New York City inaccuracies

[Darkling]

First let me say I DO like the book. It's a fun read.  But I'm not that far into it and I've already spotted a few things that caught my attention as flaws.

1.      Manhole covers cannot bend.   They handle the weight of several tons a day.  I know Spidy is strong but this is physically impossible and by that I mean breaks the laws of physics.  They'll only bend if heated, otherwise the most you can do (and this is also improbable) is snap and crack. 

2.  Mary Jane wanting a car to get to Atlantic City.   
     Okay.  Most real New Yorkers don't own cars, period.  Not just because they're expensive to maintain but also because of New York City traffic.  Have you ever tried to drive in New York City?  Only tourists are foolish enough to do that.
          The train to Atlantic City from Penn station is NOT unreliable.  And it leaves almost every forty minutes to two hours.  The trains in New York City are more reliable than the trains anywhere else in the state.  Any New Yorker will tell you this.  Getting out of New York City is easy.  It's the trains coming in that tend to get delayed.   The longest delayed train out of New York City I've experienced is forty minutes (that was in an emergency situation).   Usually the Penn station delays are about ten minutes (and for a New Yorker that's a long time).   Now if you're leaving upstate New York to get back down to New York City the delay to get down into the city can be up to five hours.
          I say this as someone who grew up on Long Island just a county out of New York City for the first twenty five years of her life and moved to the rural upper, upper part of upstate New York three years ago and as someone dependant on public transportation.
            Mary Jane broke the illusion of a legitimate New York City resident.  A real New Yorker would know the traffic in the city (if you're going by car) is more of a hindrance and more unreliable to get somewhere on time than any express train out of Penn Station.

             I'm sure I'll find other little flaws but as a New Yorker these grabbed my attention.

[PerCuriam]

These are all excellent and valid points. However, with my apologies to the guys and gals over at Best Brains, "Just repeat to yourself it's just a book, I should really just relax..."   

[Shecky]

1. I've seen bent manhole covers. And not by application of heat - merely poorly-placed covers hit by very heavy weight.

2. As a resident of New Jersey and with a wife who has been commuting to one of three boroughs every weekday for fifteen years from NJ, I'm unfortunately all too familiar with the trains in and out of NYC. I also know a good number of people who commute daily from central (and even southern) New Jersey to NYC for work. Depending on your definition of "unreliable", any of the lines can be called unreliable - most days, they're okay and reasonably on time, but any shared-track train gets less and less sure of being on time the farther it goes from the city. The ACES train, in keeping with this, is okay most of the time but cannot be counted on with any real certainty. And finally, an old friend of my wife's (both of them have lived here all their 40+ years, and her friend has lived in the city his entire adult life) regularly visits family down in AC... and he always rents a car. If there's trouble on a track or in a tunnel, the train is SCREWED. With a car, you at least have multiple options: Holland, Lincoln, GWB, etc. For that friend, it's all about the reliability of having options - if things are going normally, the car option can easily be slower, but if there's a snag, the car HAS options.

[Darkling]

1. I've seen bent manhole covers. And not by application of heat - merely poorly-placed covers hit by very heavy weight.

Maybe so but that takes several, several, tons, like a truck.  Spidy might be strong but he doesn't have the body mass for it.  It's like a pencil. You know you can break it in half but not if you're only using two fingers.   

2. As a resident of New Jersey and with a wife who has been commuting to one of three boroughs every weekday for fifteen years from NJ, I'm unfortunately all too familiar with the trains in and out of NYC. I also know a good number of people who commute daily from central (and even southern) New Jersey to NYC for work. Depending on your definition of "unreliable", any of the lines can be called unreliable - most days, they're okay and reasonably on time, but any shared-track train gets less and less sure of being on time the farther it goes from the city. The ACES train, in keeping with this, is okay most of the time but cannot be counted on with any real certainty. And finally, an old friend of my wife's (both of them have lived here all their 40+ years, and her friend has lived in the city his entire adult life) regularly visits family down in AC... and he always rents a car. If there's trouble on a track or in a tunnel, the train is SCREWED. With a car, you at least have multiple options: Holland, Lincoln, GWB, etc. For that friend, it's all about the reliability of having options - if things are going normally, the car option can easily be slower, but if there's a snag, the car HAS options.

Yes, but you have to agree usually trains out of New York City are (at most) only ten minutes late.  It's the trains going into the city that are unreliable.

[Shecky]

Maybe so but that takes several, several, tons, like a truck.  Spidy might be strong but he doesn't have the body mass for it.  It's like a pencil. You know you can break it in half but not if you're only using two fingers.   

We don't know the numbers, to be honest, but given some of the feats he's pulled off in the comic books, I would be hesitant to state that he couldn't put several tons of force into a small area. Jim's also been a Spideyfan for 30+ years; I'd imagine he has a pretty clear idea what Spidey can and can't do.

Yes, but have to agree usually trains out of New York City are (at most) only te minutes late.  It's the trains going into the city that are unreliable.

Not when they use shared rail lines. My wife and her coworkers have quite a few horror stories. As do I, for that matter. The point is that I can understand both sides - some see it as "mostly reliable" and others see it as "mostly reliable but when it really hits the fan, it REALLY hits the fan." Again, it would be perfectly understandable for an NYC dweller not to want to rely on it when it CAN go badly wrong. If the AC train were entirely on its own line, not shared by Amtrak or any other regional train, it would be different, but it's not.

[jtaylor]

Besides, any inaccuracies in the New York described in the book are explained away by the fact that is isn't New York. It's the Marvel Universe New York. It's an alternate timeline, and not every thing is going to line up.

As for physics of bending a manhole cover, Spidey could do it. His hand and arm strength are capable of lifting and throwing several ton armored cars and helicopters. By using both arms, he creates a natural lever to apply that tremendous force to a very small area. The steel would bend before snapping if the force was applied relatively slowly. And you can crush the wood and lead in a pencil causing it to break with two fingers, you just have to apply more force than a normal person can with their hand. For an example, use a pair of vice grips to crush a number two. Only two points of contact with a contact width roughly equal to a finger and thumb, but the pencil will break if you squeeze it enough.

[Patrick]

I drove to NYC last year to drop a friend off and really didn't have much trouble with the traffic.  People were pretty good about letting others merge, and even in Manhattan getting around wasn't really that difficult.  Honestly I have had far worse experiences driving in Pittsburgh's rush hour traffic than New Yorks.  In Pittsburgh if you kill a merge into a crowded lane because you simply have to chances are you will get someone giving you the finger and another person honking at you.  As long as you drive calmly and courteously in NY then everything seems to work out fine for the most part. 

[Shecky]

I drove to NYC last year to drop a friend off and really didn't have much trouble with the traffic.  People were pretty good about letting others merge, and even in Manhattan getting around wasn't really that difficult.  Honestly I have had far worse experiences driving in Pittsburgh's rush hour traffic than New Yorks.  In Pittsburgh if you kill a merge into a crowded lane because you simply have to chances are you will get someone giving you the finger and another person honking at you.  As long as you drive calmly and courteously in NY then everything seems to work out fine for the most part. 

That was one time, of course, but you're right that it's not THAT unreliable; although I can see Darkling's point (how many times have pedestrian commuters seen massive traffic tie-ups in the streets?), but most of the time, it's fairly reasonable, considering the sheer amount of traffic. Same thing goes for the train - most of the time, it's okay, but when it goes bad, it goes BAD.

[Sebastian]

We don't know the numbers, to be honest, but given some of the feats he's pulled off in the comic books, I would be hesitant to state that he couldn't put several tons of force into a small area. Jim's also been a Spideyfan for 30+ years; I'd imagine he has a pretty clear idea what Spidey can and can't do.


...

According to a (translated) excerpt from official marvel lists of charachter history and abilities from... early 80's or so, spidey can bench-press 10 metric tons. (22,000 lbs)
Of course I seriously doubt that's applied consistently for all writers.

[Ms Duck]

web head provably hits with the force equivalent of an anti tank shell, has been stated so several times.

as to the train... marvel's new your allso contains:

empire state university
baxter building
latverian embassy (and yes, it's a small castle)
a sunken three mile long tower that used to be x factor's space ship HQ
a giant glowing hole where shield hq was...

somehow, i doubt the rest of the geography matches ours closely