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Brendan McDermid / Reuters
A photo of a rat is displayed on the "Rate my Rat" section of the website www.ratfreesubways.com.
Reuters reports from NEW YORK:
Subway workers angered over what they say is a rat infestation in their workplace are holding a photo contest for the "nastiest" shot of a rodent, with a grand prize of a monthly transit pass.
Commuters who see rats on subway platforms and tracks are urged to upload photos to www.ratfreesubways.com, created by the Transport Workers Union Local 100, New York City's largest transit union.
The union is calling for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) to clean stations more regularly, place more trash cans on subway platforms, and repair holes in walls and floors. Read the full story.
www.ratfreesubways.com
Left: Rat in a trash can. 138th St 3rd Av IRT 6.
Center: Atlantic Terminal. Manhattan-bound N/D platform.
Right: 7th Avenue.
Some of the tamer pictures uploaded to the rats' rogue gallery are reproduced above. If you'd like to see some much nastier images -- and help to rate the rodents on a sliding scale from "Handsome" through to "Beastly" -- here's the link.
Leave a Comment:
Hey, rats gotta eat too!
"Rate your rat" - I thought this was a political peice.......darn. :-)
The workers are just ratting-out their employers, which is fair enough. But seriously, New York needs more predatory birds to snack on these rodents. Bring back the falcons and owls.
They could have garbage cans every 2 feet and people would still throw their trash on the ground.
Can it get any worse?
I know, they act like the rats are going to stop eating.
Better a rat on the subway then then a rat at restaurant or a rat in my kitchen.
@Eric: Let's not insult rats by comparing them to politicians. I've had pet rats, and they are quite affectionate and intelligent creatures; qualities sorely lacking among those that run for office.
Where's the Rate my Roach contest?
That contest is on the "Legalize Marijuana" stories!
Screw "Rate Your Rat"! I'm going to look for "Rate Your Beaver"!
I'm cracking up. Good to know some people still have a sense of humor!
Oh, sheesh, these are pets compared to the cat-sized one I saw in Seattle, behind Pike's Market. It was nosing around in the garbage near some old homeless guy who was lying on the ground, sleeping. I screamed and woke the guy up, but the rat just kept nosing around.
Couldn't we just ship in some "fixed" homeless cats to eat the rats?
How did the cats get "broken" and "homeless? Subprime mortgages?
Unfortunately, not all cats are good "ratters"......
Yeah! Some of them are just "pussy's"!
Cats could not handle those rats. They are too big and feral. It would take terriers to handle them, or at least an infestation of snakes.
just shows NY is a nasty nasty place.
It seems to me that this problem might be diffused it human beings didn't throw their crap to the ground. UGH! I don't know which is nastier---rats or human litter on our planet.
That would require more toilets not trash cans!
New York already has to export a huge portion of its human feces disguised as fertilizer to unsuspecting citizens of other states. But let's go ahead and open up immigration, shall we? As long as we can flush it down where we don't have to look at it, we don't have to think about it, right?
Guess what, the rats were there long before the city, and I don't want to think of how many more are shipped in each and every day in cargo containers. Rats simply are.
We've run them out of room, and this is what happens.
If they're really that big of a deal, then give the homeless a buck for each one they kill. By the end of the week, they'll likely be extinct.
Cats will only eat rodents if their mothers teach them how,just like lionesses teach their cubs to hunt.
But these are big ass rats! Maybe some coyotes could handle them,but then you would have dumbasses feeding them and they would say to hell with rats,gimme another Big Mac!
Poison would be an option but once people see them thrashing around with blood coming out of every orifice(warfirin poisoning) that would end.
Actually a bounty might be a good idea,then you'd see homeless pushing shopping carts full of dead rats instead of bottles and cans,part of the charm of New York you know.
I saw rats that were bigger then cats in NYC. I was working on a construction job in lower Manhattan and the building had a old reefer unit, the rats ate their way through a door eight inches thick to get to the rotten fish left inside the reefer unit.