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Comment by jachee | Hacker News Reader

As someone who was recently in NYC for a conference, I found the subway system very easy to navigate in the 21st century. It was pretty cool to not need any cabs or cars at all, for a whole week.

The Transit app makes it trivial to navigate between any given two points on the most efficient route. A current version of this game would require prohibition of navigation apps, as well as asking directions.

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I was in NYC in 2014 and had no trouble navigating the subway either. The only weird thing to me was that trains belonging to several different lines would sometimes stop at the same platform, but you get used to it quickly.

Speaking of poor navigation signage, I've been living in Saint Petersburg my whole life, and our subway system is very simple in comparison (5 lines, all transfers in the center), but the most visible signs only specify the last station for each track. More often than not, whenever I travel an unfamiliar route, I have to pause to think which station is at which end of the line. And it's me who can draw most of that map from memory. I feel sorry for the visitors.

NYC gets this right. As far as I remember, the signs said actually useful things like "Manhattan" and "Uptown and Queens".

I completely disagree. I don't know if it's just me or the "European mindset" but I find the NYC metro to be one of the most confusing subway systems in the world.

- You have trains that don't stop an all the stops of the line. - You have lines that share the same tracks but go to different destinations (that's okay for trains, but for a subway?!?) - You better listen to the crappy PA because if you don't you may end up in an express train, far away from where you want to go. Or pay attention to the electronic signs (if you are lucky and they work)

I think with the help of an app is usable, but I don't know how I would have managed 20 years ago

Oh and another thing that it's extremely annoying and poorly designed. The stations with unreachable tracks. You pay your fare only to find out that you have to use a different entrance to reach your track. In all the other subway systems I used, you pay your fare and you are free to roam the whole station and reach any track

IIRC in that case you can exit the station and re-enter through the correct entrance for free.

> In all the other subway systems I used, you pay your fare and you are free to roam the whole station and reach any track

I've also seen such stations in Paris. I was later told that the ticket works for 30 minutes after first use, so again, you can exit and re-enter just fine.

And St Petersburg has a few of these as terminal stations. Not a problem if you went there intentionally, but it is a problem if you ended up there accidentally, because they are rather strict about not letting people ride the train as it turns around.

edit: I googled it, http://metro.spb.ru/information.html#opl1 explicitly says, with too much legalese, that you have to pay again ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A few more: you have trains where the shape of the bullet (circle or diamond like (7) or <7>) differs and has different stopping patterns. The train stops change between daytime and late nights, as well as weekends and weekdays. In case of signal malfunctions trains can be dispatched to go anywhere just to clear congestion, like F not entering Manhattan or A going to queens (both actual examples in the recent incident at W 4 St).

> You have trains that don't stop an all the stops of the line. - You have lines that share the same tracks but go to different destinations

How is this non European? London has similar things. You need to pay attention to the signs/display, not a PA, though.

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