NYC transit crime spiked nearly 20% as subway ejections paused due to extreme cold: NYPD
Transit crime spiked nearly 20% in February as cold weather policies prevented NYPD officers from booting rule-breaking passengers from the subways, the police department said Monday.
There were more than 190 offenses reported underground last month, an 18.5% jump from February 2025, according to data released by the NYPD.
“The increase coincided with record cold temperatures and snow in February, when ridership patterns shifted and the department paused ejections from the transit system for violations of the rules during the extreme weather,” the NYPD said in a statement.
NYPD works the scene after a man was killed after being shot on the subway platform at the 170th Street station at Grand Concourse in the Bronx. Kyle Mazza/Shutterstock
The pause on ejecting passengers who break transit system rules was instituted due to the below-freezing temps that gripped Gotham for most of the month, according to a City Hall spokesman, who said it was in effect Feb. 5-10.
“That’s something unique to how unbelievably bitter cold January and February were, with tons of snow,” an official in Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s administration said.
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Cops patrolling the subway system booted 61% fewer misbehaving straphangers in February compared to January, according to the NYPD.
The MTA’s rules of conduct include not sleeping on the trains if that might affect other passengers, using headphones when listening to music and, broadly, not behaving in a way that might trouble fellow straphangers.
A recently retired, longtime supervisor in the NYPD’s Transit Bureau said it was the first time he could recall a citywide policy that halted evictions from the system.
It came as Mamdani faced backlash over the outdoor deaths of at least 19 New Yorkers during January’s Winter Storm Fern and its unbearably cold aftermath.
“Allowing New Yorkers to remain warm in any way possible during extreme cold was a necessary, temporary measure grounded in common sense, compassion, and public safety,” said City Hall rep Sam Raskin in a statement Monday.
Despite the shocking transit crime data, the NYPD hailed continued record-low numbers of shootings, gunshot victims and murders in the first two months of the year.
“Once again, the NYPD is demonstrating how targeted, data driven policing is reducing crime and keeping communities safe,” said NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch in a statement.
Of the 192 crimes reported in the subways last month, about 27% were felony assaults. More than half, 52%, were about non-violent grand larcenies, according to NYPD data.
The more serious crimes included a 41-year-old man shot dead on the platform of a Bronx subway station during an argument on Feb. 9, cops said.
A few days later, on Feb. 12, a Yeshiva student, 20, was assaulted at the West 181st Street and St. Nicholas Avenue 1 train stop, according to police.
The string of subway mayhem stretched into March, as a 47-year-old woman was knifed in the back and a man, 55, was cut on his finger during a dispute with a stranger on an A train in Queens Monday afternoon, police and sources said.
Police at the 181st Street Station. Christopher Sadowski
Felony assaults against NYPD officers in transit also jumped about 42% — from 12 to 17 attacks – last month compared to February 2025, the department said.
Overall, there were 97 victims across 83 shootings and 32 murders in January and February across the city — helping to fuel an 8% drop in major crimes last month compared to the same time span in 2025, according to NYPD data.
Burglaries also dropped almost 20% in February – for the lowest level in recorded history year-to-date, while retail theft plummeted about 25%, according to police stats.
Public housing complexes also saw the fewest shootings, gunshot victims, murders and robberies for the first two months of any year in recorded history, according to the NYPD.
“The men and women of the NYPD brought major crime down in every borough and there were 1,100 fewer reported crimes than last year,” Tisch said.
“From our public housing – which had historic lows in crime – to our streets and subways, we will always stay focused on keeping New Yorkers safe, and I thank every member of the NYPD for their continued work in getting us here.”
Old Man Winter blasted the city with low temperatures below-freezing 19 days in February, according to AccuWeather numbers.
The month was capped off with a major blizzard that buried most of the five boroughs with close to two feet of snow.
— Additional reporting by Larry Celona
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