Subway books give Mexico a novel way to fight crime

By Morgan Lee
The Associated Press

	EDUARDO VERDUGO / AP Passengers read while riding the subway in Mexico City yesterday, the first day free books were made available in an effort to encourage more reading by citizens.
	E-mail this article Print this article Search archive

The city started handing out 250,000 specially published books during the morning rush hour so commuters could relax and read a little on a ride that can require some jockeying for space and a sharp eye for pickpockets.

The first edition for the Metro contained accounts of Mexico City life in prose, poetry and works of theater, with passages short enough to read during a subway ride.

The opening piece by Carlos Monsiváis, one of Mexico's most prominent writers, recounts the aftermath of a devastating earthquake in 1985, when people rallied to organize rescue crews and help victims.

Monsiváis, a regular Metro rider who accepted a "symbolic" payment of $300 for use of his work, said he had faith the books will be put to good use.

"Those that don't (return them) will lend them to other people," he said.

The first sprinkling of paperbacks is part of a plan to distribute 7 million books in the next two years, while trusting subway riders to return them.

"When we take them out, they just fly" out of our hands, said Alejandro Camarena, one of several volunteer book distributors fighting to keep up with demand.

Camarena's post handed out 150 books in just a few minutes early yesterday morning. Before rush hour was over, 45 books had been returned. Marta Gaona got as far as page 16 on her commute to work, then asked if she could keep her book to read on her lunch hour. She planned to return it on her way home.

"I don't know if everyone will return them," she said. "I think some will."

The idea emerged from discussions with Leoluca Orlando, former mayor of Palermo, Italy, and former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani's consulting firm on ways to cut crime in Mexico's capital, a city of about 8.5 million people.

"We are convinced that when people read, people change," said Javier Gonzalez Garza, the Metro director.

Mexico City isn't the first major city to try cultivating a literary underground.

Tokyo has dozens of tiny paperback borrowing libraries at subway stations, usually located outside of turnstiles. Japanese commuters say the libraries foster a sense of community.

Mexico City's subway has adopted other measures to improve the commute, including installing art exhibits in stations and requiring men and women to ride separate cars during rush hour to prevent sexual harassment.

Robbers and pickpockets remain common on the vast Metro system, which carries 4.7 million people a day across the capital for less than 20 cents a ride.

Authorities are considering other anti-crime measures, but Gonzalez said the Metro decided to address the issue from "the cultural side."

The administration of Mayor Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a potential presidential candidate in 2006, also may have voters in mind as it lends books to the city's poorer residents, who are more likely to use the Metro than wealthier Mexicans.

The subway program comes amid a national push to increase literacy. President Vicente Fox is planning an expansion of the national library system and increased spending on textbooks.

Mexico officially has a literacy rate above 90 percent, but many people do not read on a daily basis, in part because many are too poor to buy books.

Organizers of the book project say they hope to create 500,000 new readers. A private company that has the subway's advertising concession will pay for most of the books.

Some have doubts about the program's value as an anti-crime tool.

"Now we'll have an equal number of delinquents, but well-educated," said Omar Raul Martinez, the director of a book and magazine publishing firm.

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company