By Alex Robinson
Queens is home to two of the city’s bottom five subway stations in dire need of structural repairs, state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said last week.
The Seneca Avenue station in Ridgewood on the M line ranked second to last and the 52 Street stop in Woodside on the No. 7 line was fifth from the bottom, according to a report released by DiNapoli, which slammed the Metropolitan Transportation Authority for being too sluggish in making structural and architectural fixes to the city’s subway stations.
“New York City Transit reports it is making progress on repairing stations, but the pace is too slow and much more work needs to be done,” DiNapoli said. “Worn or damaged stairs and platform edges pose risks for riders, while broken tiles, lights and peeling paint leave riders with a low opinion of the transit system.”
More than 85 percent of the Seneca Avenue station’s structural components – such as stairs, columns and platform edges – required repair and more than 79 percent of the 52 Street’s parts needed fixes, the report said.
Brooklyn and Queens’ stations make up a third of the stations with defects and not a single Manhattan station made it onto the list of 10 stations with the most structural problems.
The report, which used 2012 data compiled by NYC Transit, said only 51 of the city’s 468 stations were completely free of any defects. DiNapoli said the MTA has renovated 241 stations over the last 30 years, but has not had the resources to keep them maintained.
A spokesman for the MTA said the majority of the stations on DiNapoli’s list have either already been addressed, are under construction or in the planning process.
He added that any unsafe conditions on platform edges, as well as in any other part of the subway system, are repaired immediately.
“All 468 stations in the MTA New York City Transit subway system are safe for our 5.8 million daily customers, and the MTA has spent billions of dollars to improve the appearance and structural conditions at stations as well,” he said. “This report does not reflect the improvements being made under the MTA’s new component approach, which began in the current capital program and focuses on improving deteriorated components system-wide rather than rehabilitating entire stations.”
The MTA said it has already fixed defects in more than 150 stations and plans to continue this work.
DiNapoli’s office acknowledged that the MTA has made repairs at certain stations since 2012, but pointed out that the subway system is not static and that conditions have also continued to deteriorate during that time.
Reach reporter Alex Robinson by e-mail at arobinson@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
