Will the Port Authority Fix This?

Christopher Street station in the West Village is a mess. Always has been. It's dangerous and unsafe, especially under certain circumstance. One of those circumstances occurred today with the strike that hit the MTA transit system. A very heavy rush hour when the platform is teeming with people and the four turnstiles are a chokepoint as people rush in to catch their trains bump up against people trying to leave.

There was a line winding around the block to get into the station. That's not the dangerous and unsafe part. The dangerous part is that there is only one entrance/exit to the station, which winds down more than 50 steps to a narrow platform.

Not only is the station a throwback to an earlier era before the age of the Americans with Disabilities Act, but it's nearly 100 years old. And it's a deathtrap should an incident ever occur blocking the solitary entrance.

The last time this situation came to the attention of the Port Authority, it was right after 9/11 and the WTC PATH station was destroyed. Lower Manhattan could not be reached by PATH, so Christopher Street became the station closest to downtown. It quickly became apparent that the station was overwhelmed. Both it an 9th Street are accessible only by a narrow staircase, so the decision was made to limit entrance to the station during the morning rush, and no exits during the evening rush. It worked, but at the expense of long lines.

The Port Authority promised to look into building secondary entrances to the stations. They quickly ran into strong opposition from some of the local businesses that complained that the expanded station might harm the look and feel of the neighborhood. I kid you not. The sex shops and video stores complained that building a new entrance on Christopher Street might destroy the neighborhood, even though it might only reduce parking by several parking spots, and one or two businesses might have to be relocated/condemned for purposes of building the entrance and related services.

More than four years later, nothing has been accomplished and the problems remain. The stations are still dangerous and no closer to having a second entrance built. We're still waiting for an environmental impact study to be completed, but it seems odd to be taking four years to complete, especially when other projects were greenlighted in far less time. So, enough with the footdragging and community resistance. Get it done.