Rude LIRR riding on the rise as tech, pandemic fuel poor behavior, commuters say

Huntington commuter Jenn Triquet was only a few years into being a daily Long Island Rail Road customer when she first felt the need to snap a picture of a fellow passenger.

“It was a packed train. Not a seat to be had. And this woman sat right in the middle of a three-seater and just proceeded to open a tuna fish sandwich — with pickles and, you know, all the accouterments,” Triquet, 45, of Huntington Station, said, recalling the 2012 incident.

As the years have rolled on, so too has the “the decline of civility,” Triquet said.

Although thoughtless passengers long have been a staple of the railroad, she and many LIRR regulars believe commuter courtesy is at an all-time low — worsened by advancements in technology and pandemic-related societal changes.

Among the dozens of photos and videos shared by Triquet on social media in recent years: a guy playing a video game on his phone at full volume; another puffing on a vape with his feet up on the seat in front of him and another riding a scooter down the aisle of a moving train.

“The worst had to be the guy that was picking his earwax out of his ears and wiping it on the window next to him,” said Triquet, who takes the railroad five days a week. “It does feel like people feel more emboldened to just sort of do what they want — like whatever etiquette or consideration for your fellow passenger existed before is almost gone."

With fare evasion and assaults on conductors on the rise in recent years, some riders say the lack of consideration contributes to an increasingly unpleasant commute. It's one in which passengers lug oversized electric bikes onto trains, run charging cables across aisle floors, blast music from Bluetooth speakers and even clip their toenails — all with little regard for their fellow passengers, and often without reprimand from train crew members.

Gerard Bringmann, chairman of the LIRR Commuter Council, the railroad’s state-regulated rider watchdog group, also believes boorishness on the railroad “has gotten a little worse” as of late, with the most despicable behavior coming, not from regular commuters, but from “day trippers,” like some of those who pack the trains bound for the Hamptons on the weekends, hogging up precious seats with their belongings and engaging in the kind of boisterous revelry that some weary 9-to-5 commuters abhor.

Bringmann said, while there's always been "that 3 to 5% that don’t give a damn about anybody else," that segment of riders seems to be growing, due in part to more riders being immersed in their cellphones and oblivious to their surroundings.

"I think the pandemic kind of accelerated that a little bit, too," Bringmann said. "You’ve got people back and they just don't know how to interact with other people. They're just so used to doing everything that suits themselves that the civility has gone way down." 

What's worse, Bringmann said: "I don't know what you can possibly do about it.”

Late last year, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the LIRR’s parent organization, tried to get ahead of the plummeting social graces displayed by some riders. In October, the MTA launched a public awareness campaign aiming to remind commuters that “Courtesy Counts.” Illustrated posters cue passengers grooming themselves on trains to “save it for the salon,” and chatty phone users to “leave us off the conference call.”

MTA chief customer officer Shanifah Rieara, who helped put together the campaign, acknowledged the change in behavior can be traced back to when the relatively few commuters still taking the LIRR during the height of the pandemic had "empty cars to themselves." 

“They were able to sort of spread out and put their bags on the seats and have a lot of space to themselves,” said Rieara, who noted  ridership since has rebounded throughout the transit system. The LIRR carried 35.8 million riders in the first half of 2023, about 80% of what it did during the same period in 2019 and well ahead of the MTA's ridership recovery projections.

“That’s why they sort of need these social reminders and cues and prompts on how to travel,” Rieara added.

It's not the first time the MTA has moved to address the importance of proper rider conduct, including through a 2015 campaign also called "Courtesy Counts," and a similar effort in 2019 depicting "LIRR Heroes" — including those who text rather than talk on the phone and who put their bags in overhead compartments.

In 2011, the LIRR also began formally designating "quiet cars" on some trains, where phone calls and loud conversations were discouraged. Rieara said the MTA has "gotten away from that," in part because of the challenges of enforcing it.

Some disgusted LIRR commuters questioned the utility of the MTA’s messaging efforts. Hicksville commuter Matthew Katz said that while the gentle reminders of the railroad’s rules of conduct may work on the relatively few riders who are truly unaware of them, they are lost on the many more who are willfully disrespectful.

“People know what the right thing to do is,” said Katz, of Plainview, who commutes on the LIRR five days a week and said he witnesses some act of thoughtless behavior on the train every one of those days.

Katz said he’s recently shared train cars with passengers smoking marijuana, watching YouTube videos without headphones and discarding their trash on train floors. Despite its “Courtesy Counts” campaign, Katz said the LIRR and MTA tacitly communicate to riders that discourteous behavior is acceptable on its trains by rarely doing anything about it.

“They don’t want to make a problem. They don’t want to say to that one guy, ‘Hey, excuse me, sir, could you put headphones on and turn the volume down?' Maybe one in 20 does that,” Katz said. “If nobody says anything about the behavior, it just continues.”

Anthony Simon, who heads the LIRR conductors union, said his members "do not have enough protection or support to even attempt to engage with riders on rules of conduct." He said employee "injury and trauma numbers resulting from poor rider behavior is way up, and the support of LIRR medical and the employee assistance program is failing our members miserably."

LIRR statistics show the rate of injuries among LIRR employees causing them to lose time from work increased from 4.37 injuries per 200,000 hours worked in 2022 to 4.46 last year. The figures did not specify the cause of those injuries. According to MTA Police statistics, there were 19 reported assaults against MTA employees in 2023, up from 10 the previous year.

Rieara acknowledged while LIRR employees have “the discretion to engage” with riders behaving badly, the MTA “does not have a policy for these conductors to play that role.”

“We’re looking for customers right now to sort of self-regulate and just be good customers,” she said.

Patricia Napier-Fitzpatrick, founder of the Etiquette School of New York, believes the number of self-centered people "are more than ever before." Still, she believes there is some value in the MTA nudging rude riders to shape up.

“There’s the person who has never been taught these things,” said Napier-Fitzpatrick, whose Manhattan school holds classes promoting proper etiquette, good manners and civil behavior — principles she believes are especially important on an LIRR train car, where “you can’t escape the person who’s talking too loudly.”

“Just stop and think: ‘Am I being mindful of the other person? Does this influence their time? Is this unpleasant for them?’ " Napier-Fitzpatrick said. "Then perhaps I shouldn't do it.”

By Alfonso A. Castillo

alfonso.castillo@newsday.com@alfonsoreports

Alfonso Castillo has been reporting for Newsday since 1999 and covering the transportation beat since 2008. He grew up in the Bronx and Queens and now lives in Valley Stream with his wife and two sons.