Citing budget shortfalls in the face of a drop in real estate taxes, the MTA last week delayed a host of key improvements to the transit network postponing previously announced service enhancements to 11 heavily traveled rail lines and several bus lines throughout the city.
The $21 million dollar shortfall comes on the heels of a larger postponement until at least 2010 of the $2.7 billion infrastructure renovation of 19 subway stations in Brooklyn and the Bronx. Rising construction and energy costs have been cited as the preventing planned fixes to ventilation, lighting, and structural systems along the 
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Straphangers will likely debate the “most dire” station among the 734 rail and subway stations citywide, but a strong case can be made the rickety Smith-9th Street in Gowanus.
Nestled 90 feet above the street, the 75 year-old station along the F and G lines has seen better eras. Peeling paint and rusting metal add worn flair to a station that, particularly with its wooden siding, has an air of structural incompleteness to an already precarious perch on the elevated rail line.
In honor of the MTA’s delays and fiscal straits, we bring you the work of Steve Duncan, explorer, photographer and historian of New York’s vestigial infrastructure. His explorations of the subterranean urban realm have taken him into abandoned asylums, aqueducts, and subway lines throughout New York – with side trips in Chicago and Denver, among others – highlighting the forgotten workmanship of a previous age.
His expertise has recently caught the eye of Hollywood producers, who are tapping his knowledge to find the perfectly dank environs for an upcoming sci fi television project.
Duncan’s photography and writing can be found at undercity.org.
1 Comment
July 15, 2008 at 9:19 pm
Too bad.
If only they would re-privatize the system and create a legal environment for expansion.
The city will outstrip the transit infrastructure if this is not done.
Good post!