I remember in high school there was a guy on the F train who was particularly creepy, he would wear a suit and read the newspaper and looked like any other commuter, but underneath the newspaper he'd be playing with himself. EEEWWWWWWW!!!

I haven't travelled enough on the T to make a comment.

But in Chicago on the EL were I have lived for nearly 4 years I have a lot of stories. There was this one where during rush hour this guy right in front of me who was apparently rubbing himself up and down a woman, got surrounded by a bunch of other women and I honestly think he was lucky to get of train intact.

I've had a few 'fun' experiences. The latest one was not long ago when I was head down in an academic piece and this guy sat down beside me - forward facing two-seat). Unbeknownst to me there were a lot of completely free seats, but once I get focused on an article ... well, anyway ... slowly and slowly his right leg kept pushing up against me. I just figured it was the normal thing of guys sitting with their legs wide apart (honestly boys, it's not THAT big!) and so shifted closer to the window.

But he continue with it, till I was tight up against the window. So I asked him firmly but 'fuck-with-me-&-die' if he wouldn't mind giving me a bit of room. He shifted back. I got some room.

However, not long after that, he started doing it again. Pissed off I looked up and went "LOOK ..." only to see that he was pushing into his crotch a rolled up newspaper, rocking it back and forth along the inside of his thigh.

I think my facial expression mst have spelled body-part-removal as he got off that train carriage like someone had lit his arse on fire. It was then that I noticed all the other empty seats. I'm far more aware now of my surroundings or will sit on the outside seat if there are other seats free.

I agree, I don't think segregated cars are the answer (why should we have to change our behaviour for the fuck-ups of guys?) but at the moment, can't really think of a better solution.

Wow, I don't have a story that "good." A couple of months ago a guy sat next to me and put his arm around me, and his head on my shoulder.

Not thinking that anyone would be so stupid, I asked if I knew him. He said no, but he thought it would be a good way for us to get acquainted.

Then he acted all surprised when I pushed him off and told him off. He asked why I had to "be so mean."

In my pre-car days, I was always getting hit on while riding the bus or waiting at bus stops. The only actual physical contact was one guy who kept trying to run his hand up my outer thigh. These guys probably didn't know that I was 14-16 years old (I was 5' 7" and in college), but they might not have cared even if they did know.

I do have a story that kind of gives you hope-- at least in that weird "one day at a time" kind of way.

A couple of months ago I was standing at the wall street stop when a guy, nicely dressed in typical wall street banker fashion, was walking by and grabbed the ass of a woman about to get on the train. I thought that he must have known her or something, and was waiting for her to turn around and when she did, she looked horrified and then the train door closed and the guy went up the stairs and (I thought) out of the station. I looked at the (older) woman standing next to me and we started talking about how we couldn't believe that when the guy actually came back and started patrolling for more women. Seriously. The other woman and I started to watch him to this, and then decided to talk to the police officer stationed on the platform, even though we were both unsure of how he would react.

The police officer was really receptive (or some would say just doing his damn job, but hey!) and he had another officer go pick up the guy-- who he had caught on tape-- and also said that they would do a background check on him, etc, to see if there had been any recent complaints at that station. The officer also told me that the guy told them that they "didn't know who they were messing with" and that he used to work for the D.A. Whatever, man.

Don't know what ended up happening with that guy, but to make a long story short (it's so long already!), the cops at Wall Street are down to help out. Also, there's a cool org in NYC called the STreet harassment project that deals w/ shit like this: http://www.streetharassmentproject.org/
Maybe you folks know of some similar projects in other areas as well?

a few years ago a friend and I left a Los Angeles club around 1am and started walking to our car, which was parked in a residential area a few blocks away. We noticed man cut across a parking lot to follow us, and we noticed him gaining on us even though we started walking faster. Then he started talking to us, saying creepy things - I can't remember exactly what he said, but he was scaring us. then he said "hey, look what I have" in this really threatening way, and we looked at each other and my friend said "run" and we ran as hard as we could to her car, got in, and got out of there as fast as we could. she was shaking so hard that she had to pull over, and we talked about what we had thought was happening. we both thought that he had had a gun in his hand and that's what he wanted us to see, but she had turned around to look while running because, she said, she didn't want to just suddenly get shot without knowing what was going to happen.but it turned out that he had his dick out of his pants and in his hand.