Delancey Street–Essex Street (New York City Subway)
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The Delancey Street/Essex Street station is a
station Station may refer to: Agriculture * Station (Australian agriculture), a large Australian landholding used for livestock production * Station (New Zealand agriculture), a large New Zealand farm used for grazing by sheep and cattle ** Cattle statio ...
complex shared by the BMT Nassau Street Line and the
IND Sixth Avenue Line The IND Sixth Avenue Line is a rapid transit line of the B Division of the New York City Subway in the United States. It runs mainly under Sixth Avenue in Manhattan, and continues south to Brooklyn. The B, D, F, and M trains, which use th ...
s of the
New York City Subway The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the government of New York City and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, an affiliate agency of the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). Opened on October 2 ...
, located at the intersection of Essex and Delancey Streets on the
Lower East Side The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Traditionally an im ...
of Manhattan, just west of the Williamsburg Bridge. It is served by the: * F and J trains at all times * M train at all times except late nights * Z skip-stop and <F> trains during rush hours in the peak direction In addition to the two track levels—the BMT platforms are on the upper level, and the
IND Ind or IND may refer to: General * Independent (politician), a politician not affiliated to any political party * Independent station, used within television program listings and the television industry for a station that is not affiliated with ...
platforms are on the lower—an intermediate
mezzanine A mezzanine (; or in Italian language, Italian, a ''mezzanino'') is an intermediate floor in a building which is partly open to the double-height ceilinged floor below, or which does not extend over the whole floorspace of the building, a loft ...
built for the IND platforms provides the passenger connection between the two lines. As the BMT and the IND were originally separate systems, the transfer passageway was not within fare control until July 1, 1948. The full-time entrance is on the north side of Delancey Street, on either side of Essex Street. __TOC__


Station layout

Since June 2010, both the F and the M operate local along the Sixth Avenue Line north of the Delancey Street/Essex Street station. This resulted in many riders waiting in the stairwells connecting the Sixth Avenue Line's lower-level northbound platform, where the F stops, and the Nassau Street Line's upper-level southbound platform, where the M stops before merging onto the Sixth Avenue Line northbound. This phenomenon did not occur in other stations where two services have separate platforms before merging into the same direction, such as 50th Street–Eighth Avenue. In 2017, the MTA installed train-arrival "countdown clocks" across the New York City Subway system, which show how much time will elapse until the next train arrives on each respective platform.


Exits

Both the IND and the BMT stations have additional closed exits. The IND station had four additional exits; two were at both the north end of the station at
Rivington Street Rivington Street is a street in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which runs across the Lower East Side neighborhood, between the Bowery and Pitt Street, with a break between Chrystie and Forsyth for Sara D. Roosevelt Park. Vehicular traffi ...
and the other two were at the south end at Broome Street. Two of the staircases were sealed on street level, but metal trapdoors block the other two. A former exit to the southeastern corner of Rivington Street and Essex Street, adjacent to the rear of the Essex Street Market building, remains as a northern emergency exit, and a former exit to the southeastern corner of Broome Street and Essex Street similarly remains as a southern emergency exit. As part of the construction of the nearby
Essex Crossing Essex Crossing is an under-construction mixed-use development in New York City's Lower East Side, at the intersection of Delancey Street and Essex Street just north of Seward Park. Essex Crossing will comprise nearly of space on and will cos ...
development, Site 9 (120 Essex Street), located on the east side of Essex Street between Rivington and Delancey Streets, contains an easement for a future elevator entrance.


BMT Nassau Street Line platforms

The Essex Street station (announced as Delancey Street–Essex Street) on the BMT Nassau Street Line has three tracks, one side platform, and one island platform. The side platform is used by trains coming from the Williamsburg Bridge. The other two tracks serve the island platform. The middle track, which was formerly the peak-direction express track, is now used for outbound J and Z trains traveling over the Williamsburg Bridge on weekdays and late nights, as well as short turning M trains during weekends and late weekday evenings. After a 2004 reconfiguration, the former northbound local track south of this station was taken out of regular service. It was only used for occasional reroutes from Chambers Street until 2010. The
Chrystie Street Connection The Chrystie Street Connection is a set of New York City Subway tunnels running the length of Chrystie Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. It is one of the few track connections between lines of the former Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit ...
between Broadway–Lafayette Street and Essex Street was not used for regular revenue service from 1976 to 2010. On June 28, 2010, with the re-routing of M trains to the
IND Sixth Avenue Line The IND Sixth Avenue Line is a rapid transit line of the B Division of the New York City Subway in the United States. It runs mainly under Sixth Avenue in Manhattan, and continues south to Brooklyn. The B, D, F, and M trains, which use th ...
and
IND Queens Boulevard Line The IND Queens Boulevard Line, sometimes abbreviated as QBL, is a line of the B Division of the New York City Subway in Manhattan and Queens, New York City, United States. The line, which is underground throughout its entire route, contains 23 s ...
, the connection again saw regular use for those aforementioned trains only. This station is a bottleneck for eastbound trains, which are frequently delayed momentarily at this station because the island platform’s two eastbound tracks merge into one track upon leaving the station and before crossing the Williamsburg Bridge.


History

Next to the Brooklyn-bound local track is the closed Williamsburg Bridge Trolley Terminal, which was built along with the subway station and opened several months earlier. The terminal consisted of eight turning loops with low-level platforms which were used for trolley service from 1908 to 1948 that traveled over the Williamsburg Bridge to different parts of Brooklyn. The underground terminal for the subway adjacent to the trolley terminal opened on September 16, 1908. The station initially contained only two tracks which ended at the west end of the station. It also had an additional southern side platform adjacent to the trolley terminal, with the station organized in a Spanish solution. The station was rebuilt for through service from 1911 to 1913 for the Centre Street Subway to extend to Chambers Street. The rest of the subway line has four tracks while there was room at Essex Street station for only three tracks and two platforms. There is provision for a fourth track to run through the trolley terminal area and join the subway west of the trolley terminal, should a four-track subway station be wanted. For many years, the elevated train service was very intensive, and the fourth track at Essex Street would have been useful to handle the crowds, but at the same time, the trolley service was also well patronized, so no expansion was ever proposed. This would have added a second side platform to the south of the southernmost track, directly against the trolley terminal. The island platform would have been demolished to make room for the fourth track; alternatively, the fourth track would have been constructed adjacent to the southernmost track, resulting in a 2 side-platform, 1 island-platformed station, similar to the IRT platforms at Atlantic Avenue-Barclays Center. After streetcar service ended in 1948, the former track area on the south side of the bridge was rebuilt into auto lanes with a new ramp from street level closing off the former downhill ramp to the trolley terminal. The trolley terminal itself, however, was left vacant, and small portions were converted to storerooms and an emergency exit to the southern corners of Norfolk Street and Delancey Street. The vacant space was the proposed location of the LowLine, a planned underground park, but after fundraising proved unsuccessful, the project was indefinitely postponed in February 2020. Prior to 1913, the BMT station was also known as Delancey Street.


Image gallery

File:Essex Street (Nassau).JPG, Platform File:Essex Street BMT 9200.JPG, Name mosaic File:Essex Street BMT 9192.JPG, Letter mosaic File:Essex Street Abandoned Trolley Terminal vc.jpg, Abandoned trolley terminal File:LowLine Existing.png, Abandoned trolley terminal


IND Sixth Avenue Line platforms

The Delancey Street station (also announced as Delancey Street–Essex Street) on the
IND Sixth Avenue Line The IND Sixth Avenue Line is a rapid transit line of the B Division of the New York City Subway in the United States. It runs mainly under Sixth Avenue in Manhattan, and continues south to Brooklyn. The B, D, F, and M trains, which use th ...
has two tracks and two side platforms. The station has a part-time booth on the south side of Delancey Street and has two street staircases. Crossovers connect both platforms to the BMT platforms, which are above and perpendicular to the IND platforms. Both platforms have a renovated medium Parma violet trim line with a black border, as well as renovated tile captions in a different font, spaced farther apart, and far lower on the wall than the originals. Only the original mosaic name tablets remain, which read "DELANCEY ST." in white
sans-serif In typography and lettering, a sans-serif, sans serif, gothic, or simply sans letterform is one that does not have extending features called "serifs" at the end of strokes. Sans-serif typefaces tend to have less stroke width variation than seri ...
lettering on a dark Parma violet background and medium Parma violet border. The southbound platform is lined with indigo I-beam columns, while the northbound platform has tiled columns, both having the standard black station name plate with white lettering every other columns. In a departure from the norm of recent restorations, northbound platform columns that don't have the station name plate feature a large "D" composed of four tiles. The station formerly had two mezzanine areas, split by the BMT station. Twelve staircases, six on each platform, led to the mezzanine. Most were removed; only the stairs at the extreme north end and the extreme south end of both platforms remain as stairways to emergency exits and storage space. There are two large wall-sized pieces of artwork, one on each wall where the staircase exits and transfers are located. The artist for both glass mosaics is
Ming Fay Ming Fay () is a Shanghai-born and New York City-based sculptor and professor. His work focuses on the concept of the garden as a symbol of utopia and the relationship between man and nature. Drawing upon an extensive knowledge of plants both East ...
(2004). The artwork on the downtown side is titled ''Shad Crossing'' and details two giant
shad The Alosinae, or the shads,Alosinae
fish swimming, along with another wall mosaic of blue waters. In the late 19th century, shad were found along the Hudson River when new immigrants came to New York, many of whom settled on the Lower East Side. The new staircase to the relocated full-time booth also has another painting of a shad wrapped around the bottom of the stairs. The uptown platform is titled ''Delancey Orchard'' and has a cherry orchard tree mosaic, which symbolized the tree owned by the Delancey family in the 18th century. Miniature versions appear along all staircases leading from the Delancey Street platforms to either fare control. File:IND Sixth Delancey Street Mosaic.jpg, Original mosaic name tablet under renovated trim line File:IND Sixth Delancey Street D Tile.jpg, "D" tiles on alternating northbound platform columns File:DelanceyEssexOrchard.jpg, ''Delancey Orchard'' mosaic on the northbound platform File:DelanceyEssexArtwork.jpg, ''Shad Crossing'' mosaic on the southbound platform


Notes


References


External links

Subway station: * * * Station Reporter â€
Delancey Street/Essex Street Complex
* MTA's Arts For Transit â€

* [https://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=40.718648,-73.988135&spn=0,0.013765&z=17&layer=c&cbll=40.718768,-73.98808&panoid=IiyC_eyLMSN-gprYyyX6JA&cbp=12,259.63,,0,3.31 Delancey Street and Essex Street entrance from Google Maps Street View]
Delancey Street and Norfolk Street entrance from Google Maps Street View

IND platforms from Google Maps Street ViewWestbound BMT Platform from Google Maps Street ViewEastbound BMT Platform from Google Maps Street View
Trolley terminal: * Abandoned Stations â€

Joseph Brennan, Columbia University, 2001. {{DEFAULTSORT:Delancey Street-Essex Street (New York City Subway) Delancey Street–Essex Street (New York City Subway) IND Sixth Avenue Line stations New York City Subway transfer stations New York City Subway stations in Manhattan New York City Subway stations located underground Lower East Side BMT Nassau Street Line stations Railway stations in the United States opened in 1948 1948 establishments in New York City