Missing the Subway Token

The articles are starting about the soon-to-be disappearance of the MetroCard, that thin piece of plastic that most times—if loaded with enough money—got you a ride on a NYC subway or bus. Of course this happened when you put it the right way and it didn't ask you to do it again because you "swiped" too fast/too slow. Those card readers could be temperamental.

I will forever miss the subway token. Mixed in with my at my change, quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies used to be subway tokens. Looking at this mass of metal, I could always tell how many rides I had left by seeing how many tokens there were. Looking at a MetroCard could never tell you what's left on the card. You needed to be near a reader that worked. And of course put the card in the right way.

Or, of course you could get that very much unwanted surprise if you didn't have enough money on the card and got that dreaded message, "Insufficient Funds" as the turnstile then wouldn't spin. There you'd be, stuck on the side of the road with a flat tire as the rest of humanity sailed through the turnstiles, most of the time paying with their adequately loaded cards, or sometimes leaping over or ducking under the turnstile bar. Free works too. Where there's a will there's a way. 

Once upon a time there weren't even subway tokens. The fare from 1904 to 1948 was 5¢, and inserting a nickel into the turnstile box or bus fare box got you your ride.

On July 1, 1948 the fare went to 10¢, and you can well image the outcry then. 100% increase! I'm sure the many newspapers screamed. A dime in the turnstile or the fare box got you your ride.

And then 1953 came. The 10¢ fare was dead and it was now going to cost you 15¢. But the turnstiles were not going to work with a dime and a nickel, or three nickels. The bus fare box might accept two or three coins, and they did. The buses didn't take tokens.

So, how were you going to pay 15¢ to a turnstile that wouldn't take two coins, a dime and a nickel? A token was the answer. The turnstiles were calibrated to accept the newly introduced 15¢ token. You bought the tokens for cash at a token booth, sometimes singularly, or in small bulk quantities if you had enough money to lay out in advance of the current ride. Sometimes banks offered rolls of maybe 10 tokens for sale. 

All fare increases wee accomplished by just charging more for the token, or even introducing new sizes. Eventually, the MetroCard came along and introduced more flexible ways of paying, as well as eliminating the reliance on the chore of handling so much weighty money.

When the system relied on pure cash, the turnstiles had to be drained of the coins, and eventually the tokens. This was labor intensive and accomplished with guards at night. There was such a thing  as late night "bank trains" that ran and stopped at stations and transported the money from the token booths to the counting center in Brooklyn.

Sales of the gradually introduced MetroCards were done at token booths. I'm not sure anyone ever called then MetroCard booths. As MetroCards gained in usage, mostly reliable vending machines could swallow your bills of probably up to a $20 denomination and add money/credit to your MetroCard. I was always impressed when this worked.

MetroCards were initially free in that you got the card for no fee and then added money for the fares. But like anything that was viewed as disposable when empty of money, they were discarded as litter that became  unsightly, as well as another labor intensive job to pick up. Eventually you needed to make a $1 deposit to get a MetroCard that you could add money to. Litter stopped being a problem as people stopped discarding their empty MetroCards and reloaded them for continued use. 

I could tell you I miss the tokens. I do in that I can't see my balance by looking at a MetroCard or my new OMNY (One Metro New York) Tap and Go cards that are fast replacing the MetroCards.

What I miss most were the ancient turnstiles that were at the 15th street entrance to the 14th Street Station BMT line for what is now the N and R trains. (The NEVER and the RARELY.) The 15th Street entrance is almost at 16th street, so it's almost like cheating when you use it in that you're already a block ahead of where you're going.

The entrance of course is still there, but the turnstiles seemed to evade replacing for the longest time. They must have fallen off an inventory list. Because for the longest time as turnstiles modernized everywhere, these behemoths still took your token at eye level with a mighty THUNK of acceptance that then let you turn the turnstile spindle that was one of three MASSIVE smooth blocks of thick, well-worn wood (you could never get a splinter from them) that you spun for entry. Turning that spindle could have been like raising an anchor on a sailing ship. If it wasn't going to cost you more money, you almost wanted to do it again.

When I use that entrance—and it's not often these days—I will forever see those turnstiles and hear that THUNK.

A OMNY Tap and Go will never do that for me.

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