Home East Side Access Project Inside the East Side Access project

Inside the East Side Access project

by Benjamin Kabak

Fifteen stories below street level, this space will hold one day hold four platforms and eight tracks 15 for the LIRR at Grand Central Terminal. (All photos courtesy of the MTA.)

As part of its increased presence on social media sites, the MTA has been sharing more information and more pictures of their ongoing projects with the public. Last night, via their MTA Insider Twitter account, the authority released some shots of the work in progress at the Grand Central end of the East Side Access project. For transit construction enthusiasts, these photos offer a glimpse of some good old fashioned digging. I’ve posted a few below, and the entire album is available on the MTA’s Facebook page. The Journal-News has profiled the ongoing work as well.

Once the location of Metro-North’s Madison Ave. train yard, this space will become a passenger concourse for the LIRR.

These workers, according to Metro, spend their days deep within the rocks below the city. The Manhattan schist proves a sturdy rock, and the Sandhogs say they are often joined in their work by hordes of rats.

Another view of the platform cavern.

This tunnel will, by 2016, be lined with tracks that will bring LIRR trains into Grand Central Terminal.

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8 comments

Kevin January 29, 2010 - 4:18 pm

Ben, your pictures are broken!

Even so, I saw them on the MTA site and it looks pretty amazing what they’re doing 150 feet underneath the East Side.

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Benjamin Kabak January 29, 2010 - 4:23 pm

They’re not broken unless you work somewhere that blocks Facebook. I’ll fix that in a few.

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SEAN January 29, 2010 - 4:27 pm

Check out the wright up in the Journal News today especially the comments page.

Several of these comments are quite sarcastic, tipical for TJN.

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Jerrold January 29, 2010 - 5:32 pm

As of about 5:30 P.M., the FIRST picture still shows only that little square with the X in it.

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Benjamin Kabak January 29, 2010 - 5:36 pm

Gotcha. I missed a closed apostrophe. It’s all fixed now.

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Jerrold January 29, 2010 - 5:40 pm

My OS is Windows Vista Home Premium.
My browser is IE.

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Jerrold January 29, 2010 - 5:42 pm

Ben, my last message and yout last message “crossed each other”.

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Ed January 30, 2010 - 11:02 pm

“They’re not broken unless you work somewhere that blocks Facebook. I’ll fix that in a few.”

Ha! My workplace blocks this entire site.

My office doesn’t exactly have a “no internet use on the job” policy, probably because we actually need to use the internet to do our jobs. So they make up for that by blocking sites pretty randomly and unpredictably.

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