Another person was shoved onto the New York City subway tracks on Sunday, prompting renewed calls for additional safety measures to be put in place.
The Washington Post reported that the victim, a 62-year-old man whose name was not released, was pushed onto the southbound tracks at the Fulton Street subway station in Lower Manhattan. New York City Police told the Post that the individual made contact with the first car of the train and fell onto the tracks. The man sustained a laceration to his leg and was taken to a Lower Manhattan hospital. No arrests have been made in connection with the attack, the NYPD said.
The incident came just over a week after another New Yorker was killed after she was pushed onto the tracks. 40-year-old Michelle Go was killed after she was shoved in front of an oncoming train on January 15th in the Times Square subway station. The attacker, a 61-year-old homeless man with a history of violence and mental health problems, was arrested by police and charged with second-degree murder. He has since been ordered to undergo a mental health evaluation before standing trial.
The NYPD said that both attacks were unprovoked.
New York City subways saw an increase in pushing assaults over the past year. The NYPD said in crime data released Sunday, via the New York Post, that, of a record-high 461 felony assaults that took place on the subway system in 2021, 30 involved someone being pushed onto the tracks. That number was up from 26 attacks in 2020, despite a decrease in overall ridership in that time period. Eight homicides occurred in the city’s transit system, also a record high.
The increase in push assaults has led to heightened calls for safety barriers to be installed at subway stations. At a vigil for Go last week, attendees called for safety measures to be put in place on subways, NBC 4 New York reported. The idea has been considered for a long time, but there is disagreement over whether the measures work.
“Platform doors are an idea that works in many places, but there are some special complexities in New York because of the age of our system, because of the location of structure, because it does interfere with ADA accessibility,” said Acting Chair of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority Janno Lieber.
Former MTA board member Charles Moerdler disagreed, saying that the city repeatedly promised to test the idea, but those promises never materialized. “Not only is it feasible, it is readily feasible in many but not all stations,” Moerdler said. “The constant ducking of the issue is really offensive to me … It has never been prioritized. And that’s the failing. You have to have a will.”
Even New York Mayor Eric Adams admitted he did not feel safe on the city’s subways, as The Daily Wire reported. “On day one, I took the subway system, I felt unsafe. I saw homeless everywhere. People were yelling on the trains. There was a feeling of disorder. So as we deal with the crime problem, we also have to deal with the fact people feel unsafe,” Adams said. The mayor’s comments came just a day after he was accused of dismissing concerns about subway safety as a “perception of fear” in the wake of Go’s death.