You might be surprised to learn that most NYC subway tunnels are devoid of rats. The rats, you see, only live around the station platforms – because that is where the food is. Deeper into the tunnels, where few humans go and less carry their lunches, there’s no food to live off of. That is, unless a homeless person has been present.
Most of the homeless have been removed from the NYC subway tunnels, but a few still go in and live for awhile – and sometimes, their trash doesn’t get scooped up on the way out.
This is one such location, which I’ve come to call the ‘shit track’. Removed from service a decade ago, this stub track has been severed at the switch from parallel tracks – creating a long unused, broken down trackway where hipster tourist photographers enjoy a relatively safe trip underground and where a homeless person can set up camp right in the middle of the track and cart in all the garbage they want.
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