147 reported crimes in a month in NYC's very busy subway. That's it.
Don't let social media fool you. The US is not becoming a crime ridden cesspool, the only stinking I smell is from scaremongers that profit from your fear.
Yup, it's unpopular to say, but American style policing works through vigilance, responsiveness, and deterrence. When academics and pundits argue that the 'Nordic model' or other European style of policing and criminal justice system is better, they ignore demographic differences , unreported crime, and a those countries having a higher tolerance for crime. The way you lower crime is to have less tolerance for it ,and prosecute it when it happens. This is not to say it's perfect, but the counterfactual is much worse.
That's about 1 out of every 4 stations getting hit once a month with something. Millions of people take the subway almost daily. Sounds like the chances of being close enough to witness a crime, even if not directly victimized, are pretty high.
Then you have situations like the Jordan Neely episode which, though perhaps not "reported crimes", terrorize an entire car full of people.
On December 22 the same day that woman was burned alive, a man was also stabbed to death. Another two stabbing New Year’s Day. There were 10 murders on the subway in 2024, up from 3 in 2019. People were pushed onto the tracks 25 times in 2024.
How many people should get pushed onto the tracks before it’s okay to complain?
What 'throwaway519' doesn't know, because they don't work in an NYPD precinct, is that most subway crime is not reported, and if it is reported, it is downgraded, or outright dismissed. When a crime is committed and the suspect gets a DAT, once they have completed 6 months without another offense, the crime is deleted from the reported crime numbers. How do I know this? 14 years on the job in Manhattan--and I've never seen it this bad. We get 150 complaints a day at my precinct for Subway crime. 147 crimes... What. a. joke.
We get it, all facts and figure are to be ignored. The guy on the Internet feels it in his gut (if he even lives in the area) and has some little anecdote. So just take his word it's all terrible and you should be scared of everything.
Crime reports are manipulated. A friend got hit in the head and NYPD refused to register it. Despite that, NYC is very safe compared to most of the US, and articles that say otherwise are just trying to manipulate you.
I did, still have property there in fact, and hope to return someday, but no time soon. What you are saying is absolutely correct. Crime is rampant and goes completely unreported, due to some mix of people being desensitized and the feeling of futility it has. Every time you go out you’re quite likely to have or at least witness some kind “incident”. Maybe a guy lunging at an elderly Asian woman, perhaps a man riding around in circles in the middle of Houston in a stolen Citibike wielding a wooden club at people passing by, or quite possibly someone walking by drops their shoulder and tries to shove you for absolutely no reason. That’s the baseline, constant menacing, aggression of drug addled lowlifes with everyone just pretending nothing is happening. If this boils over into some kind of more significant incident maybe people will pull out their phones and record it for social media, but nobody is filing a police report.
I travel quite a lot, visiting around 20 countries a year, often staying for weeks or even months in different cities around the world. I haven’t seen this kind of behavior anywhere else outside the US or Canada. Not even in quite “dangerous” cities in Latin America (I did see one guy try to rob someone on a bus, the other passengers beat him, stripped him naked, and the driver slowed down and opened the door while they threw him out onto the street), nothing like this in Asia, and definitely not anywhere in Europe.
Something is seriously wrong in US culture. Personally I think it’s the amount of drugs Americans consume.
I wish we could be more specific about these labels.
Whats a “complaint”?
Is that a disagreement over an empty seat or a woman getting burned to death. Are those in the same bucket?
Yes, “mentally ill man made me feel uncomfortable” is definitely underreported, but it’s hard to believe murders and assaults are underreported. And if those are down, this is a huge win.
Obviously there's some sampling bias in your response.
That aside, we can assume that the ratio of crimes to reports remained constant - because there's no reason to think otherwise. So if the ratio of reports to daily riders is now lower, even if there are billions of un-reported crimes as long as the ratio improved it did become safer on a per-ride basis.
Note that also you have a roughly 1% lifetime risk of dying in a car accident in the United States and your risk of dying on a train rounds to zero. So on balance, I strongly suspect you're safer even if there's a lot of unreported petty crime.
My understanding is that per person-hour, the subway doesn't get much more crime than any other outdoor public space.
I think this happens in London too. Crime is so normalised that both the residents and police see a creep in their threshold for what is a "serious" crime.
My apartment block sees package theft almost daily and there was a parking spot that was getting hit by smash and grabs almost daily at one point. We have up reporting them because the police were pretty nonchalant about doing anything about it. The only reason I think most crime at this level ever gets filed is for insurance claims. But if people are so squeezed they don't have insurance they wouldn't report them
So is this a new approach for 2025? Since they're just comparing it to last year's data, to invalidate the thesis that crime is down there'd need to be some significant change. If you could link to any actual source rather than just anecdotes that would be helpful.
As a fellow Manhattan resident, personally the subway (as well as the city in general) feel quite safe to me. I have experienced more issues with crime in SF and Seattle than here.
What you say doesn't in and of itself, have any effect on this. If what you say is true then it's always the case that crime is underreported, always the case that crime is deleted from reported crime numbers, always the case that crimes get downgraded...
So given that this is a consistent property of reported crime, you still need to explain why the number of reported crimes is lower now than before.
The subway has millions of riders in a day. One hundred and fifty complaints per precinct (which is a generous estimation) is nothing, and the NYPD is a failure of an organization that pays over half a hundred million dollars a year on misconduct lawsuits. NYPD officers have a higher crime rate than the people of New York.
I would assume its not the "real" number as you pointed out. But as a proxy it still has value and still speaks to the safety of the NYC subway system.
The trend is what is important. Crime is dropping - and it was already fairly safe before and is only improving.
I have to admit that while I never believed the hysteria of “crime ridden cities” and my wife and I started traveling a lot post Covid - including “crime ridden” [sic] places like Seattle and San Francisco - I have to admit that I always thought the subway system in NYC would be some dystopian nightmare.
When I went there in 2023 during the US Open, we rode the subway everywhere and I didn’t feel the least bit nervous.
As a NYC resident and white man, I found the subway broadly safe from _violent_ crime. My female and/or asian friends had significantly worse experiences: some were grabbed, others followed, some verbally harassed. It's not a dystopian nightmare — at the end of the day everyone just has somewhere to be — but regular ridership (particularly in Brooklyn and Queens) increments the bad experience counter regularly.
Thank you. The New York City subway has its issues, but most of them boil down to the fact that the system is really old and hard to modernize.
It also has unique strengths arising from the extreme population density and the inherent 24/7-ness of NYC (not to mention Manhattan's unique geography) but people don't talk about them as much as its flaws.
If your only reference point is transit in other US cities it's hard to grasp how different the NYC subway experience is, at least in Manhattan. Trains come every 5-10 minutes even at off-peak hours, and it's almost always busy. It's just not a very conducive environment for crime, unless you're riding in the middle of the night and/or at the tail ends of the system where density is lower.
When it comes to thinking about my own personal safety, I don't worry about crime on the subway, I worry about getting hit by a truck or e-bike rider.
I've lived in NYC since 1996. I still take the subway after midnight every week. The biggest crime I've seen since the pandemic was someone lighting up a joint.
Stories about the crime ridden subways have the same ring of truth to them as Fox News' reporting on cities 'burning to the ground' from their midtown NYC offices on a sunny day when I was walking to the park. Or Trump labeling NYC an 'anarchist jurisdiction'.
NYC has a population of 8.3 million people. If NYC was a state, it'd be the 13th most populous. It has as many people as Alaska, Delaware, Maine, Montana, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming combined. It's easy to pretend crime is high when you forget about "per capita".
Living in fear is a choice. There's many ways to interpret crime statistics and the one you choose is often a reflection of yourself more so than the situation.
>Mayor Eric Adams attributed the decline in subway crime to a number of factors, including the massive surge of 1,200 additional NYPD officers in the subway system, as well as an additional 300 officers patrolling overnight trains
So which is the cause of the lower crime, congestion pricing, increased ridership, or the 1,500 additional officer surge? How long will this surge be sustained?
Time will tell but I suspect its the increased ridership (helped by congestion pricing). The NYPD have been in the system for months and it didn't make much of a difference in the stats as far as I recall.
Congestion pricing is the most recent and significant changed variable.
It would be nice to see some of that money go towards subway improvements. This is still the worst subway system I have used anywhere in the world: it is loud, it is slow, it is unreliable. Even Boston's right next door is so much cleaner, roomier, and more modern. Surely if the city taxes people into using the subway, they will do something to improve the subway?
Safety is a start I guess but is hard to judge when it had been declining for years. I am hopefully.
The T is nicer, sure. It's also a fraction the size of the MTA, ass slow, and doesn't run past bedtime. Plus we're barely two years out from when it was often (literally) on fire.
Excuse my jadedness, but at least when I'm in NY the subway will get me where I'm going - and usually on time too
I was very skeptical of the congestion pricing policy but I have to confess that it frigging worked. Based on my observations it significantly reduced traffic not only in lower Manhattan but also in NJ coming into Holland Tunnel. It does not change the fact though that this was done more so as a money grab by the MTA.
It charges people for the privilege of driving their car into the densest part of the largest city in the country. They could take all the money and burn it, and it still would have been worth doing.
I think this “it’s a money grab by the MTA” mentality is ignorant of the fact that no one thinks it was ever not a money grab. There is money to be grabbed by charging the drivers who put wear and tear on the streets. Manhattanites said “yes do this we don’t want the health effects from constant traffic, incentivize them not too drive in”. Drivers said “you can’t grab my money”. Manhattanites said “fine then don’t drive in”.
A money grab isn’t a bad thing, it’s a smart move for a highly romanticized city where space is precious.
Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, or celebrities, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
Karma please.
I think crime is down on NY subways because Daniel penny got aquited of his murder charge. Showing that you too can murder obnoxious drug addicts and only be financially ruined but not imprisoned.
Although mentioned in the article as something Eric Adams has said, that's not actually what the article is talking about - this is comparing subway crimes before and after congestion pricing
I have a feeling some of the policies recent are also in effect addressing it too. Not entirely a fan of all the policies but to see something good of it come is nice.
[+] [-] throwaway519|1 year ago|reply
Don't let social media fool you. The US is not becoming a crime ridden cesspool, the only stinking I smell is from scaremongers that profit from your fear.
[+] [-] bogantech|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] bagels|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] paulpauper|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] lr4444lr|1 year ago|reply
Then you have situations like the Jordan Neely episode which, though perhaps not "reported crimes", terrorize an entire car full of people.
[+] [-] rayiner|1 year ago|reply
On December 22 the same day that woman was burned alive, a man was also stabbed to death. Another two stabbing New Year’s Day. There were 10 murders on the subway in 2024, up from 3 in 2019. People were pushed onto the tracks 25 times in 2024.
How many people should get pushed onto the tracks before it’s okay to complain?
[+] [-] nla|1 year ago|reply
What 'throwaway519' doesn't know, because they don't work in an NYPD precinct, is that most subway crime is not reported, and if it is reported, it is downgraded, or outright dismissed. When a crime is committed and the suspect gets a DAT, once they have completed 6 months without another offense, the crime is deleted from the reported crime numbers. How do I know this? 14 years on the job in Manhattan--and I've never seen it this bad. We get 150 complaints a day at my precinct for Subway crime. 147 crimes... What. a. joke.
[+] [-] Larrikin|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] hedora|1 year ago|reply
Before we bought, we checked a crime statistics site, and it said the crime rate was zero near our place.
In reality, burglaries, etc, are extremely common, but the police don’t update the database.
[+] [-] gcapu|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] throw__away7391|1 year ago|reply
I travel quite a lot, visiting around 20 countries a year, often staying for weeks or even months in different cities around the world. I haven’t seen this kind of behavior anywhere else outside the US or Canada. Not even in quite “dangerous” cities in Latin America (I did see one guy try to rob someone on a bus, the other passengers beat him, stripped him naked, and the driver slowed down and opened the door while they threw him out onto the street), nothing like this in Asia, and definitely not anywhere in Europe.
Something is seriously wrong in US culture. Personally I think it’s the amount of drugs Americans consume.
[+] [-] pj_mukh|1 year ago|reply
Is that a disagreement over an empty seat or a woman getting burned to death. Are those in the same bucket?
Yes, “mentally ill man made me feel uncomfortable” is definitely underreported, but it’s hard to believe murders and assaults are underreported. And if those are down, this is a huge win.
[+] [-] screye|1 year ago|reply
How many people are robbed, assaulted, violated or killed on the subway ?
Those are the numbers that matter. Talking about vague 'crimes' is a pointlessly low resolution.
[+] [-] remram|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] arcticbull|1 year ago|reply
That aside, we can assume that the ratio of crimes to reports remained constant - because there's no reason to think otherwise. So if the ratio of reports to daily riders is now lower, even if there are billions of un-reported crimes as long as the ratio improved it did become safer on a per-ride basis.
Note that also you have a roughly 1% lifetime risk of dying in a car accident in the United States and your risk of dying on a train rounds to zero. So on balance, I strongly suspect you're safer even if there's a lot of unreported petty crime.
My understanding is that per person-hour, the subway doesn't get much more crime than any other outdoor public space.
[+] [-] djtango|1 year ago|reply
My apartment block sees package theft almost daily and there was a parking spot that was getting hit by smash and grabs almost daily at one point. We have up reporting them because the police were pretty nonchalant about doing anything about it. The only reason I think most crime at this level ever gets filed is for insurance claims. But if people are so squeezed they don't have insurance they wouldn't report them
[+] [-] rsanek|1 year ago|reply
As a fellow Manhattan resident, personally the subway (as well as the city in general) feel quite safe to me. I have experienced more issues with crime in SF and Seattle than here.
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Maxatar|1 year ago|reply
So given that this is a consistent property of reported crime, you still need to explain why the number of reported crimes is lower now than before.
[+] [-] caslon|1 year ago|reply
The subway has millions of riders in a day. One hundred and fifty complaints per precinct (which is a generous estimation) is nothing, and the NYPD is a failure of an organization that pays over half a hundred million dollars a year on misconduct lawsuits. NYPD officers have a higher crime rate than the people of New York.
[+] [-] donohoe|1 year ago|reply
The trend is what is important. Crime is dropping - and it was already fairly safe before and is only improving.
(Yeah, I live in NYC)
[+] [-] scarface_74|1 year ago|reply
When I went there in 2023 during the US Open, we rode the subway everywhere and I didn’t feel the least bit nervous.
[+] [-] susodapop|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] peterbonney|1 year ago|reply
It also has unique strengths arising from the extreme population density and the inherent 24/7-ness of NYC (not to mention Manhattan's unique geography) but people don't talk about them as much as its flaws.
If your only reference point is transit in other US cities it's hard to grasp how different the NYC subway experience is, at least in Manhattan. Trains come every 5-10 minutes even at off-peak hours, and it's almost always busy. It's just not a very conducive environment for crime, unless you're riding in the middle of the night and/or at the tail ends of the system where density is lower.
When it comes to thinking about my own personal safety, I don't worry about crime on the subway, I worry about getting hit by a truck or e-bike rider.
[+] [-] JohnTHaller|1 year ago|reply
Stories about the crime ridden subways have the same ring of truth to them as Fox News' reporting on cities 'burning to the ground' from their midtown NYC offices on a sunny day when I was walking to the park. Or Trump labeling NYC an 'anarchist jurisdiction'.
NYC has a population of 8.3 million people. If NYC was a state, it'd be the 13th most populous. It has as many people as Alaska, Delaware, Maine, Montana, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming combined. It's easy to pretend crime is high when you forget about "per capita".
[+] [-] add-sub-mul-div|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] drekipus|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] Sparkyte|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] threeseed|1 year ago|reply
If you want to reduce crime in an area simply make it busier.
[+] [-] hnburnsy|1 year ago|reply
So which is the cause of the lower crime, congestion pricing, increased ridership, or the 1,500 additional officer surge? How long will this surge be sustained?
[+] [-] debacle|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] donohoe|1 year ago|reply
Congestion pricing is the most recent and significant changed variable.
[+] [-] JeremyNT|1 year ago|reply
It's not entirely inconceivable that he might be telling the truth, but he's an extremely unreliable source.
[+] [-] resters|1 year ago|reply
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42619051
[+] [-] remram|1 year ago|reply
Safety is a start I guess but is hard to judge when it had been declining for years. I am hopefully.
[+] [-] jakelazaroff|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] wibbily|1 year ago|reply
Excuse my jadedness, but at least when I'm in NY the subway will get me where I'm going - and usually on time too
[+] [-] nothercastle|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] objektif|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] mjmsmith|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] n144q|1 year ago|reply
Even if that were true, I have absolutely no problem with MTA grabbing some well deserved money.
[+] [-] righthand|1 year ago|reply
A money grab isn’t a bad thing, it’s a smart move for a highly romanticized city where space is precious.
[+] [-] blindriver|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] dhdjruf|1 year ago|reply
Karma please. I think crime is down on NY subways because Daniel penny got aquited of his murder charge. Showing that you too can murder obnoxious drug addicts and only be financially ruined but not imprisoned.
[+] [-] zombiwoof|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] amazingamazing|1 year ago|reply
Real takeaway is make an area expensive and crime will go away, since poor people will too. Basically the safest areas are the richest.
[+] [-] maplant|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] kouru225|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] Sparkyte|1 year ago|reply