More people ride the subway daily than get on airplanes for Thanksgiving

Plus: Why the B train doesn't run on weekends [On The Way - from WNYC and Gothamist] Gothamist relies on your support to make local news available to all. Not yet a member? [Consider donating and join today.]( Record Thanksgiving air travel is peanuts compared to subway ridership By [Stephen Nessen]( and [Clayton Guse]( Thanksgiving weekend is typically the busiest of the year for U.S. airlines — and TSA officials estimate 2.9 million turkey-stuffed travelers will take to the skies this Sunday, breaking a single day record. For frequent flyers, that’s a huge number. But for regular riders of the subway, it’s peanuts. Most weekdays, the subway turnstiles clock about 4 million entries. The city’s buses record more than 1.3 million taps and swipes a day, and conductors on the commuter railroads punch or scan about 450,000 tickets. Those numbers remain [down from pre-pandemic levels]( but they dwarf what U.S. airline operations consider record breaking travel. It’s a dynamic often cited by transit advocates, who bemoan the sorry state of New York’s mass transit system when compared to its airports, which have seen billions of dollars in [upgrades]( over the last decade using state and [federal funds](. “While it doesn’t bring Congress home for the holidays, the MTA provides nearly seven million rides a day,” said Danny Pearlstein, a spokesperson for the Riders Alliance. “It’s a good time to be thankful for our common infrastructure — and for our leaders to renew their commitment to invest in public transit.” But even without that type of commitment from Congress, the subways may prove their worth to New Yorkers who stay in town over the holiday. On Thanksgiving Day, the MTA plans to run the subways and buses on a Sunday schedule — but some lines like the 1 will see additional service as transit officials help move people to and from the annual [Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade](. Construction work on the subways is also slated to cause less disruption to service than during [other holiday weekends](. The MTA does plan a handful of outages to perform track maintenance and upgrades, most notably on the F, M and Q lines. (Scroll down to "Service changes" section for details. ↓ ) But absent any disasters, even New York’s aging subways are expected to move millions more people than its airports. What New York is reading this week [an NYPD robot in the Times Square subway station]( Bahar Ostadan/Gothamist [There’s a new sheriff in Times Square … and it's an NYPD robot]( Plus: - The Penn Station entrance at 7th Avenue and 32nd Street now has an ADA-compliant elevator, three new escalators and is 50% wider. [Read more](. - Street safety advocates who want the mayor to do more to prevent traffic violence marched through Astoria last weekend, stopping at three sites where people were recently killed by reckless drivers. [Read more](. - About 600 Metro-North workers have reached a tentative agreement with the MTA after years without a contract, averting a potential strike. [Read more](. - Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a bill this week requiring the MTA to have at least one person with a disability on its board. ([AM New York]( - MTA express bus riders who use wheelchairs say they often encounter buses with broken lifts — or bus drivers who don't know how to operate them. ([THE CITY]( - North Williamsburg's 18-block Open Street on Berry Street has been turned into a permanent two-way bike boulevard. ([Streetsblog]( - The city is down to its last two Crown Victoria yellow cabs — and they both have about 500,000 miles and are overdue for inspections. ([The New York Times]( Curious commuter “Why doesn’t the B train run on weekends?” - Abigail, from Flatbush, Brooklyn What Clayton and Stephen say: The B train used to run on the weekends — but it wasn’t the same service New Yorkers know today. Prior to 2001, the Brooklyn branch of the B line ran along what is now the D line. The B line’s northern terminal would during some parts of the week switch from the Bronx or Harlem to 21st Street-Queensbridge. The MTA switched things up in 2001 when the city spent three years renovating the Manhattan Bridge. While that work was underway, the B only ran north of Herald Square. When full train service over the bridge resumed in 2004, the B returned as a weekday-only express train between Brighton Beach and Bedford Park Boulevard. The MTA says all the B train’s stations are served by other lines, like the Q in Brooklyn and the D in Manhattan. But that explanation is unlikely to satisfy riders like Abigail as she rides the local Q train all weekend long. Want to submit a question? Email [cguse@wnyc.org](mailto:cguse@wnyc.org ?subject=Curious%20Commuter) or [snessen@wnyc.org](mailto:snessen@wnyc.org?subject=Curious%20Commuter) with the subject line "Curious Commuter question." Service changes - On Thanksgiving Day, subways and buses will run on a Sunday schedule, but there will be additional service on the 1 train ​and the ​42-St S Shuttle in the early morning. Some subway station entrances and exits along the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade [route]( will be closed, along with street closures in Manhattan. [Read more here.]( - Service on the F train in Brooklyn will be suspended from Kings Highway to Coney Island - Stillwell Avenue from Friday night through Monday morning for signal system upgrades. - The Q line will not run south of Prospect Park this weekend. - The M train will not run from Myrtle-Broadway to Delancey-Essex starting 9:45 p.m. Friday through Monday morning. Transfer to the J train at Myrtle-Broadway for service to Manhattan. [Details here.]( - Check the [MTA's Thanksgiving 2023 official schedule]( for more changes this weekend. - Also remember: through the first quarter of 2024 the M train will not travel above 57th street, and the F train will run on the E line between Rockefeller Center and Jackson Heights-Roosevelt Ave. These changes to the F line means there's no subway service at Roosevelt Island, but the MTA is providing shuttle buses instead. More details [here](. This week in NYC transit history [a crowd at the Verrazzano Bridge opening in Staten Island ]( AP Photo Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge opens to traffic On Nov. 21, 1964, the largest bridge in New York City made its [highly anticipated debut]( realizing a long-sought connection between Staten Island and Brooklyn. It was the last major project completed by Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority Chairman Robert Moses before he was pushed out of the job in 1968, when the MTA formed and took over its operations. In an interview with the New York Times in 1980, Donald Trump claimed to have attended the ceremony, and cited it as a sort of origin story for his persona. By his account, politicians at the event didn’t give any credit to the bridge’s engineer, Othmar Herman Ammann. “The rain was coming down for hours while all these jerks were being introduced and praised,” Trump complained to the Times. He said he realized, “if you let people treat you how they want, you’ll be made a fool…I don’t want to be anybody’s sucker.” But Trump’s recollection of the opening is suspect. Author Gay Talese wrote there wasn’t a cloud in the sky that day. WNYC recordings of the ceremony capture Moses hailing Ammann as the “greatest living bridge engineer, perhaps the greatest of all time.” [Instagram]( [Instagram]( [Facebook]( [Facebook]( [YouTube]( [YouTube]( [New York Public Radio] [WNYC]( | [WQXR]( | [NJPR]( | [GOTHAMIST]( [WNYC STUDIOS]( | [THE GREENE SPACE]( Copyright © New York Public Radio. 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