NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — Gov. Andrew Cuomo has announced that 24/7 subway service will return to New York City later this month as the Tri-State area gets ready to lift most capacity restrictions.
Around-the-clock subway service, which was ground to a halt last spring amid the pandemic, will resume on May 17.
The restoration of service comes as New York, New Jersey and Connecticut agreed to end most capacity restrictions on May 19, including retail stores, food services, gyms, hair salons, offices, museums, amusement and family entertainment.
"If you reopen economic and social activity, you also have to have transportation available. So we're going to coordinate the MTA's resumption of 24-hour service with the reopening and immediately with a curfew lift," Cuomo said. "Workers are going to need to get back and forth."
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On May 6, 2020, the MTA shutdown subways from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. nightly for COVID-related deep-cleaning and disinfecting at all 472 stations and on thousands of trains.
Back in February, the MTA calibrated the shutdown, closing the subways for just two hours between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. as the state made progress in its reopening amid improving coronavirus numbers.
Cuomo said when 24/7 service returns, the MTA must continue to keep the trains clean and help the homeless.
"Subway trains have never been cleaner than they are now," Cuomo said. "I can't tell you how many New Yorkers say to me there are fewer homeless who are now on the trains because when they closed in the evening for a couple of hours at night they did the cleaning an they referred the homeless to supportive services and that is an indisputable fact that the MTA provided better service. Nobody wants the MTA to now go back to the old days."
Interim New York City Transit President Sarah Feinberg told WCBS 880 that the agency will "prep, practice and drill" for the resumption of full-time subway service.
"I think our main challenge will be making sure that we can continue to clean 24/7 even with riders in the system 24-hours a day as well. We've gotten really efficient, really effective at cleaning and just need to be able to make sure we can still do that even with folks in the system at all times," Feinberg said. "It's going to be a challenge, but I think we're going to be able to deal with it effectively."
Many officials had advocated for a safe and cautious return of full subway service, including Mayor Bill de Blasio who in February said that he would be a voice for 24/7 subway service "when we are certain that we've reached the right point both on a health level and in terms of our recovery."
The transit advocacy group, Riders Alliance, which petitioned for Cuomo to restore 24/7 subway service back in November applauded the news.
"Riders organized and won back 24/7 subway service. After more than a year of punishing overnight commutes that impacted tens of thousands of essential workers, New Yorkers will see a long overdue return to a crucial part of normalcy," Riders Alliance Executive Director Betsy Plum said. "New York is a 24/7 city because of our subway. The restoration of 24/7 service is a victory not only for the city's reopening but for New Yorkers' determination to hold our public officials accountable."