NYC NOW - East Harlem Awaits Second Avenue Subway. But at What Cost?

Episode Date: July 19, 2025

More than a century after its plans for the Second Avenue Subway began, the MTA is set to launch the next phase of the project which would bring new stations to East Harlem. WNYC’s Ramsey Khalifeh unpacks how this long-promised investment could transform the neighborhood and what residents fear it might cost them.

What's the longest you've ever waited for something? Maybe it was a puppy your parents promised you when you were five years old that you're still waiting for in your 30s. Forget a girl, bite the bullet and buy your own puppy. But what if it's a new subway line? Could you wait over a century? For uptown residents in East Harlem, if they've been alive that long, the promise of the 2nd Avenue subway started over 100 years ago.

It wasn't until 2017 when the MTA finally completed the first phase of the project, which extended the Q line to 96th Street. But that's in the wealthy Upper East Side. Soon, the next phase of the project is set to begin, extending the line into East Harlem. This is NYC now from WMYC. I'm Jenei Pierre. Happy Saturday. I'm with WMYC's Ramsey Caliphé, who reports on the city's transportation systems both public and private. Ramsey, what can you tell us about the Second Avenue subway? And most importantly, why has it taken so long?

I think we have to do a little history lesson. So well before we had the MTA, the subway system was a bunch of different private companies, waging war against each other, trying to offer New Yorkers the best subway service possible. You actually had to get out of a station and look at maps of other systems just to figure out transfers and how to get around. It was pretty confusing. Oh, my God. Also, add on top of that, subways are already. a new technology and you've never seen something like this before.

And we're talking about a time with no Google Maps. No Google, nothing. Nothing. So there were companies like the independent subway system, interboro rapid transit, even something called the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company. It was actually the independent subway system that first pitched the idea in 1920. And that idea had legs. So they decided decades later, we're going to completely demolish elevated subway lines on

second and third avenues, which today I can't. imagine seeing that in Manhattan. Can't picture it at all. Exactly. So they do that decades later. And it wasn't actually until 1969 when all those private companies become a public state-run agency called the MTA, as we know it today. And they're the ones who decide, you know what, we have the funding, we have the idea, let's actually get this project done. They actually start digging, but fiscal crisis in 1975 completely shut down the work. Can't do it. And do it. anything without the dollars. Can't do anything. So that tunnel that they started is still there, and the MTA plans on using it for the East Harlem extension of the Second Avenue subway.

And another important point in between all that is in 2017, we had the first phase, which went through the Upper East Side. That obviously took a lot of time, but it was to the benefit of a lot of wealthy Upper East Siders. Yeah. Now we're trying to benefit residents in East Harlem, and that's where this next phase is coming to, which is very different because, it's one of the poorest neighborhoods in New York City. I know you spent a lot of time there talking to residents, so tell me what you heard from them. Yeah, so I went to the area directly around East 125th Street,

and that's where the four, five, and six lines run. And it's a quite unique place, mostly because it's a commercial strip with a mix of fast food restaurants, cultural centers, and a lot of empty lots that were once retail spaces. And the MTA raised these buildings in anticipation of this project actually happening. So I visited that neighborhood every week for about a month.

And I want to take listeners there to that commercial strip and meet the people I met who have many opinions and questions about what this new train line could mean for East Harlem. Michael Brown takes the train to the East 125th Street and Lexington Avenue subway station almost every day to visit a safe injection site. He says he can get his fix safely here without being bothered. What brings me here? If you experiment with drugs, you can go there and use drugs.

legally and you won't be penalized by the police because it keeps people off the street. Brown is homeless. He says he's been in and around East Harlem for decades. The drop-in center is just a block north of the busy subway station, which sees more violent crime than any other in the city. The surrounding streets are usually littered in the area's notorious for open drug use. Do you mind if I ask what drugs you've used or do currently use? Hello, cocaine. My brother died from heroin.

and that was a great loss for me. East Harlem is the poorest neighborhood in Manhattan. For decades, it's received little investment despite being adjacent to the Upper East Side, one of the city's wealthiest areas. Long-time East Harlem resident Bobby Jones says the state of the neighborhood keeps people away. I mean, look at the neighborhood.

It needs a facelift, you know, to bring more attraction here. You know what I'm saying? Because if people see graffiti and all this stuff like this, drugs and needles on. the ground, they ain't gonna want to come around here. But that might change. The MTA is finally extending the 2nd Avenue subway into East Harlem.

It'll run up from 96th Street along 2nd Avenue. Then it'll end at a completely overhauled station at Lexington and 1 25th. Many locals aren't holding their breath. Here's Sanford McLeod, who's lived in the neighborhood for decades. I don't know nothing but that nonsense. I think taking a long time. Other locals, like 70-year-old James Gromes,

are more optimistic. He can't wait for the new subway and the changes it's expected to break. rank. Any upgrade is positive. Definitely. It makes the trains go move faster, and people tend to respect it more, I say. Federal documents show the subway extension won't open for service until 2032.

But the project is set to change the neighborhood long before then, sparking fears of gentrification from longtime residents like Sabine Blazin. She works at the Caribbean Cultural Center on East 125th Street. And we don't want to just be a community where there's, warriors and tourists looking at what once was or looking at our culture as is, but we can't really thrive and live and function and work in the community. Change is already visible. Several retail spaces along 1 25th Street have shut down in recent years and turned into

empty lots where the new station will go in. It's a real catch-22 situation about transportation infrastructure and the potential for gentrification. Rachel Weinberger is with the Regional Plan Association. She says urban planners and the MTA have to strike a balance when they undertake a project that has such far-reaching ramifications for a neighborhood. There's a concern that there's insufficient access provided to the population that's living there now, the current population. And the trick is how to provide access without creating displacement. Like the construction of the new subway line, that kind of displacement could take decades. In the meantime, residents are fighting for more immediate investment into East Harlem.

One way to quickly fix up any neighborhood is to secure money to clean up the streets and sidewalks. And that's exactly what local resident Carrie King is doing now. She's director of a nonprofit that enlists a small crew to pick up trash around the area. As a nonprofit, we fundraise for what we can fundraise. But with a bid, you have dedicated funding coming in every year to pay for these things. New legislation allows King to form East Harlem's first ever business improvement district, also known as a bid. Once that's up and running, King says it will help make her clean up efforts in the area permanent. King is also working to organize businesses in the community ahead of the 2nd Avenue subway opening.

A very wise person once referred to it as a jewelry box where all the necklaces are tangled up, and you really have to sit there and work with your fingers to undo the knots. That's what it's like here. While the MTA has not announced when construction will begin in the area, officials say they're working out a contract to dig out the tunnel for the new line later this year. Stay close. More on the 2nd Avenue subway and its next phase after the break. Gentrification is a really interesting topic.

In the story we hear from Rachel Weinberg of the Regional Plan Association, and she calls it a catch-22. Ramsey, what does she mean by that? Well, to understand what gentrification is in a kind of a different way than I guess the average person might understand it as, it typically starts from major government infrastructure investments. That can then prompt major developers to decide we'll pursue housing projects in this neighborhood because it's now more desirable. The community in East Harlem has lacked a subway forever.

They had those elevated lines, but that was, again, over a hundred years ago. It made the area and the neighborhood less accessible. It made housing cheaper, but it also created a reason for it to be neglected by the government for any. investments, whether it's keeping the street clean or building new housing that is more desirable. Now the subway is finally being built and the people who have lived in the neighborhood making it what it is today fear that they'll be displaced if these new investments start to roll in. And rightfully so. I mean, aren't there fears valid?

They're absolutely valid because this is something that's happened across the city, especially when you think of Williamsburg and the L train. The proliferation of that system really changed the neighborhood because it was so accessible to a lot of New Yorkers. The next steps of gentrification is the migration of new people into these neighborhoods, who then, for example, decide to open up hip coffee shops, artisanal stores, host new community events, let's say, that weren't happening there before. That's how maybe the average person sees what gentrification is, but that's typically what

comes after. So when Rachel's talking about that as a Catch-22 situation, it is how do we make this more accessible for the current population and how do we prevent them from actually being pushed away from that and maybe it will benefit somebody new. So a way that everyone can benefit. Exactly. But we should note it's a decades-long process. This doesn't happen tomorrow or it doesn't even happen the second the new subway line gets there. This is really interesting, Ramsey. And I know you talked with so many people in your reporting for this story. But it seems like although residents understand, you know, the risk of gentrification, they're still on board to welcome the

2nd Avenue subway. Exactly. And there's so many more people who can add to this conversation. I spent some time to maybe figure this out better in the current subway station on 1 25th Street and Lexington Avenue. And as I kind of explain in the feature, this station and also the surrounding areas are notorious for open drug use. There is a drop in center, a block away.

people are allowed to use drugs in a safe environment. There's littered streets and there's a history of crime in that subway station. So Vital City, which is a urban policy think tank in New York City, they wrote a report early this year about subway crime from the year before, so in 2024. And they found that this station in particular ranked highest in the total amount of violent crimes recorded in the system. In the subway only. In the subway only, exactly. Righters who I spoke with who ride the four, five, and six have told me frequently that they're scared of going to the station late at night or they've seen violent crime between people, whether it's just riders or homeless individuals who have nowhere else to go. And what I did instead was show them this mock up design of what the new subway station would look like on Park Avenue, which is right across the street, and it would connect to this existing station. So you look at these designs, it's a lot of glass, open air.

It's a big contrast to a lot of subway stations we see in New York that are dark and cavernous and maybe scary at night to go to. Definitely. So these people I met have lived in this neighborhood collectively for many, many decades. One man I met is named Chris Lucero. He's 43 years old. And he told me something that I thought was quite extreme. So I asked him about the state of the neighborhood, about the subway station. And there were homeless people walking by, and he likened the homeless men and women to trash.

and to hear that is quite extreme, obviously. He said something along the lines of, if these people live in trash, they become trash. So when he told me that, I said, so do you feel like the risks that come with, let's say a new train line and this overinvestment, a risk that might affect you and your family if you get priced out, do you care about that?

And he said, no, I'd rather see changes here. We need changes here. I think that speaks to some of the tension that people feel in this neighborhood. Yeah. So let's bring it back, Ramsey. Like we discussed, the first phase of the 2nd Avenue subway was built through the Upper East Side. How can the first part of the project inform what might happen in East Harlem?

The two neighborhoods are very different, but the first phase, I think, can really give New Yorkers a preview of what we might see in East Harlem. So there's this method called imminent domain. It allows the government to seize private property anywhere in the country, city government, if it's in the interest of the public. So the MTA actually used this in the first phase. So what does that actually look like? If a New York City residential building is in the location of where we want to build our new subway station, we as the MTA, the state government, have the right to purchase it at market value and kick everybody out and just completely demolish it.

So I'm sure you can imagine if you've been somebody who's lived in a building for 20 years, 30 years, maybe for multiple generations, and the government comes in and says, We plan to build a new subway station. It's opening in 10 years, but in order to get that done, we need you to move out next year. We'll give you a check, maybe to get a new apartment, or even help you find a new apartment. That's one pretty daunting, but it's actually what happened during the first phase in the Upper East Side. Oh, wow, really? Yeah, there were residents in several buildings in the neighborhood who were given this contract, not to fully move out, but to temporarily move out.

And that obviously upended a lot of people's lives. some people might have had access to alternative housing for that amount of time, but others don't. And if you can imagine in a neighborhood that's poorer, it makes it a lot less flexible for the average person to do that. Sure. So for phase two, MTE documents show that at least 15 buildings will be taken over by the MTA. So that includes apartments, the Church of Scientology in East Harlem that's on East 125th Street, and other small businesses. So these people have to leave their businesses, leave their homes and their church homes. Yes, they have to completely leave.

Not every building, some are temporary where they have to just close off a water line or make some adjustments. But some people, including families that I'm starting to meet, have to completely move out and find housing elsewhere. So in the Upper East Side, construction was just so bad that the city said, as the project neared its completion, we're going to help promote businesses and people to come to these businesses. So there was the shop second avenue metro cards. There was also a second avenue restaurant week. And that was just an attempt to get New Yorkers in a neighborhood and maybe in other neighborhoods to come and be a part of these businesses again because they lost out so much from the construction.

Desperate for foot traffic. Exactly. And I've been speaking with some business owners now in East Harlem who are warning me, not that their retail spaces are being closed up, but that if the construction begins and it looks like it's going to happen, obviously, that they're just going to and decide to close up shop completely to avoid the huge loss in foot traffic that they might get. That's WMYC's Ramsey Caliphate. Ramsey, thanks so much for your reporting. Thanks, Janay.

And thank you for listening to NYC now from WMYC. I'm Jeney Pierre. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.