By Joe Kellard
Standing on the Oceanside platform after 9 a.m. the day after the London bombing, commuter Robin Hederman said, "Actually, I'm going in a little later than I normally would."
"I'm deliberately going in later today," said Elizabeth Beaman, who took the westbound train after Hederman in Oceanside. "Last night I stayed at work until 8:30. I'm avoiding the rush hours."
Beaman was working in the city near the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. Asked how she felt traveling last Friday, as compared with the day after the terrorist attacks almost four years ago, she said, "Over the past three years I've learned to push that anxiety down."
Meanwhile, the day after the bombings, other commuters indicated that they felt more at ease because of the heightened security in the wake of the bombings.
Mike Gutman, a commuter who got off at the Island Park train station at 6:15 p.m. the day of the bombings added, "I was a little more concerned today than the last four years, but it's not really a concern. You just have to keep on going. I feel more for the Londonites today than anything else."
Another commuter from Island Park, Stephanie Schwartz, who works with the New York City police, said after she stepped off the train on the day of the bombings, "When I first heard the news I didn't even think about a threat being in New York. When I actually got to work, some people asked how was your commute. I noticed tons of police officers at Jamaica Station where I get off, and I actually felt safer with them there."
"It doesn't really affect me," Schwartz continued. "Now that we're aware of it, I feel much safer. Maybe that's naive, but I do feel safer. Unfortunately, it's going to happen and you can't stop your life. It's going to happen when it happens. Hopefully, it will never happen again.
"I work with the police, and I know that they're all on call and they're putting on emergency measures in New York."
Police and emergency-response officials in both Nassau County and New York City are stepping up efforts to ensure that local commuters arrive at work safely and make it home safely in the coming weeks.
Following the four terrorist bombings on London subway trains and a bus that killed more than 50 and injured 700, Nassau County police are intensifying patrols at all Long Island Rail Road stations, where uniformed officers will "park, walk and talk."
"This means that the officer will park his or her car, walk through train platforms, ticket offices, waiting rooms and inspect for suspicious persons, packages and vehicles," said Tim Driscoll, deputy county executive of public safety.
As Nassau County residents make their way to work in New York City, they can rest assured that similar safety measures are being taken there, said Jarrod Bernstein, a spokesman for the New York City Office of Emergency Management.
More officers have been assigned to subway and bridge duty, Bernstein said. What's more, city agencies are prepared to handle bombings similar to the ones that rocked London last Thursday, he said. "We did a multi-agency drill in 2004 that consisted of a terrorist attack in the subway," Bernstein said. It was organized after the bombing of the train in Madrid that took hundreds of lives.
In addition, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has brought in additional police officers to step up security in the entire New York City system, according to MTA spokesperson Mercedes Padilla.
Nick Buglione, Esther McKenna and Chris Munzing contributed to this story. Comments about it? DMiller@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 213.
