4 homicides already this year and it's not even August? I read on HN that between 1990 and 2003 there had been just 10 homicides in the very same subway and it allegedly had been much more dangerous in that period of time [1]. Seeing that the population only grew by ~15% since 1990 it looks like a huge increase in murder rate. What's going on there?

1.https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32223533

Subway crime rates have risen substantially in the last two years; it remains to be seen whether that’ll become a long-term trend. In particular, as ridership numbers return to normal, the rate seems to be going down.

Even with the 2022 rise, the subway remains substantially safer than any other form of transit.

>Even with the 2022 rise, the subway remains substantially safer than any other form of transit.

By miles traveled or by the total number of deaths occurred while traveling?

Both. The subway is safer by these four metrics:

* Number of deaths, miles traveled

* Number of deaths, per capita commuter

* Number of deaths from violent crime or negligence, miles traveled

* Number of deaths from violent crime or negligence, per capita commuter

So, to be safer than 0.07 death per billion miles in air travel and still have at least 4 death (there might be more deaths from other causes) and assuming nobody will die the rest of the year, also given 3M daily commuters from your numbers it appears the average commute in NYC subway is more than 52 miles?

What's the point of being intentionally obtuse? We're talking about commuter transit, which doesn't include airplanes.

I read what you wrote, I cannot read your mind, sorry about that.

> since there's no homicide. The woman didn't die.

Yes, so it wouldn't have shown up in your touted homicide stats, yet the fact that it happened makes everyone who rides the subway feel less safe.

How many attempted homicides, attempted muggings, stalkings, etc. are there that never get reported?

However people might feel (and they might feel less safe!) does not detract from the raw factuality that the subway is extremely safe. If people died and were maimed on America's highways at the rate they are in NYC's subways, we'd save tens of thousands of lives and livelihoods yearly.

> How many attempted homicides, attempted muggings, stalkings, etc. are there that never get reported?

Do you have a source indicating that NYC underreports these crimes uniquely, and not merely that they're generally underreported? Our police are generally zealous when it comes to violent crime statistics, since it allows them to pump the Fear Machine and keep public support up.

There's a certain, urm, unique element of gangs that disproportionately lives in large cities like NYC and those people like to keep their business as their business (even as victims of violence) and not police business. I'm not sure how much difference it makes but I'd find it to believe there's not a huge amount of gang crime that doesn't get reported, and disproportionally so.

I'm sure most of their deaths end up getting found out sooner or later, if they're someone who will be missed. Anything lesser probably ain't gonna be found out if it's gang on gang. This is the kind of stuff that you can kind of 'feel in the air' but can't prove because no gang is going to let Professor Squiggles nerd up on his sociology study during the next hit.

A couple of things:

* “Like NYC” is doing a lot of work here. NYC has organized crime, but not a lot of violent organized crime anymore. There’s a reason the handwringing over MS-13 focused on the suburbs of Long Island and not NYC.

* There’s a lot of “it just doesn’t feel right to me” floating around whenever someone points out, statistically, that NYC is both far safer than its recent history and far safer than the rest of the country. And it’s perfectly reasonable that people would feel that way, because it is unintuitive! But unintuitive feelings don’t trump numbers, and there’s no real evidence (including from sources that have a strong incentive to make crime seem as bad as possible) that massive amounts of violent and property crime are going unreported.

Yes there is not evidence because the gangs and those living under their thumb do not reveal the evidence to police. As I said, no one is inviting Professor Squiggles or woodruffw the computer hacker on the next hit. I'll be the first to admit it's not provable, I've said that all along. It probably never will be provable, and despite your claims that NYPD is happy to report crime I can assure you NYPD is still scared shitless of getting in a gunfight with organized crime except in the narrowest of circumstances where they have controlled conditions and a planned out mission to ambush their enemy alone. NYPD has as much incentive to let sleeping dogs lie as much as the gangs do. They have zero incentive to make it look like their cops need to be doing something that is likely to get them hurt -- much easier to cite some yuppie dunce for a DUI or something -- and aside, "going home safe to your family comes first."

Living in the city is one of those places where the statistics sound nice but not going off your intuition eventually catches up to you.

But we're not talking about investigative evidence; we're talking about dead human bodies. I don't need to do a gang ridealong to confirm or refute the crime statistics, unless you think that the NYPD is massively undercounting the number of suspected homicides in the city (and again, in a way that's disproportionate with homicides in the rest of the country).

(The stuff about firefights similarly confuses this -- I have no doubt that the NYPD is afraid of getting into gunfights. But that has absolutely nothing to do with the routine paperwork of recording a homicide victim.)

Intuition is meant to comport with ground reality, and the ground reality is that NYC is not gangland anymore (and hasn't been for decades). Other cities might still be, but we aren't.

I'm willing to consider what you say is true (earlier you said violent crime, so I'm going to revert back to that here rather than just homicide which is harder to hide). Also willing to consider it is not.

Ultimately recorded crime data should be used as an aid to guide our decisions, in combination with other signals. I would consider your view reckless in light of deciding how to go about my life in the city, but ultimately it is your decision to make and I hope it guides you well.