Run-on Advice

The past few months have been hard for the captive audience who reads SubTalk. SubTalk is the cute banner under which the MTA messages are placed. Typical ads warn people that holding doors can be dangerous, running to catch a train can be fatal, riding between cars, while looking damn cool, can result in death.

Lately, in an effort to dumb down the subway messages, the MTA has succeeded only in butchering the English language. A good example of this are the take ones. You probably know what these are because the name does convey the meaning, but the fact that we cannot handle the words brochure, pamphlet, or guide is alarming. Plus, take one just doesn't work linguistically. Pick up a take one.

What drives me to complain about this now is the new ad about littering on the tracks. This ad gives me a headache each time I see it. Here it is:

Litter gets on the tracks and catches fire and that causes train delays that make you late aside from making trains and stations untidy because a little litter goes a long way.

No punctuation, no flow, just a bunch of phrases glued together in a scattered mess. Someone fire that copy editor!