, Newday. ..

The BBQ Pit
1

Dear Sirs,

I have been riding the [Long Island Railroad info deleted 'cause I don’t want strangers knowing my daily habits] each morning for close to 3 years now and I have been subjected to the harassment of your ticket-taker for most of this time, yet I have never complained-- until now.

I didn’t complain when, having a hard time finding my ticket, I handed him a bill. When the ticket dropped out of the folds of the bill I said, “Oh here’s my ticket.” to which your ticket-taker replied, “Too late,” moved the bill out of my reach and proceeded to pull an on-board ticket out of his punch and punch it up [let me add here that there is a 5 dollar surcharge for buying your ticket on board the train].

I didn’t complainwhen he physically barred an elderly woman laden with packages from taking a seat. He forced her to the back of the car and stood over her, glaring, while she fumbled for her ticket with one hand through her packages.

But what I witnessed this week surpassed harassment andjumpeddirectly into lunacy. On Wednesday, September 17 of 2003 he again barred a passenger from taking her seat, herding herto the back of the car and then got into a shoving match with her. He shoved her right out of her slip-on shoes and then absconded with the woman’s shoes! He absolutely refused to give the woman back her shoes and when the other passengers added their (now raised and justifiably angry) voices to the request for the shes, the seemingly insane ticket-taker tried to hide them at the other end of the car. Lickily, a pssengersitting in the front of the car witnessed the ticket-taker stashing the shoes and pointed out the hiding place. To add insult to injury, the now hysterical woman was hauled off the train by five police officers the Jamaica station.

Apparently emboldened by the events on Wednesday, the ticket-taker did the same, exact thingto a different passenger. This time he ran off with the man’s umbrella. Again there was a loud, disruptive confrontation–instigated by the ticket-taker. And again the passenger was hauled off by a group of police officers.

There must be a file a foot think on this employee. It is not fair that your employee gets to harass paying customers, calls ahead to alert the police, then gets to watch the passengers herded of the train. Something must be done about him.

My only regret is that I’ve waited until now to say anything, especially since it is obvious he saves this treatment for the people of color who ride in his car. I have always been skeptical of cries of “racism” when stupidity could easily explain the foolish actions of some. In this case however, it is hard to see how it could be anything else since, to my experience of the last 3 years, the white passengers on [again, detailed info removed] have never haved to deal with this type of behavior from him.

Sincerely,
Biggirl

CC: Every news organization in the NY Metro area.

Yeah, I’m pissed.

2

Holy shit. Did you get the guy’s name/“badge number”/whatever?

Are you sure about this? If you’d never complained before, maybe a lot of other passengers have felt like they shouldn’t raise a fuss, especially when the cops manhandle them/other people who say something.

3

Biggirl, I’m glad you’re writing that letter. That jackass needs a beat down.

4

That’s insanity. I hope your letter gets printed.

5

I suck. I hit post too early.

I just wanted to add that I do sympathize and think he’s a horrible guy, but sometimes people don’t speak up. My mother was talking to an employee at the clinic that I went to when I was growing up, and happened to relate some stories of extremely rude and totally uncalled-for “bedside manner” by a pediatrician who used to work there. The woman recognized the name of the doctor and asked if she’d ever filed a complaint or brought it up officially, and my mother said no. The response was that it was a shame, that if there’s just a lot of talk but no official complaints, nothing can be done. I’m not saying that’s the case here, or that it would even help, mind you. I’m just saying.

(And let me add that I’m guilty of the same thing, myself.)

6

You’ve stolen people’s shoes and had them arrested? Jeeezus. Note to self: Do not piss off Denise.

No, really, I agree with you about complaining to the proper folks, the ones who can actually do something about the situation. Too many people complain, and too few do it to the right people.

7

I think you’re doing the right thing writing that letter.

I do have a question, however. When those passengers were taken away by the police, didn’t any other passengers get off the train and make it clear to the cops that the ticket-collector should be the one charged with assault?

8

and…

**

Ticket taker = Curious George?

:stuck_out_tongue:

9

I know for a fact that the one woman complained when this same ticket-taker tried his blocking technique on her, she slipped by him and he never came to punch her ticket. The next day he punched two rides through, knowing full well her ticket was punched on the second train (there are a few of us who take the same train everyday and transfer in Jamaica).

The man who was taken off the train by the police today is actually my co-worker. He came in about two hours late and said he pressed counter-charges against the ticket-taker.

He took her shoes! We were all farglestabbeed by this.

10

Motherfucker bet’ not show his ugly face on a NJ Transit train. We don’t play that shit here in Newark!

<angry black woman>

11

I’m not real anal about spelling on a message board, but I hope you did a spell check on that or had a proof reader take a look.

Not to dismiss the severity of the actions of the ticket taker, every word in the letter could be spelled wrong and the guy is still a dip shit. Just looks better if it gets published and they don’t (sic) you to death. Actually not many misspelled words, justsome words run together.

Please don’t think I’m trying to put you down, I’m damn glad you wrote that letter. If I had witnessed those things, there might have been a paragraph in it devoted to " and then a guy named Duke bitch-slapped his ticket-taking ass and got the shoes back before he was hauled off by 5 policemen".

You go, Biggirl!!

12

The letter was touch-typed onto the thread in a hurry. Don’t worry, I’ll not make a fool of myself by sending in anything that looks as terrible as the OP.

13

This man is clearly insane.

Biggirl, I’ve got three words for you.

1 Kick
2 his
3 ass

14

Yeah! What are you gonna do about it, huh?!

:stuck_out_tongue:

Thanks for the extra info, Biggirl - I hope this guy gets fired.

15

Say…his name wasn’t…

<pause>

…Costanza, was it?

16

That is awful. Please keep us posted - I want to know what happens to this jerk.

17

Typo there… you have ‘shes’ not ‘shoes’.

Good on you for sending it.

18

Cite please?

this is what I know of:

From http://mta.info/lirr/pubs/TicketInfo.htm

And I just can’t buy the rest of the story either. I ride the LIRR often enough and NEVER have seen anything like that (with limited deservign exception*), NEVER. I have my own personal beef w/ the LIRR too as the day of the power failure they let me out 4 stops from my destination (actually between stations), which is 2 zones and NEVER offered me a refund for services not delivered, apx $1.50 (difference in price between the zones).

Also the LIRR has multple conductors per train, and that person could easily go to another car serviced by another conductor. Also passangers would complain.

No sorry your story is either widely exagerated or made up.

Sorry, that’s how I interpert it, you may want to do a rewrite before you send your story to the papers. It would also be helpful to send the train #, conductor # (or assistant conductor #).

  • The limited exceptions that I have seen are passengers outright refusing to pay the fair, masterbaiting (yes I saw much more then I wanted to), or very disruptive. The procedeure has always been the same:
    1 “All conductors go to channel 4” (channel 4, if you don’t know is the channel that is for private conversation between train personel, usually they talk about things like a loose wheel/ train has a good chance of derailing, or brake system failure, but also emergencies).
    2 One calls ahead to the police to wait at the next platform. The others wait in that car or just outside it.
    3 The train is slowed down so the police can set up on the platform
    4 the train pulls in and it is like a swat team, they go in and quickly remove the person
    5 the conductor appoligized for the delay

I have never seen a conductor remove an artical from a passanger.

The ‘racist’ conductor would have to have the cooperation of the entire train crew to pull this off.

19

Very nice of you to accuse the OP of lying, kanicbird. Real class act, you are.

Did it ever occur to you that your own range of experience might not include every possible occurence?

You might think the story sounds weird or unlikely, but i see weirder and more unlikely shit every time i open a newspaper.

20

KANICBIRD, are you high? Or just a total unredeemable asshole?

It is considered rude beyond redemption to drop by to call the OP’er a liar when you have zero – ZE-RO – evidence that they have fabricated their OP. If had assholes such as yourself do this to me in the past, and believe me, it is a first-class way to piss somebody off.

BIGGIRL is a well-known poster here who has absolutely no history of exaggeration, grand-standing, or fabrication. I have no doubt that what she says happened is exactly what happened, your totally irrelevant experiences with other people on other trains notwithstanding.

Unless you have more than your spidey-sense to indicate that she’s making this up, you can stuff your insulting speculations regarding her honesty right up your ass, next to you head.

Go get 'em, BG. :slight_smile: