The MTA’s round-the-clock subway service, an emblem of New York City life for more than a century, was brought to a halt early Wednesday morning as the agency embarked on an unprecedented plan to close all of its stations between the hours of 1 a.m. and 5 a.m.
Governor Andrew Cuomo ordered the indefinite overnight closures last week, arguing it was necessary to more thoroughly clean the system for the safety of both riders and workers. Ridership has fallen by more than 90 percent since the pandemic began, and 109 MTA employees have now died from COVID-19, officials said.
But the true motivation for the nightly shutdown, according to advocates and some transit workers, is ridding the subway of its growing homeless population — a situation Cuomo has repeatedly vowed to crack down on, and which he described last week as “disgusting.”
Around midnight on Wednesday, more than 1,000 NYPD officers descended underground to evict those seeking refuge inside the transit system. At terminal stations, dozens of cops lined the platforms, vastly outnumbering outreach workers with city-contracted homeless service groups.
When trains arrived, the NYPD entered first, rapping their metal flashlights on subway poles to awaken sleeping riders. Some were directed to outreach teams that offered them transfer to a shelter or safe haven, though others were not.
NYPD Officers at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue station order homeless people out of the trains
Many of the homeless people were confused by the new policy of shutting down the system. An 83-year-old man at Penn Station, who gave his name only as Nick, said he had planned to sleep at a quiet station off the Q train in Brooklyn. He learned that was not an option just minutes before the final train arrived, and was unsure where he'd go. “I’m embarrassed to have got myself into this situation,” he said.
Like many other unhoused individuals, Nick was reluctant to enter a congregate shelter, which he described as “full of the virus.”
According Steven Banks, Commissioner of the New York City Human Resources Administration/Department of Social Services (HRA), the city engaged 252 homeless individuals on Wednesday, 139 of whom were moved shelters or safe havens.
Mayor Bill de Blasio called the outreach effort a success. "That's an amazing reality," the mayor said at a press conference on Wednesday. "We have never seen so much success in a single night before. We've never seen this high a percentage of people living on the streets agree to something different."
There were roughly 2,200 homeless people living inside the shelter system during last year's count. Advocates have called on de Blasio to provide empty hotel rooms, which are currently available only to at-risk shelter residents, not to the street homeless population. They note that safe havens have been deemed dangerous by health professions because residents share bathrooms and other common areas.
As MTA Chairman Pat Foye inspected the platform at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue terminal, some would-be subway riders also grew frustrated by the lack of clarity. “Everybody is telling me a different story,” fumed one rider, who said he was initially instructed to take a shuttle bus back to Manhattan, only to learn that his trip would involve three buses. “They have no clue what they’re doing. This is a mess.”
The MTA plans to run 75 percent more buses during the four-hour shutdown window. Essential workers who fill out a form will be eligible for a single-trip taxi ride, according to the agency. Interim NYC Transit President Sarah Feinberg has admitted the plan is a work in progress, predicting the agency will “get better as we go.”
Desmond, a healthcare worker based in Flatbush, opted to take a 5 a.m. subway train on Wednesday from Atlantic Avenue–Barclays Center to the Upper East Side, where he has to be at work by 6 a.m. He said he’d planned ahead for a “difficult day of travel,” but had still lost sleep over the schedule change. “Let’s just have hope and faith,” he said, glancing at a countdown clock indicating the next train would arrive in 20 minutes.
It's unclear how much the MTA will spend on this effort. Foye said the extra cleaning would cost several hundred thousand dollars this year, a rough estimate he hopes will be covered by another round of federal stimulus funding and grants from FEMA. The NYPD has not disclosed the cost of the additional enforcement effort required to clear the subway stations.
Cuomo has declined to say when overnight service will return, suggesting it will last for the duration of the pandemic, without specifying how that metric would be judged. Transit officials have stressed that shuttering stations will allow for more efficient disinfecting, making use of high-tech cleaning methods like ultraviolet light and electrostatic sprayers.
Inside the World Trade Center and Coney Island terminal stations, the cleaning process did not appear to have dramatically changed. Workers in surgical masks briefly wiped down empty trains cars with spray bottles and paper towels. One member of the MTA’s Mobile Wash Unit took it upon herself to improve the regimen — adding Fabuloso to the mix for a less pungent smell.
The MTA later sent out footage showing some workers in hazmat suits cleaning buses, and using more advanced disinfecting tools on the 96th Street Q station.
Tramell Thompson, a subway conductor and union activist who recently contracted COVID-19, described the MTA’s promises of significantly enhanced cleaning as a “false reality.” Other transit experts have argued that the agency could easily experiment with new disinfecting technologies without closing the entire system at night.
Despite the historic and indefinite adjustment, New Yorkers may be heartened to know that the subways will not actually stop running. Because transit workers still need to access the system at all hours — and since there’s not enough space in the rail yard to hold all of the cars, anyway — the trains will continue on their late night schedules, rumbling through the city while they sit all but empty, waiting to be cleaned.
Explained one overnight supervisor at the World Trade Center, who said he was not permitted to speak with the press: “Even if you wanted to, you can’t stop the heartbeat.”
Additional reporting by Scott Heins and Amy Pearl.
