$213M Fix For Subway Stations Passed Against City's Wishes

NEW YORK, NY — Even the MTA's renovation plans get delayed. The state-controlled MTA Board approved a package of eight station upgrade projects worth $213 million on Thursday over continued objections from Mayor Bill de Blasio's appointees, who argued the money should go to fix the subways.

After the 10-3 vote, two companies will renovate the stations — including the 1/2/3 and A/C/E stops near bustling Penn Station — under Gov. Andrew Cuomo's Enhanced Station Initiative, a $1 billion effort to give more than 30 stations structural repairs and cosmetic fixes, such as new stairs, floors, countdown clocks and lighting. This round of projects includes six stations in Manhattan and two in the Bronx.

The work at the Penn Station stops — two of the busiest in the subway system — and three others in Manhattan is expected to be finished within 11 months of work starting.

The MTA Board was forced to delay a vote on the projects last month after de Blasio's appointees threatened to block them. They said the city didn't have enough input in selecting the stations and objected to the exclusion of elevators, which would make the stops accessible to disabled riders.

Three mayoral appointees voted no Thursday, repeating concerns that they did not fully understand why these particular stations were selected for upgrades. One of them, Veronica Vanterpool, said the MTA should not be spending so heavily on largely cosmetic fixes when the subway is facing so many other problems.

"My position has never been that a lot of these enhancements, even the lighting, even the art, is not needed. My position is not now," Vanterpool said.

New York City Transit President Andy Byford, who oversees the subways, repeated his support for the program Thursday. Many of the Enhanced Station Initiative stops desperately need repairs that go beyond cosmetics, he said.

"It's a bit of a Pyrrhic victory to have a station that’s fully accessible but oops, you can’t get into it because it’s closed because it’s fundamentally dangerous," Byford said Thursday.

Byford has said MTA selected stations based on a 2012 survey of all its stops, which some board members said they wanted to see. Byford also touted the MTA's work on accessibility upgrades. On Tuesday he said he'll commission a study of how much it would cost to make every stop accessible for disabled straphangers.

The debate over the projects reflected the broader fight between de Blasio and Cuomo when it comes to control of the MTA and the subways. Cuomo and his appointee, MTA Chairman Joe Lhota, say the mayor doesn't care enough about fixing the beleaguered system, while city officials argue the state wants to maintain control of the transit system without giving the city much input.

Andrew Saul, a board member from Westchester County, supported the station renovations because "the system is in very bad shape." But he said the MTA should be more careful about where its money goes, given the need to balance big long-term projects with the everyday functioning of the system.

"I think it’s very important that since we’re dealing with a pie that can only be stretched so far, that we very carefully look at the money we spend," Saul said.

(Lead image: The 34th Street-Penn Station subway stop is seen in Manhattan. Photo by Mark Osborne/Patch)