MTA Starts Every-Night Cleaning Of Metro-North, Subway

The Metropolitan Transit Authority will be cleaning trains and subway cars every night as the MTA works to protect essential workers during the new coronavirus pandemic. It will also help gear up for the return of commuters once New York state's shutdown has ended downstate.

Most dramatically, New York City subways will stop running 24 hours a day, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Thursday.

The same level of cleaning will take place on Metro-North; however service will not have to be disrupted.

Also on Thursday the MTA announced that as of May 4 it would suspend the substitute bus service that had been compensating for the suspended ferry service between Haverstraw and Ossining and Newburgh and Beacon. Free parking for riders of that Metro-North service will be available at the Irvington, Tarrytown and Beacon stations.

Subways won't run between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m., starting May 6 and continuing for the duration of the pandemic.

"This is going to be one of the most aggressive, creative, challenging endeavors the MTA has done," said Cuomo. "It's not that easy to stop train service."

Reports of homeless people sleeping in subway cars spurred Cuomo to call the situation "disgusting."

Mayor Bill de Blasio phoned in during the governor's daily COVID-19 briefing to show support for the MTA initiative and to say that city agencies were also reaching out to the homeless population.

"We're going to do something during this pandemic that we've never done before," said de Blasio.

Transit advocates were quick to express their concerns that the service shutdown would not be temporary.

"Even during a crisis, New York is and will be a 24/7 city," said Riders Alliance Executive Director Betsy Plum. "Governor Cuomo's suspension of subway service must be strictly temporary while a longer-term solution is developed and implemented."

Overnight service will resume once "customer demand returns," said the MTA, currently facing a 90 percent drop in ridership and an $8 billion budget deficit.

The MTA estimates about 11,000 riders currently use the subways between during the four-hour period. Buses will not be included in the service shutdown and will continue to run 24 hours a day and essential workers traveling overnight will be connected to free for-hire-cars, said officials.

By Kathleen Culliton, Patch Staff