The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
NY subway expansion improves access in Manhattan
Upper East Side linked to Brooklyn, Coney Island.
NEW YORK — Eleven-yearold Bobby Graves may have only caught the tail end of a century’s worth of deferred promises on New York’s Second Avenue subway. But he’s already seen enough to treat the project with extreme skepticism.
“I thought it was some sort of joke when I heard it was going to open Sunday,” he said, as he waited with his parents outside the entrance of the 96th Street station.
But it was no joke. Graves and hundreds of other New Yorkers took the inaugural ride on the Second Avenue subway, a trip that whisked them through three brandnew stations that cost $4.5 billion and serve as the transit system’s first major expansion project in half of a century.
The new stations are located at 72nd, 86th and 96th streets, and provide an extension of the Q line that will now connect the Upper East Side in Manhattan directly with Brooklyn and Coney Island. There are three more phases planned for the project.
But in addition to the improved transit connections — now, Upper East Side residents can reach Times Square without swapping trains — the debut of the new stations has been hailed for the unconventional design of the stations. They’re spacious, airy, with high ceilings, an expansive mezzanine level, and ambitious public art installations.
“I hope when you go down there, you’re really going to feel it’s worth it,” said New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo outside the 96th Street station on Sunday, thanking the local residents and business owners who endured years of construction work. “This is a subway system like you’ve never seen before. It’s not your grandfather’s subway.”
In the crowd were upperEast-Siders Kaz Tanakh and Mark Conrad, self-described transit die-hards who wore New Year’s Eve party hats directed with yellow “Q” stickers to celebrate the opening of the stations. They took selfies outside of the station’s sleek glass entrance.
At 72nd Street, many of those riders disembarked to soak in the design station, where there were already crowds of people seeking an opportunity to get one of the first looks of what was inside. One of those people was 33-year-old Lindsay McLoughlin, who lives a short distance away on the Upper East Side.
“It’s like Disneyland for the commuter!” she gushed to her mother as she stepped off the escalator and onto the platform, grinning and turning in a slow circle.
Thomas F. Prendergast, president of New York City Transit, acknowledged that the wow factor of the new stations’ visual design won’t mean much if it’s not coupled with punctuality and reliability.
“We’ve gotta follow through with good, on-time service,” Prendergast said. “And we will.”
Up on the mezzanine level of the 72nd Street station, crowds gathered along the walls to get a closer at the artwork — a series of dozens of mosaics by the artist Vik Muniz, each of them a portrait of an average New York subway rider. There were kids in soccer gear and a woman in a sari staring at her cellphone. A man holding a bouquet of balloons, and a woman carrying a toddler in one arm and a stroller in the other. A white-collar worker depicted in a clutzy moment of tripping, his briefcase tumbling out of his hands as stacks of papers burst out. Two men, in flannel and jeans and overalls, holding hands. A police officer holding a Popsicle.
Riders snapped shots of the mosaics. Some posed next to the artwork. But many just wanted to take a close look, their faces inches away from the wall, their fingers brushing against the tiny glittering tiles.
“What I love was seeing how people responded to it. It’s really quite wonderful,” said Jock McLellan, 76, from Connecticut.
“The art is spectacular — the inclusion, the young and old, black and white, immigrants, readers, travelers,” said Deborah Daughtry, of Ridgewood, New Jersey. “It gave me goose bumps.”
Daughtry came with her partner David Burnett. Neither of them commute frequently to the Upper East Side, but they treated the excursion like a visit to a museum.
“He dragged me out of bed this morning to see it,” Daughtry said.
Burnett, too, was amazed by his surroundings — but for slightly different reasons.
“I don’t know why it needs to be this big,” he said, chuckling.