The first time I clearly remember riding the metro was when I was 9 years old. It was the Paris Métro. There were certain things I remembered: my dad buying our family tickets, using those tickets to get through small doors that slide open, and walking down the stairs to the metro platform.
We rode an escalator that brought us many feet below ground. My mom and I raced to the white and orange metro seats before my dad could get there. The train cars were white with this pretty teal stripe. I even remember the little warning graphic of a pink rabbit alerting us not to get stuck between metro doors.
Metros can be in all kinds of elevations. Most of them are below the ground. Some of them are ground level, but not many (at least, the ones I have seen). Finally, there are the metros that are way above ground (notably Chicago’s line).
I used to call metros “subways,” which still works, but it can get confused with the sandwich company, so I switched to using the word metro. It is a much cooler word in my opinion.
I noticed the United States does not have many metros, but the most famous one is New York. It’s hard to miss the round colorful dots to indicate different lines and the iconic metal design on metro cars.
My home city does not have any metros, sadly. The closest thing to a metro is the ground-level train that runs from my neighborhood to the airport (a light rail). I think it’s decent, but I wish we had metro stations, where you can use stairs or an escalator to go feet below the ground to platforms. It would have been so much cooler to see a new world underground.
The same goes for regular trains in the U.S. I know there are trains to transport resources, but never leisure trains for people to watch the countryside from one side of the U.S.A. to the other. There must have been some long ago for people to get from the East Coast to the West Coast, but as far as I know, I don’t think they exist anymore. I think it would be much more fun to ride a train instead of a plane to get to a destination, like the trains in European countries. But don’t get me wrong, I love airports!
At one point, I even looked up metros on YouTube because I missed them so much. I tried to pretend I was in that scene as much as possible.
That is why I get really excited whenever we get to go on a metro on vacation. From Paris to Tokyo to Copenhagen, it is always the underground sensation that makes me happy. I always wonder how people were able to dig out space for them. It must have been a very long process.
When I’m on a metro, I look at the screen hanging from the wall, checking to see when the next metro will arrive. Finally, when it reads arriving, I hear a faint rumble. I look as far as I can down the tunnel (without crossing the yellow line, obviously) and see the metro’s lights in the distance. As it makes its way to the platform, I feel the air rush by and see passengers in cars, waiting to join them.
If it’s available, I always sit by the window, either next to the tunnel wall or next to the empty track. When the metro moves, it’s like getting a tour of the underground tracks. It was always fun when I saw a metro going in the opposite direction, and within a few seconds, it was gone.
In my personal opinion, the longer we stay on the metro, the better. Unfortunately, I have to get off after two or three stops, on average. Since each stop did not take long, my time on the metro would come out to be less than 10 minutes.
When I get off the metro, I sometimes insist on watching the metro leave the platform. I’d watch it fade into the tunnel with its headlights, getting smaller and smaller. Now and then, there would be a metro coming in at the same time the first was leaving. I do not know how to explain why I want to watch metros arrive and depart from platforms, but I do. I always have.
My favorite metro system of all time is the TMB (Transport Metropolitans de Barcelona). I remember the specific whoosh sound symbolizing the metro’s arrival. I remember the alert sound the overhead speaker made before this man started making announcements inside the metro car. There are around nine different lines, each corresponding to a specific color. I still remember that our hotel was close to a stop on the Green Line. I remember that (at least once) our family got off the yellow, red, and purple lines. Metros in Barcelona look similar to the ones in Paris, except the teal accent stripes turn red.
The last time I was on a metro was in Copenhagen, in 2022. I honestly am a little bit sad because I have not been on a metro for that long. Maybe sometime this upcoming summer, I’ll go to a new place where I can ride a metro.
When people think of highlights for their vacation, they’d say it could be the food, the atmosphere, the monuments, etc. For me, one of those highlights would be the metro system. I know it’s not the first thing people would think about as the best part, but for me I just like it. Even though it’s basically just a train…
My hope is that one day, I’d move to a city with an established metro system, or at least live near a city that has one. Metros are so efficient instead of using cars or buses! For cars especially, think about how much gas we use, even if we commute. With a metro, passes are cheaper, and there are no interruptions to get to the next stop.