Lone UWS Train Station Has Chance Of Added Platform Door: MTA

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — Got time to read 4,000 pages about train platforms?

With mounting public concern and interest over better safety precautions on New York City subway platforms, the Metropolitan Transit Authority publicly released a huge study Wednesday night from 2019 where it explored the feasibility of platform door barriers in the city's 472 stations.

The study found that only 128 of those stations had the correct conditions to allow for the installation of the floor-to-ceiling gates.

"There are serious challenges to installing — we have three different cars with doors in different places. ADA access for wheelchairs is an issue," Janno Liber, the head of the MTA, said Thursday in an interview on "The Brian Lehrer Show."

He added, though, that the agency has identified 40 to 100 stations where platforms barriers are possible, and he would like to see a pilot program set into place at those stops.

What about the Upper West Side?

For the 14 train stations on the Upper West Side, the MTA concluded that just one of them was feasible for the installation of the platform barrier doors.

The one local stop where the platform barrier could be built is the 96th Street B and C train station.

The most common reason the MTA gave for why the installations wouldn't work in the UWS stations was the narrowness of the platforms not allowing for compliant wheelchair accessibility if the barriers were added and not enough room to make emergency exits from a train.

While the MTA decided that the majority of NYC stations weren't viable candidates for the platform barriers, it is still noteworthy that just one station on the UWS is part of the 128 stops identified throughout the city.

Following the release of the 4,000-page report, various NYC transportation blogs criticized the MTA for not being solution-oriented on the pointed-out hurdles and possibly overestimating how much the installations would cost.

The issue of added subway platform safety has received major attention in the two weeks since Upper West Sider Michelle Go was shoved in front of an oncoming R train at 42nd Street and killed.

Here's more of a breakdown of each subway station on the Upper West Side:

110th Street 1 Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen door barriers at the station.
• The implementation would not work because the columns would impede both access to do maintenance and the ability to leave the train through the emergency exit doors.

103rd Street 1 Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation would not work because the columns would impede both access to maintenance and the ability to leave the train through the emergency exit doors.

103rd Street B/C Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation of the barriers would leave the platforms no longer ADA compliant for people in wheelchairs.

96th Street B/C Train Station

• It is possible to build automatic platform doors and platform screen doors at the station.
• There might have to be some platform edge reconstruction required to properly install both systems.
• The rough estimate is $30.8 million to install automatic platform doors and $38.7 million to install platform screen doors.

96th Street 1, 2, 3 Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation of the barriers would leave the platforms no longer ADA compliant for people in wheelchairs.

86th Street 1 Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen door barriers at the station.
• The implementation would not work because the columns would impede both access to maintenance and the ability to leave the train through the emergency exit doors.

86th Street B/C Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen door barriers at the station.
• The implementation of the barriers would leave the platforms no longer ADA compliant for people in wheelchairs.

81 Street B/C Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen door barriers at the station.
• The implementation of the barriers would leave the platforms no longer ADA compliant for people in wheelchairs.

79th Street 1 Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation would not work because the columns would impede both access to maintenance and the ability to leave the train through the emergency exit doors.

72nd Street 1, 2, 3 Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation of the barriers would leave the platforms no longer ADA compliant for people in wheelchairs.

72nd Street B/C Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation would not work because there would not be enough room to make an emergency evacuation exit from the train.

66th Street 1 Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation would not work because the columns would impede both access to maintenance and the ability to leave the train through the emergency exit doors.

59th Street 1 Train Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation would not work because the columns would impede both access to maintenance and the ability to leave the train through the emergency exit doors.

59th Street A + C Station

• It is not possible to build automatic platform doors or platform screen doors at the station.
• The implementation of the barriers would leave the platforms no longer ADA compliant for people in wheelchairs.