The MTA and the city are trying to build a better mousetrap.
In their unrelenting war on the battalions of rats in the subway, they’re installing a roach motel-like trap at the Franklin Street station on the No. 1 line.
Once the rodents get in, they’re not supposed to get out and will have nothing to eat but the poison baits inside.
If it the new trap outsmarts the lower Manhattan rats, thousands of the units will be installed at other stations around the city.
Workers will do a rat census at Franklin Street before and after the traps are installed. to give them some idea of their effectiveness.
Rats “clearly are a major problem for us,” said New York City Transit spokesman Howard Roberts.
Roberts said workers have been spreading poison baits in the track areas for 20 years yet the rat population hasn’t decreased.
“It’s a constant source of annoyance to passengers,” he said. “It’s one more thing that if we can improve, obviously our passengers would be a lot more comfortable.”
In another rat-fighting move, transit workers will seal every crack in the rooms used to store garbage, until it is carted away.
Officials said they didn’t know exactly how many rats called the subway home.