Prague’s Metro Is Getting Into The Matchmaking Business

What’s the Latest Development?

Transportation officials in Prague want to do their part to help lonely people find their soul mates. Their idea: For a fixed amount of time each week, they will set aside a metro car especially for singles to meet and mingle. Spokesman Filip Drápal says that in today’s busy world, people “have no place to meet…Here they have the opportunity.” Apparently they can’t restrict the car just to singles — alloting for crowds during rush hour, for example — but an online poll in the Czech weekly Týden showed that just over half are in favor of the idea.

What’s the Big Idea?

Writer Feargus O’Sullivan notes that the relationship between the individual and their method of public transportation can be quite intense: “Nowhere else beyond a city’s transit system do we come into close proximity with such a volume of strangers. Nowhere is there a stronger taboo against actually talking to them.” However, the romantic potential associated with big-city living, along with the possibility of “what if?” has helped spawn “missed connections” sections in newspapers and on Craigslist. A Web site in Paris even identifies which metro stops contain the most singles. Ultimately, says O’Sullivan, these attempts may prove that “just because you live among millions of other potentially eligible partners, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be any easier to meet.”

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