BMT Brighton Line History

A Note on Safety & Tragedy

It is a somber truth that significant advances in public safety almost always come in the wake of devastating tragedies. Catastrophes like the sinking of the General Slocum ferry, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, and the Malbone Street Wreck—which occurred right here on the Brighton line in 1918—cost hundreds of lives and forced systemic changes.

Yet, all of these historic transit disasters combined pale in comparison to the immense toll of automobile traffic deaths that occur silently in a single year. It is a depressing commentary on human nature that when fatalities are dispersed and only affect a few lives at a time, we feel far less collective urgency to intervene and prevent them.

There are very few things you can do to reduce your risk of injury by over 90%, and one of them is taking public transportation—but most people have no idea that this is the truth. Car accidents cause about 30,000 deaths a year.

This disparity in public perception continues to shape transit policy today. For papers analyzing New York City specifically, a recent study in Injury Epidemiology quantifies how media reporting diverges from actual transit data (Roberts et al., 2024). This paper analyzes the sharp disconnect between widespread media coverage of violent attacks within the NYC subway system and actual crime and safety metrics. It frames how political and public focus on subway danger fuels heightened public fear, even though public transportation yields massive net health benefits to urban environments—specifically through the dramatic reduction of traffic crashes and vehicle-related air pollution.