Subway Ride Musings, Expressly for the Web

When the A train pulls out of the 59th Street station for its uninterrupted run to 125th Street along Manhattan's West Side, Cully Long takes out a moleskin sketchbook and a ballpoint pen and scans the subway car for intriguing faces. His subjects are captive for one of the longest stretches in the city's subway system, and he takes his time.

Mr. Long, who posts the portraits he draws on the subway on his Web log, Childofatom.blogspot.com, is part of an expanding group of New Yorkers broadcasting their underground observations on the Web. Essays about commuting, speculations about other straphangers' lives, as well as photographs and sketches of New Yorkers in transit are increasingly ending up as well-trafficked blog posts.

In a bustling city where the fast pace of life often affords little leisure time, the daily commute doubles as many people's only opportunity for drawing, writing, or simply staring at and wondering about their fellow New Yorkers.

"I'm attracted to older people because they have interesting faces," Mr. Cully, who works as a theater set and costume designer, said. "But in the winter, I drew nothing but people with scarves pulled up around their faces so you could only see their eyes." Mr. Cully, who next week is releasing a self-published book of subway sketches titled "A Line," says his unsuspecting subjects rarely notice his gaze. "People just close down on the subway," Mr. Cully said. "They're reading or listening to their iPods, and just don't pay attention to me."

Frustrations about long subway waits, crowded quarters, and weekend train line diversions also fuel much of the blogosphere's chatter about the subway system. The editor of Subwayblogger.com writes on his BlackBerry during his morning and evening commutes, and then posts his musings from work or home.

Jim, who works for a television station and did not want his last name published, updated Subwayblogger.com yesterday afternoon with a post about eating in transit: "A cup of coffee or a soda is one thing. However, breaking out an entire meal of KFC is a little strange."

"It's not hard-hitting journalism, it's the everyday things that people see," Jim said. "It can be interesting and comical and dramatic all at the same time. It's sharing experiences." The blog has gained a small but faithful following among transit aficionados. It receives about 10,000 hits a month, according to its editor.

Web sites such as the photograph sharing site Flickr.com now host groups for people to share sketches and photographs of subway life.

Local blogs, such as secondavenuesagas.com, have launched in the past few months to track and comment on the progress of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's large-scale expansion plans, including the Second Avenue subway line and the extension of the no. 7 line.

"People are fascinated with the subway because it's the great equalizer," the editor of Web site thesubwaychronicles.com, Jacquelin Cangro, said. "When the train doors close, nobody is getting there any faster than anyone else. On the train, you're in it together."