Subway Ridership Dips At Long Island City Stations, Data Shows

LONG ISLAND CITY, QUEENS — Long Island City subway ridership plummeted after city and state officials urged New Yorkers to work from home and banned large gatherings in an effort to slow the spread of the new coronavirus, officially known as COVID-19.

Ridership plunged by nearly 38 percent at the E and M train side of the Court Square subway station between this past Friday and the previous Friday, according to an analysis of MTA turnstile data by THE CITY.

Just under 6,000 people swiped in at the E and M train side Friday, compared to nearly 9,500 the Friday before, the data shows. On the other end of the sprawling subway station, where the G train starts, ridership dipped from just over 6,000 entries to about 4,200.

Other Long Island City subway stations saw similar drops. Ridership was down about 37 percent at the Vernon Boulevard-Jackson Avenue 7-train station, dropping to about 9,400 turnstile entries Friday from almost 15,000 the Friday before, according to the data.

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Queensboro Plaza saw about 10,500 subway riders enter the station Friday, compared to roughly 14,600 the week before. The decrease was even more apparent at Queens Plaza, where 9,550 people entered the station Friday, versus 14,600 a week earlier.

Long Island City isn't an outlier. The number of turnstile entries dropped at almost all of the 457 subway stations analyzed, according to THE CITY.

The decrease was greatest in Midtown Manhattan, where turnstile entries at Grand Central-42nd Street, 34th Street-Penn Station and Times Square-42nd Street saw drops exceeding 40 percent, THE CITY found.

“Not surprisingly, we are seeing daily declines in ridership and we expect those declines to continue as mass gatherings are barred and major companies and universities move to telecommuting,” Abbey Collins, an MTA spokesperson, told the news outlet.

The decline in ridership — coupled with increases in bus, subway and station cleaning — could bring financial trouble to an already struggling agency.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo has already said the MTA will need federal assistance to get through the crisis wrought by COVID-19, and the transit authority may also consider reducing service frequency, THE CITY reported.

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