Trying to rescue a teenager from a subway track as a train roared in, Wesley Autrey faced a harrowing choice: try to pull the young man to the platform, or push him down and hope to find a safe harbour between the rails. ”I had to make a split decision whether or not to struggle and maybe end up getting us both killed,” Autrey said.

The city’s subways rumbled to life just after midnight on Friday, ending a crippling, three-day strike that brought the nation’s largest public transportation system to a standstill. Faced with mounting fines and the rising wrath of millions of commuters, the city transit union on Thursday sent its members back to work.