Philadelphia – PATCO (Follow Me)

PATCO Speedline is the rail line which connects Philadelphia with New Jersey, more of which I’ll get round to writing about at some random point in the future. I’ve had problems with uploading photos due to sluggish wi-fi, so I’m already getting hopelessly behind writing about what I wanted to.

Anyway, today I used the Speedline (what a wonderful name for a rail service) for the final time on this trip to get back into the centre of Philadelphia, as I’d been staying in New Jersey for reasons of accommodation affordability. I used my paper ticket to get through the barriers, as with other trips, and the bloody thing didn’t work. My faffing about and trying it in different machines meant that time had passed and every other passenger had gone through and I was stuck the wrong side of the barrier with no staff members visible.

Just as I thought I might have to live at the station for ever (OK, so an exaggeration, but until the next train at least) a man came slowly up the stairs. He saw me looking irritated at the machine and he called over “you’re not from Philadelphia are you?”. He explained that he had seen me not follow another passenger through when they went through the barriers.

He said:

“There’s a saying here, you follow me, I follow you.”

I assumed that he meant he’d follow me if he ever got trapped in the same way, rather than he was threatening to follow me once he’d got me out. So we both went through on his ticket and he welcomed me to Philadelphia (a lot of people have done that). And he didn’t follow me. Marvellous.