I remember my now-wife-then-girlfriend being able to get on the train from Queens after walking over the 59th Street Bridge. She saw a man in a three-piece suit, completely covered in soot, sitting on the train with his head down, and the whole dissonance of the day made it so that it took her about a minute to figure out why.
Yup the G was definitely one of the first lines restored on 9/11, I know my parents took it to meet us. On September 12th was my post 9/11 subway ride, going from Borough Hall to 181 Street on an A running local that day (which continued for at least one more on Thursday until its tunnel to Brooklyn reopened) via the F beneath the East River to bypass Lower Manhattan. This continued on Thursday as well as the city started to get back to normal.
I think by Friday the A was restored via Chambers Street (which was closed and bypassed) and in one of the following days on my commute from Upper Manhattan to Brooklyn the conductor announced “To observe a moment of science” while we went through the station.
Then there was the slowness of the Broadway-7 Avenue line since all service for a year the 1 and 2 was running local with the 3 the only express to 14 Street, and if you took it for a faster ride you often had to wait outside of 14 Street and not have a faster ride.
9 comments
I remember my now-wife-then-girlfriend being able to get on the train from Queens after walking over the 59th Street Bridge. She saw a man in a three-piece suit, completely covered in soot, sitting on the train with his head down, and the whole dissonance of the day made it so that it took her about a minute to figure out why.
Yup the G was definitely one of the first lines restored on 9/11, I know my parents took it to meet us. On September 12th was my post 9/11 subway ride, going from Borough Hall to 181 Street on an A running local that day (which continued for at least one more on Thursday until its tunnel to Brooklyn reopened) via the F beneath the East River to bypass Lower Manhattan. This continued on Thursday as well as the city started to get back to normal.
I think by Friday the A was restored via Chambers Street (which was closed and bypassed) and in one of the following days on my commute from Upper Manhattan to Brooklyn the conductor announced “To observe a moment of science” while we went through the station.
Then there was the slowness of the Broadway-7 Avenue line since all service for a year the 1 and 2 was running local with the 3 the only express to 14 Street, and if you took it for a faster ride you often had to wait outside of 14 Street and not have a faster ride.
I wonder why that map only shows the 1 at 18th St. The 2 definitely stopped there too!
It was probably just a typo.
Motorman Hector Ramirez Remembers
Some may have forgotten how important the Nassau Loop was to the connection between Brooklyn and Downtown in the weeks and months after 9/11.
Now, of course, trains don’t even run though that connection, and the Lower Manhattan stations are closed on weekends.
I couldn’t agree more. It was interesting to see the J and M lines replacing the N and R lines in Brooklyn. It’s too bad they couldn’t do it today.
What is that orange S that ran with the F??
Shuttle to Queensbridge. (The F still ran through 53rd until December.)