The new stationhouse at 96th St. sits amidst a busy Broadway. (Photo by Benjamin Kabak)
The new entrance at 96th St. and Broadway is one near and dear to my heart. My parents live a few blocks south of the 93rd St. side of that station, and even though I no longer live on the Upper West Side, that station will always be home to me. Over the last three years, the station had been undergoing a comprehensive renovation that saw the main entrances at 96th St. moved to a new stationhouse on the Broadway median. Unfortunately, though, now that the new entrances have been open for a few months the neighbors aren’t too happy with it.
The problem, as DNA Info’s Leslie Albrecht reported this week, is one impacting pedestrians and drivers alike, and it was one entirely foreseeable. When the MTA rebuilt the 72nd St. stationhouse, they closed off Broadway’s uptown lanes to all traffic, but at 96th St., straphangers leaving and entering the station must compete with cars zooming down Broadway and trying to access the Henry Hudson Parkway. It has become a dangerous mess.
Albrecht has more:
Pedestrians cross Broadway to reach the bustling subway stop, which serves the 1 local line as well as the 2 and 3 express lines, and like most New Yorkers they stride into the crosswalk when there seems to be a break in traffic. But those bold walkers can’t see the turn signals guiding cars, and they don’t realize they’re sometimes stepping into the path of cars turning left onto southbound Broadway from westbound West 96th Street. “The way it currently is, it’s not flowing very well at all,” said Assemblyman Daniel O’Donnell, who represents the 69th District.
O’Donnell says he is so worried about unsafe conditions at the busy crossroads that he wrote a letter earlier this month to the DOT, voicing concern about “construction, timing of turn signals and general pedestrian confusion” at the intersection. O’Donnell wants DOT to run a safety inspection at the intersection…
O’Donnell says problems at the intersection are compounded by cars racing to reach the West Side Highway via West 96th Street now that the West 95th Street highway on-ramp is closed. Parents at nearby P.S. 75, at West 96th Street and West End Avenue, say they worry, too, about the onslaught of cars.
Police at the NYPD’s 24th Precinct have also asked DOT to make safety improvements at the intersection and have even gone as far as submitting a list of suggestions, including using signs to warn people leaving the subway station from a median in the middle of Broadway to watch for turning vehicles, and prohibiting left turns onto Broadway from 96th Street.
As Albrecht notes, the MTA had to cut sidewalk space to accommodate traffic on Broadway while building a stationhouse wider than median. Thus, cars are battling people for space on the avenue while, at the same time, every passenger exiting at the north end of the station comes up in the middle of the street. The sidewalk entrances that kept pedestrians safer have been shuttered as part of the renovation. It’s a perfect storm for potential accidents.
Short of closing off parts of Broadway or attempting to siphon Henry Hudson-bound traffic around to 97th St., there is no easy solution to this problem. With the 95th St. entrance to the parkway shuttered, cars need to access 96th St. to reach the Henry Hudson. Cutting a lane of traffic to save sidewalk space and make the crossings shorter would have been ideal, but that ship has sailed. Instead, traffic calming and a delayed green should solve this pesky problem.
26 comments
Will the side entrances reopen sometime soon? If not, that’s an awful lot of folks exiting in the middle of B’way.
The side entrances at 96th have been permanently closed. However, different entrances still exist at the southern end of the station (at 94th St)
A big part of the problem is the short “Walk” interval for those crossing Broadway.
Since vehicles turning left off Broadway onto 96th have their own turn signal (which is probably a good thing), that means pedestrians have a shorter time to legally cross Broadway.
Plus, the pedestrian signals do not truly reflect times when it is ‘clear’ for peds to cross.
For instance, when only southbound Broadway traffic has the light, pedestrians should be able to (legally) cross the northbound lanes of Broadway.
However, they are faced with “Don’t Walk” signs at that time. Same thing goes in the opposite direction.
If DOT added the proper crossing time, things would be a lot safer for pedestrians.
As it stands now, I usually go out of my way to enter the station at 95th St, where there are fewer peds and turning vehicles.
Another part of the problem is that, in almost all cases, pedestrians who need to cross in both directions can cross either way first. That’s not the case here – coming out if the station, first you have to cross east or west, then north, and vice versa for approaching the station from the north. If the turning phases are eliminated or reconfigured, it would be feasible to add a crosswalk directly north from the station, which I think would help a lot.
Wait, did I read that first part of the quote correctly?
Part of the problem is that people crossing against the light might get hit?
Ummm, yeah? Isn’t that kinda the reason the light changes colors as an indicator of when to cross? Did I miss something?
I thought I mis-read that too! So it’s like “damn, I almost got hit crossing against the light.” Ah, New Yorkers, gotta luv ’em!
Normal NY walking etiquette states that if no cars are coming, you cross. Well, at this intersection, you can see only half a block’s worth of traffic, so cars zooming up to make that left turn signal are invisible until you’re already into the intersection.
The solution to me sounds like: turn the left turn lane into sidewalk; make the leftmost lane a turn lane, and use the other two lanes as through/right turn lanes. You’re back to the normal broadway configuration, but not treacherous any more.
Why is the 95th Street entrance to the Henry Hudson closed? Temporary or permanent closure?
Permanent and has been for a few years. DOT closed it in 2007 because it created a dangerous situation with cars entering at 95th St. and others exiting at 96th St. It was a welcome change for drivers.
Prohibiting left turns at this intersection could be the answer. Sure, it would be a hassle for drivers, but there are plenty of other similar intersections with similar prohibitions across the city, and drivers would learn to adjust their driving patterns, preferring West End or Amsterdam if they need to turn on 96th, for example. At most intersections in the city, the designated left-turn signals used at 96th would be considered a luxury.
Are there designated left turn signals at West End and 96th? If not, perhaps those could be added to compensate for a reduction in turn-ability at Broadway.
I believe there is a turn lane, although I don’t think there’s a dedicated signal. West End can’t handle that volume of turning cars right now.
Broadway at 97th is no left turns, as well, I believe. Under your scenario you wouldn’t be able to make a left between 93rd and 99th.
I think West End has a dedicated signal. But be careful – there’s a school at 96th and West End.
Who drives up Broadway? Where are they coming from that they’re entering the highway at 96th? Obviously north of 79th, or they’d enter the highway there. If they’re coming from east of Broadway, they can just as easily use Amsterdam. Are there any major auto traffic generators along Broadway between 79th and 96th?
All separate left-turn signals do is make it harder for pedestrians to cross the street. I have to endure Amsterdam/110th every day, and it’s no safer or easier to cross than Broadway/110th, which only has the usual two phases. Usually what I end up doing when crossing Amsterdam is see that there are no cars and make a dash for it on red.
Separate left signals are generally used where, if you don’t have them, nobody can ever turn left and left-turn traffic backs up far enough to cause gridlock. No idea whether this is the case at this particular corner.
It sounds like reconfiguration of the light cycles to make better pedestrian cycles could solve the problems here.
I don’t understand why they couldn’t of just left the side entrances and made them exit only. Yea, sidewalk space is tight, but not everyone would use them i imagine. It would at least cut down on the amount of people exiting in the median (plus i really liked getting to study the old IRT tile work on the side platforms when i would be there).
They closed the passageway beneath the tracks. You can’t have the exits open if the passageway to get to them isn’t available any longer.
I think you have cause and effect reversed. The sidewalk staircases had to be removed to make way for the new right lane of Broadway. And the new sidewalk is too narrow to accommodate a staircase.
(I think the passageway is supposed to reopen, if it hasn’t already, for transfers between platforms.)
Let me get this straight… in a neighborhood where more people use the subway than use cars, the subway entrances were pushed to the middle of a street, and now every passenger needs to cross the street to get to the entrance, so that another lane of cars could be added?
This makes no sense to me at all. If anything, we should be expanding the sidewalk there, not reducing it.
No, no lanes of cars were added. The new station entrance pushed the street outward; to maintain the same number of lanes as before, the sidewalk had to be narrowed.
Did the same number of lanes have to be maintained? Of course not, but Weinshall was in charge of the streets when this was being designed.
What Andrew said is correct AFAICT.
Do you know if the side stairs are under the “new” lane of traffic or were they just sealed over, but still exist under the sidewalk?
I still don’t understand why MTA would seal off the transfer passage, it was still quite usable and unless the new staircases land on top of the old ones to the passage, it could be opened up again.
I don’t know, i just like the old stuff and to see anything not be used bothers me.
The old stairs were at the outer edges of the sidewalks. Since the sidewalks were narrowed, that places them now at least partly if not entirely under the traffic lanes.
As I said, the passageway is going to reopen, if it hasn’t already. The southern stairs from the platform to the passageway were fixed up. Last I looked (a few months ago), there was work going on downstairs; I don’t know what the current status is.
A good part of the problem I think, is that that stretch of Broadway is straight, and psychologically, when drivers see that ‘vanishing point’ effect, they tend to floor it.
I am at that station twice a week, and it definitely seems southbound traffic is faster than northbound, where drivers can see a curve in front of them.
DOT should put some kind of neckdown on the south down side., maybe between 97 and 96.
Also, I know the old street entrances are closed, but does anyone know if the underpasses in the station are also permanently closed?
Peter
inklake
“…………..must compete with cars zooing down Broadway and trying to access the Henry Hudson Parkway.”
OK, you meant “zooming”, but it sure looks like a Freudian slip,
as in “driving like wild animals”.
I see that it’s been corrected.
I’ve already commented on this on Streetsblog, so I won’t repeat myself here:
http://www.streetsblog.org/201.....ent-287761
http://www.streetsblog.org/201.....ent-287816