On Friday evening, I wasn't feeling well stomach-wise, so I had to down some Pepto-Bismol before I left for the city. At Grand Central, I had a sandwich from Hale and Hearty for dinner. Half a sandwich for $5. What the heck? I brought my water bottle with water from the Catskills.
Props to the PA announcer at Grand Central Terminal, who made the fitting announcement: "Boarding on track 25 is the 7:34 express to New Haven, the last bar car train" or something like that. What I know is that the PA announcer made sure that people who wanted their bar car got it, and I will say that the information was much appreciated. The platform was truly packed.
The onboard atmosphere could be described as the farewell episode of a well-known sitcom. It was like going to a happy funeral, if there were such a thing. The New York area press was onboard, with reporters from the Daily News, the Wall Street Journal, NBC 4 New York (WNBC-TV) and a guy from ABC 7 Eyewitness News (WABC-TV) who had press credentials from also PIX 11 News (WPIX-TV). The train was quite packed; in fact there was barely any room in the bar car to move around. Metro-North was smart to put a second bar car on the train.
But a few of us didn't leave empty handed, except mine got bent. A cafe car sign from Metro-North's commissary department, and when I have a place to put it, it's going on my wall:
I got off in Stamford, as going all the way to New Haven, while it would have been nice, would have been exhausting. One of the guys from the Urban Transit Club offered to bump up my ticket, but I would have gotten back real late. And as I've found, NJ TRANSIT buses don't have the same headways (the frequency that the trains/buses run at) that the MTA buses and trains have.
On the other hand, not everyone is mourning the departure of the bar cars.
Jim Cameron, chairman of the Commuter Action Group, said he won’t miss the bar cars. “I say good riddance. I think they’re an anachronism from a bygone era and they don’t fit the needs of modern commuters,” he said.
More important, he said, “We’re finally getting rid of the oldest cars in the fleet that were held together by baling wire [and] duct tape.” The new M8s offer a much more comfortable ride and people can buy drinks at the carts, he said.
“I’m also a little skeptical about whether they will be replaced by an M8 bar car design” because of the expense.
Well, I disagree with Cameron. "...They don't fit the needs of modern commuters..." Then why are they so popular? Why then did a few hundred commuters descend on a platform to catch the last of them? The bar cars served their purpose well, and even someone whose borderline autistic can even understand that!
If the bar cars are brought back (while I'm not exactly holding my breath, I DO HOPE SO), I'm going to ride on them for a few weeks and take down some serious observations, whether or not the bar cars, their design and the alcohol themselves have an effect on the commuters who ride them (lower blood pressure compared to non-bar car riders, lower rates of depression, etc). I believe the bar cars have their purpose, and should be brought back to not just the New Haven Line, but all of the MTA's commuter rail lines, AND other commuter rail operators across the country should have similar setups. Of course, I'd keep it to urbanized areas, where drunks could walk home from the station. Yes, I have my concerns about drunk drivers driving home from the station, but heck, if your commute is long enough, you're a full grown guy and you down a beer, chances are that your buzz will be over in an hour.
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