Archinect - News

New York City MTA releases 20-Year Needs Assessment plan... sans price tag

2023-10-13T12:06:00-04:00

Some 400 miles of subway tracks, half of Metro-North’s Hudson Line and several Long Island Rail Road stations are in dire need of upgrades to stave off flooding and other extreme weather exacerbated by climate change, the MTA wrote in a report published on Wednesday. The report, called the 20-year needs assessment, is a breakdown of the agency’s $1.5 trillion worth of transit infrastructure, and details which equipment planners believe most urgently needs fixing over the next two decades.

The system, which is now (finally) on a more stable financial track, needs a litany of upgrades over the next two decades, according to the breakdown. A total of 350 of the 493 elevators operated by the MTA will need to be replaced in that timeframe. Another 6,300 rail cars and 100% of all 6,000 city buses will also need to be replaced. (The full assessment can be found here.)

The findings were published in advance of a five-year construction phase that begins in 2025, though an exact price tag for the slate of fixes has yet to be established by the agency.

Another audit from the state comptroller’s office released last week indicated that the MTA has not sufficiently used money from capital improvement projects to mitigate against the effects of climate change, as was made apparent by the September 29 catastrophic rain event.

New York's MTA will officially make 95% of subway stations ADA compliant by 2055

2023-04-11T15:25:00-04:00

A Manhattan federal judge on Friday approved a settlement to a class action lawsuit that locks the MTA into equipping 95% of subway and Staten Island Railway stations with elevators or ramps — with a deadline three decades away. The approval by Judge Edgardo Ramos caps one part of a long-running push by advocates for people with disabilities to improve access to a transit system where merely a quarter of the nearly 500 stations comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.

As The City reported, the ruling makes the terms of last June’s landmark settlement official. Judge Ramos told plaintiffs that he knows the push would be a “very difficult thing to achieve.” MTA officials currently plan the upgrades in stages, with 81 stations affected by 2024 as part of the $50 MTA Capital Program; another 85 by 2035; 90 more by 2045; and the final 90 ready by 2055, bringing the total to 346 (or about 95% of the networks total stations).

Austin Transit Partnership names UNStudio, HKS, and Gehl to lead city's public transit expansion

2023-03-06T19:47:00-05:00

UNStudio, HKS, and Gehl have been selected by the Austin Transit Partnership (ATP) to lead the architecture and urban design of Project Connect, a major expansion of the city’s public transit system. The voter-approved investment includes new light rail, expanded bus routes, a subway, and more services across Austin.

Austin voters approved Project Connect in November 2020, followed by the formation of ATP, an independent organization created in partnership with the City of Austin and CapMetro. It will serve to oversee the finance and development of the project, which aims to improve access to essential jobs, health care, education, and entertainment in the city.

Video courtesy UNStudio via Vimeo.

“The design team brings both broad international expertise delivering transit and public realm projects at the highest level of design and an acute sensitivity to Austin’s specific culture and heritage,” said Peter Mullan, ATP Executive Vice President for Architecture and Urban Design. “P...

MTA to evaluate potential subway line to run west along Harlem's 125th Street

2022-08-01T09:00:00-04:00

The MTA will consider a transformative project that would extend the upcoming Second Avenue Subway even further by routing it west below 125th Street and then further uptown, the agency announced this week.

The Second Avenue Subway is currently set to expand from its phase 1 completion, which wrapped up in January 2017 with the opening of the 72nd, 86th, and 96th Street stations. The decades-old project, which was originally proposed in 1920, moved into the next stage of the federal funding process earlier this year, that would make way for the extension of the line up to 125th Street in East Harlem. Three new stations would be built along this route.

Now, according to documents released by the MTA this week titled the MTA’s 2025-2044 20-Year Needs Assessment, the Authority will consider extending the Second Avenue Subway even further. The line would move westbound along 125th Street, adding two to four new subway stations. Listed possibilities include the route ending at Broadway and 125th Street, turning north below Broadway to a connection at 137th Street, turning north under Riverside Drive to a connection at 137th Street, or turning north under St. Nicholas Avenue and continuing ...

Decommissioned BART cars to be transformed into a variety of venues across the Bay Area

2022-04-04T14:18:00-04:00

Eight lucky winners have been awarded decommissioned BART cars, as BART announced these retired cars will be transformed into a retro video game arcade, a bike repair shop, and a beer garden at The Oakland A’s stadium.

In 2020, BART issued a request for proposals for the creative reuse of old train cars as they are taken out of service and replaced by their “Fleet of the Future” cars. The first of the BART’s 775 new train cars went into service in January 2018. The fate of the decommissioned cars, some dating to the original fleet in the early 1970s, is being stripped and recycled into scrap heap.

The eight recipients were selected after submitting a proposal to BART describing what they intended to do with the vehicle, including their plans for the cars’ retrieval and disposal once they’ve served their purpose. The remaining decommissioned cars, with approximately 531 still in service, will be mainly recycled over time.

The "Residence and short-term rental" proposal by Hernandez-Eli Architecture.

The winning proposals for the repurposed BART cars include the creation of a retro video game arcade, a craft beer garden at The Oakland A’s stadium, a bike repair shop, a multi-use social space, a muse...

MTA's plan to create artificial reefs with retired subway cars fails

2022-01-27T17:01:00-05:00

After 58 years of service, the Metropolitan Transit Authority has now retired every single one of its remaining “Brightliners” (R-32 subway cars). Known for their shiny corrugated stainless-steel paneling, the Brightliners bid New York City farewell earlier this month, before they were taken by rail to be scrapped in Ohio.

A majority of the cars were retired over ten years ago, when more than a 1,000 of the R-32s were dumped in coastal areas in Delaware, New Jersey, and Georgia to establish artificial reefs. The plan was meant to boost recreational fishing, which at the time generated billions in state and federal taxes. Additionally, it would have saved the MTA millions of dollars by not sending the cars to get scrapped.

However, the Brightliners ended up disintegrating only months after they were dropped. The reason behind this is because the trains were made of stainless steel and spot-welded, leading to corrosion. And, their corrugated pattern made it easier for undercurrent waves to tear the cars apart.

A new map offers a unique historical exploration of Berlin's eclectic subway architecture

2021-10-05T14:47:00-04:00

Blue Crow Media’s latest update to a series of influential design maps uses 50 select sites along the U-Bahn, Berlin’s invisible lifeline, as a means of looking into the social and economic impacts of architecture in 20th-century Berlin.

Courtesy Blue Crow Media

Featuring photography from Nigel Green, architectural historian Verena Pfeiffer-Kloss’s two-sided, bilingual guide offers a lurid investigation into significant design elements of the network using examples from 1902 to 2009.

Courtesy Blue Crow Media

More than half of the current system was designed by Swedish architect Alfred Grenander before his death in 1931. His Art Noveau inspiration gave way to modernism in the years that followed.

Stations by Rainer Gerhard Rümmler served as an integral part of post-war Berlin’s unique and often eclectic mix of architecture.

The map celebrates their and other contributions while encouraging readers to observe the deta...

New York's subway system could be broke by 2025 as remote work continues

2021-09-29T20:40:00-04:00

New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the largest U.S. mass-transit provider, is running on borrowed time, facing budget and revenue challenges as federal aid is set to tap out in 2025, State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, said in a report Tuesday.

The announcement comes on the heels of a rough summer for the MTA, which is only now seeing its ridership climb past 50% of pre-pandemic levels as it weighs a controversial congestion pricing plan that would add $1 billion in revenue a year beginning in 2023.

Interim boss Sarah Feinberg stepped down in late July, creating a leadership vacuum for the agency, which is now projecting $3.5 billion budget deficits that will run into 2024 and 2025. The MTA currently owes about $48 billion in debt.

The MTA will now have to grapple with the ramifications of the remote work revolution. According to the state’s report, annual fare revenues could decrease by $500 million if the typical rider adopts a three-to-four-day telecommute.

A New York City MTA train has been wrapped in Supreme in new collaboration

2021-08-17T15:11:00-04:00

A Supreme-wrapped subway train has been added to the New York City MTA. This marks the second major collaboration between the two, following their 2017 MTA MetroCard release.

Looks like Supreme is linking up with NYC & MTA again. This time full wrap on subway trains @DropsByJay @snkr_twitr @J23app

Thanks to my man Kenny for the pics! pic.twitter.com/BMb6pY1g35
— C (@IDKwhyImHere) August 9, 2021

Rolled out this past weekend, one train, fully wrapped in Supreme’s iconic red Box Logo, will run on the L line, an MTA spokesperson told WCBS reporter Vincent Barone. The MTA representative also stated that this partnership is part of a new revenue stream for the organization, along with a means of promoting Supreme’s upcoming Fall/Winter 2021 collection. This comes as the MTA recovers from sharp declines in ridership as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic last year.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Supreme (@supremenewyork)

The pair’s first collaboration came i...

'Starry-eyed' Berlin's new Museum Island U-Bahn station is turning heads

2021-07-13T13:58:00-04:00

A theatrical new subway station is gracing the Berlin stage after a dramatic opening Friday.

The new Museumsinsel U-Bahn station is part of an expansion of the U5 that will connect the line into an area of the city called Museum Island.

Swiss architect Max Dudler is behind the transformation, which was inspired by theater sets built by the great 19th-century German designer Karl Friedrich Schinkel.

The final stage of the €500 million ($590 million) project was unveiled last week following lengthy delays that have set back Dudler since winning the competition for its design in 1998.

Photo: André Carré, via @BVG_Kampagne/Twitter

Starry-eyed Berliners can now embark on their journeys underneath a deep blue ceiling vault dotted with over 6,000 points of light that runs almost the entire length of the 180-meter station. A dark-grey main concourse takes riders through a colonnaded hall composed of granite from the Fichtel Mountains to evoke a classical feel. The new station, along with ...

Heavy Rail vs Monorail: Could the recent approval of two transit proposals change LA's 'most challenging transit corridor?'

2021-04-01T13:59:00-04:00

Los Angeles freeways are notorious soul-sucking pathways that most residents face daily. The infamous 405 freeway is considered one of the most "congested stretches of highway in the United States." However, as Forbes Staff writer Alan Ohnsman reports, there may be two solutions the city's transportation authority can get behind. "Local officials are considering an audacious fix for commuters on the city's west side: a sleek, automated $6.1 billion monorail to whisk riders above soul-crushing freeway jams," writes Ohnsman. "A rival proposal for a $10.8 billion subway from a group led by construction giant Bechtel, running below the highway, also won PDA funds worth up to $69.9 million."

While many remember the "hyped" vacuum-tube hyperloop proposed by Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk making headlines, the city did not make it a contender for transit funding. LA traffic is inevitable, but will the proposed LA Skyrail Express and subway project from Bechtel lead the city to an impro...

Coronavirus slowdown could push L.A. subway construction six months ahead of schedule

2020-04-02T12:52:00-04:00

A planned Los Angeles County subway extension could see the light of day six months ahead of schedule, as the social and economic shutdown put in place to limit the spread of the novel coronavirus strain prompts authorities to consider consolidating construction activities.

A recent report from Streetsblog indicates that as the volume of pedestrian and vehicle traffic has dropped across the region, authorities in the city of Beverly Hills have worked an agreement with the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) that would allow Metro to speed up construction of its forthcoming Purple Line by up to six months.

Map highlighting the section to be closed in red. Image courtesy of City of Beverly Hills.

Though the wealthy enclave has fought tooth and nail to stop or slow down the subway route running below its streets, it now seems that the opportunity to have construction come to fruition at a quicker pace could convince the Beverly Hills City Council to allow f...

Influential New York City subway map designer Michael Hertz has died

2020-02-26T14:42:00-05:00

Michael Hertz, whose design firm produced one of the most consulted maps in human history, the curvy-lined chart that New York City subway riders peer at over one another’s shoulders to figure out which stop they want, died on Feb. 18 in East Meadow, N.Y. He was 87.

In an effort to boost ridership, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, North America's largest public transportation network, formed a committee under the leadership of John Tauranac in the mid-1970s to create a new, more appealing map for the New York City subway system and replace the iconic, Massimo Vignelli-designed — yet impractical and not universally loved — map in service at the time.

Michael Hertz Associates provided a new design, featuring more geographically correct lines, which was ultimately published in June 1979 in time for the subway's 75-year anniversary. It has remained the basis for all subsequent maps issued until today.

New York City Subway Map from July 2019. Courtesy of Metropolitan Transportation Authority of the State of New York.

"The map that Mr. Hertz’s firm came up with included streets, neighborhoods and other surface reference points," writes Neil Genzlinger for the NYT. "And it depicted the city and its signature elements like Central Park and th...

Portland to study downtown subway

2019-06-28T14:50:00-04:00

Metro Oregon and Portland's TriMet are studying the possibility of creating a new below-ground transit route through the city's downtown.

Planning for future growth, the organizations are working to link the Lloyd Center shopping mall on the eastern banks of the Willamette River with Southwest Portland through downtown. The transit authority currently runs approximately 40 trains per hour during the busiest times of the day across the downtown area, a figure that will need to increase by at least 50% in coming decades to accommodate projected population growth.

The new route could, according to Metro Oregon, reduce travel time through downtown Portland by up to 15 minutes while adding 15,200 daily riders to the city's transit system.

TriMet is planning to hold community meetings as it moves to initiate a formal process for approving and constructing the tunnel.

HASSELL, Rogers Stirk Harbour, Weston Williamson design five new Melbourne metro stations

2018-05-31T15:54:00-04:00

Melbourne has consistently been ranked the world's #1 most livable city (often sharing the top spot with rival Vienna), and city planners hope to strengthen this position with a new metro tunnel set to open in 2025.

Five new stations, along with bicycle facilities, new parks, open spaces, and public plazas, will dot the tunnel line and boast architectural design that is the result of a collaboration between Australian architects HASSELL and UK firms Rogers Stirk Harbour and Weston Williamson.

The new stations are:

North Melbourne Station

North Melbourne Station

Project description: "North Melbourne Station has an impressive large-scale brick arched entrance to reflect the area’s industrial heritage and skylights to enable natural light to filter down on the platforms and concourse."

Parkville Station

Parkville Station

Project description: "In Parkville, a glass feature roof at the Grattan Street entrance provides passengers visiting this world c...

Man Writes 91 Songs About the Washington, D.C. Metro System

2017-06-13T17:28:00-04:00

It took six years, but every subway station in the Washington, D.C. area is now immortalized in song. For musician Jason Mendelson, it’s his magnum opus.

The Magentic Fields wrote 69 songs about love; professional tax manager and sometime musician Jason Mendelson has managed to record 91 songs about the Washington, D.C. Metro system, with one song for each subway stop.

Map of the Washington, D.C. Metro.

While music critics will not be equating these two works anytime soon, it's rare for an entire transportation system to be memorialized in song (although [Get Your Kicks On] Route 66, along with Kraftwerk's Autobahn, come to mind). It's worth noting that Mendelson doesn't play favorites: in the video accompanying the article, he proclaims that "There are no boring commuter stops."

How much is easy access to a subway worth?

2016-08-31T13:40:00-04:00

How much would you be willing to pay to shave a minute off your commute? For New Yorkers, the answer appears to be around $56 per month. That’s how much more New Yorkers pay in rent, on average, for a one-bedroom apartment that’s a minute closer by subway to Manhattan’s main business districts. That finding...puts an approximate value on the old real estate adage about the importance of location, location, location.

More data collectin' and crunchin':

Is Los Angeles becoming a "real" city?

2016-06-23T13:35:00-04:00

Could Los Angeles grow to become a “real city” like New York or London? Last year, LA gained at least 50,000 people, according to a recent report from the California Department of Finance, pushing the population to more than 4 million people for the first time in the city’s history.

Part of the appeal of Los Angeles has been its refusal to be like other cities. For years, its objective "center" was a forbidding cluster of office towers with near zero street life, while in outlying, low-density neighborhoods, people partied in back yards that ran up against wildlife preserves, hiking trails, and quaint man-made lakes.

However, as other big, traditionally urban U.S. cities gradually became stupidly unaffordable (looking at you, New York and San Francisco) and Moby wrote that one Op-Ed, a sizable number of creative-class types decided to try their luck in a place with what then had half the rental costs and much more temperate weather.

Now, with a rapidly growing subway system and a still undaunted, ebullient vibe, L.A. may be starting to take itself seriously as a city, which ironically could be its undoing, or the impetus for spectacular urban development. If history is any guide, it will be both, creating the newest weird, beautiful, idiosyncratic iteration we co...

With opening of Expo Line to Santa Monica, L.A.'s dream of a "subway to the sea" finally comes true (again)

2016-05-20T20:32:00-04:00

The $1.5-billion second leg of the Expo Line, which opened Friday from Culver City to Santa Monica, adds seven light-rail stations and more than six miles of track to the growing Los Angeles County transit network. [...] In the immediate context of L.A.'s attempts to turn its public-transit network from national punch line to something that increasingly resembles a mature system, 13 new Metro stations in less than three months qualifies as a pretty dramatic upgrade.

The aggressively expanding LA Metro system in recent Archinect news stories:

New York may finally get open subway cars

2016-01-28T18:21:00-05:00

Moving from one subway car to another is no easy task. There is the dart-and-hustle option, entailing a sprint between entrances before the doors close, and the perilous — and prohibited — passing between the doors at the end of the car. But the Metropolitan Transportation Authority wants to examine another route: a new generation of subway trains with open pathways between cars.

Similar designs already travel through cities like Paris and Toronto, where they have been reported to increase passenger capacity by 10%.

Currently, riders can face a steep fine for trying to move between subway cars.

Related:

Jakarta, the world's largest city without a subway, is drowning in traffic

2016-01-19T08:00:00-05:00

Since 2000, the world’s second-largest megacity, Jakarta, has seen its population swell by a staggering 34 percent. Though the city proper is home to just 10 million, the urban zone is home to 30 million [...] “Jakarta is the largest urban metropolitan area in the world without a metro,” he [Deden Rukmana] says. “And a metro is the most crucial element of transportation for a megacity. There’s no way it can exist otherwise.”

Cut away confusion from your NYC commute with these beautiful subway maps

2015-11-25T13:26:00-05:00

Candy Chan, an architect living in New York City, has what she describes as a "love-hate relationship" with her subway system. Fascinated in particular by the mechanisms of the MTA's stations – their navigation and placemaking methods, their circulation patterns – Chan was surprised to learn that there are no comprehensive, 3D maps of the station interiors available to the public.

To anyone easily turned around by traveling underground, the experience of emerging from the station on the wrong side of the street is a familiar and frustrating one, and travel can be discombobulating from the get-go. 3D station maps are commonplace in Hong Kong, where Chan is from, then why not New York? So Chan set out to map the stations herself, as a labor of love.

Her ensuing "Project Subway NYC" is a blog and resource, chronicling Chan's studies of the subways and gorgeous diagrams of their interior structures. The Project began this past July, and Chan just released a new slew of station maps – pict...

Gorgeous long-exposure shots of the Montreal Metro

2015-11-03T13:16:00-05:00

This is the work of Canadian architectural photographer Chris Forsyth who has been sharing his pictures on Instagram, looking to show how beautiful design is all around us. [...] "What draws me to the architecture in the metro system is its variety from station to station. I love the colours, the architectural styles and influences, and above all its very bold graphic appearance." [...] Forsyth uses long exposures to blur the motion and to remove traces of people passing through the shot.

For more work by the architectural photographer, you can follow Chris Forsyth on Instagram @chrismforsyth, with more shots of the Montreal Metro through #mtlmetroproject. View a selection of photos below:

NBBJ proposes 3 moving walkways to replace London's Circle Line

2015-09-11T05:50:00-04:00

Instead of relying on a subway that breaks down and causes interminable delays, what if the 17 miles of London's Circle Line were replaced with three moving walkways, much like the ones in airports, that allow pedestrians to step on at three miles per hour and then amble over to a fast lane of 15 miles per hour?

According to James Pinkerton, an architectural assistant at the London office of NBBJ which proposed the idea, the travelators would be easier to maintain than a traditional train system precisely because of its three separate walkways. If one broke down, the "two further lines would run smoothly," forming a ceaseless band of movement that wouldn't need to pause for stops or be held up by one solitary malfunctioning train. Travelers could simply walk on and walk off.

"We came up with this idea that benefits the city as a whole," he explained to me in a brief phone interview. Pinkerton was also part of the NBBJ team that created the shadowless tower, which was designed from a s...

Public Transit Helps New Yorkers Earn More Money

2015-01-05T14:23:00-05:00

[NYC] neighborhoods with the best access to transit, usually in Manhattan...also have the highest median household income, and the lowest unemployment rate... Neighborhoods with the worst access to transit (South Staten Island) had lower median incomes... and slightly lower unemployment rates...The neighborhoods with limited access to public transit, like the Flatlands in Brooklyn, fare the worst: their unemployment rate is nearly 12%, and their median household income is around $46,000.

That or the subway was designed around, and continues to serve, historically-affluent communities...

The study was conducted by NYU's Rudin Center for Transportation Policy and Management.

Geology and the Art of New York City Subway Construction

2014-11-03T13:27:00-05:00

The Second Avenue Subway is the stuff of legend in New York City, the locomotive who cried wolf. Plagued by funding shortages, the project has been stop-and-go since the 1920s. Now construction is back to go; in late September, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) [...] requested $1.5 billion [...]. Michael Horodniceanu, head of construction for the MTA, has stated that the long-awaited line may be ready by 2029. In the meantime, the MTA is learning about, and acting on, geology.

China builds its dream island; Qatar controversies continue; the internet slows down: Weekly News Round-Up for September 7, 2014

2014-09-15T20:01:00-04:00

Friday, September 12:

Vincent Scully Prize 2014 awarded to journalist and TV host Charlie Rose: The prize was established by the National Building Museum in 1999, and is named after the famed Yale art history and architecture professor who helped establish Louis Kahn and Robert Venturi. Rose was distinguished by his interviews of leaders in urban design and development.

Thursday, September 11:

Toronto set to unveil first museum of Islamic culture in North America: The museum is backed by Aga Khan, a "lesser-known royal" and spiritual leader of an estimated 15 million Ismaili Muslims, approximately 100,000 of which now live in Canada. The museum is designed by Pritzker winner Fumihiko Maki, and opens September 18.

Wednesday, September 10:

The long-lost design bible of the New York subway is (briefly) back in print: In 1967, the New York City Transit Authority asked designers Massimo Vignelli and Bob Noorda to create a solution to the subway system's inconsistent and confusing identity. Th...

The long-lost design bible of the New York subway is (briefly) back in print

2014-09-10T15:37:00-04:00

To many designers, the manual became an exemplar of the form—and a design classic in its own right. [...] When Hamish Smyth and Jesse Reed, who work at the New York design firm Pentagram, stumbled across a copy a few years ago, it was buried under old gym clothes in a locker. They digitized the manual, and now they’re reprinting it with the blessing of the MTA. A complete reissue, which includes a new essay on the manual’s history, is being sold on Kickstarter starting today [...].

Bed Bugs Found on N Train in NY

2014-08-06T13:18:00-04:00

Bedbugs were discovered on at least three subway trains on the N line this week, authorities said. Two trains were taken out of service Sunday after the unwanted riders were found onboard some cars, officials said. And on Tuesday, a third N train was also sent to the Coney Island yard in Brooklyn for fumigation. Some of the bugs were found in seat cushions in train cabs, which are used by conductors and motormen, sources said.

NYC Can't Afford to Build the Second Avenue Subway, and It Can't Afford Not To

2014-07-17T13:36:00-04:00

In New York City history and lore, the Second Avenue subway is the Loch Ness Monster crossed with the Abominable Snowman. Politicians, transit planners, and everyone in between have witnessed this East Side subway line face countless stops and starts [...] And yet, the Second Avenue line has become a beacon for New York's future and a symbol of the numerous challenges facing a global city that must, in light of massive costs and slow build-outs, expand its transit network to stay competitive.