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Soon the NYC subway will be sparkling clean (or, you know, marginally less covered in garbage). New Yorkers may be assholes and proud of it, but unfortunately there are a whole lot of litterbugs in this city too. Now, the MTA has finally realized that the subway is a cesspool of germs and is launching a new initiative that's bigger than posting adorable stick-figure drawings gently suggesting you pick up after yourself.
Sounding more like Batman’s latest battle move, Operation Trash Sweep will add portable vacuums and vacuum trains to every one of the city’s 469 subway stations and 10 million miles of connecting tracks. It was actually enacted in June, with a new schedule upping the cleaning from 34 stations to 94 stations every two weeks.
Phase two (ba bum bum) kicks off on September 12, when 500 workers will clean day and night for two weeks straight. After that, a portable track system—basically, vacuum robots—will start prowling the subway, destroying any garbage in its path. That arrives at the end of 2016, and it will be followed by new vacuum trains and refuse cars in 2017. Just make sure not to accidentally confuse one for the G train (an easy mistake).