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Special report by Chabadinfo

The MTA said that the MTA will add elevators to three Crown Heights stations and make them ADA compliant (which means making the station wheelchair friendly elevators or ramps, among other improvements). The move comes as the MTA is ramping up efforts to upgrade the Subway lines that run through Crown Heights.

The stations are part of a list released by the MTA, as part of the recently passed Capital plan. In it, 26+ stations across the city will receive elevators for full ADA accessibility. Among the stations announced are three stations in Crown Heights to the stations:

• Nostrand Avenue, which is serviced by the 3 (and 4 during late nights)

• President Street – Medgar Evers College, which is serviced by the 2 and 5

• Sterling Street, which is serviced by the 2 and 5

Additionally, the Saratoga Avenue station on the 3 line, which sits right outside of Crown Heights, will also get elevators.

As of press time, there is no timeline for these station upgrades has been announced.

Chabadinfo asked the MTA why these three stations were getting elevators, specifically both Nostrand and President Street, rather than Kingston Ave (which is further from any ADA stations) or Franklin Ave (which is the second most used station in Crown Heights and has a connection to the Franklin Ave Shuttle).

The MTA told Chabadinfo they use “legislatively-mandated criteria including geographic coverage, community destinations, ridership, demographics, transfers, constructability, and cost.” And they rely on feedback on which stations to choose for upgrades. The MTA added that residents can use this form to give feedback on ADA upgrades.

Additionally, because the MTA is required by law to add ADA accessibility when it plans to upgrade a subway station, the addition of elevators to these stations could give the MTA the green light to upgrade these 100+ year old stations–sooner rather than later.

How much would it cost?

The costs of these upgrades — which average at 100 million per station — drew criticism city-wide, since the elevators only cost $5 million apiece on average. Curbed noted that the high costs of these upgrades were attributed in part to tangentially related projects, such as equipment upgrades, and because ADA regulations demand larger, more complicated lifts.

Tim Mulligan, Deputy Chief Development Officer for MTA Construction & Development, said at a Board Meeting for the Capital Program that the MTA bundles ADA contracts out to reduce costs per station. “We used to put out ADA station work, one station at a time or one station per contract. And how we use bundling in [the] 2020–24 [plan] to support the … more than four‑fold increase, and how quickly we put out ADA projects to comply with the settlement. We had two years where we were positioned to make more than $10 billion worth of commitments right in 2022 and in 2023.”

The MTA’s plans for the Neighborhood

Crown Heights is currently served by nine Subway lines: the 2, 3, 4, and 5 run right through the community along Nostrand and Eastern Pkwy. The A and C run along the North side on Fulton Street. The B and Q run along the West side of the neighborhood on Flatbush Avenue. And the Franklin Ave Shuttle (a remnant of the former Brighton and Fulton Line) runs along Franklin Ave. The Long Island Railroad also serves Crown Heights with its station at Nostrand and Atlantic Avenue.

In the Capital Plan the MTA singles out the 2, 3, 4 and 5, some of the most ridden and congested trunk lines for upgrades, as Chabadinfo exclusively reported recently, the MTA will unclog the infamous “Nostrand Junction” just east of Franklin Ave in Crown Heights, which merges the 2, 3, 4 and 5 lines, according to the updated Capital plan released by the MTA. This plan means that the 3 train may no longer run at Kingston Avenue.

The project involves the installation of new crossover tracks, meaning that it will rearrange the tracks so that trains that run express (4 and 5) in Brooklyn west of Franklin Avenue can approach on the express tracks and trains that run local (2 and 3) can stay on local tracks all the way through the junction. It will also make a modified routing plan for the trains that use Nostrand Junction.

Although no specific plans have been announced, an earlier study (which was used in the MTA’s 20-Year Needs Assessment) released by the MTA suggests that the 3 and 5 lines will be swapped in Brooklyn and a new line added. Notably, this would change the routing of the Subway lines in Crown Heights, losing direct access to Lexington Ave (4, 5) or 7th Ave (2, 3) lines:

• The 4 would still end at Utica Ave, but the 5 would go down to New Lots.

• The 2 and 3 would run along Nostrand Ave to Flatbush Ave

• A new line (called the 8 line in the plan) between Wakefield–241st Street and New Lots Ave, with local stops at Nostrand Ave and Kingston Ave. In this scenario, there would be a sole line at these two stations, which may mean even longer headways.

Read more about the plan here

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Speaking of service patterns, the MTA is in the draft phase of redesigning Brooklyn’s bus network — which Chabadinfo first reported on in 2023 — which would overhaul bus lines across Brooklyn, including rerouting the southbound B43 along Albany instead of Brooklyn Ave. and adding the B10 along Empire Blvd. Additionally, the northbound B49 would run along New York Ave and the northbound B44 local will run along Rogers Ave.

The MTA also plans on phasing out the iconic orange seat cars on the 3 line with new train cars. They are scheduled to remain in service until the late 2020s, when they will likely be replaced with the new technology trains “R262” models. Other number lines may also get these upgrades, depending on how the MTA utilizes them.

In the just-passed capital program, the MTA is in the midst of planning the “Interborough Express,” a new train line between Brooklyn and Queens which would connect the communities of Flatbush, Boro Park, and Crown Heights. Additionally, The MTA is also evaluating whether to construct a Subway line down Utica Avenue, but that isn’t in the current plans.

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