23rd Street Subway Station (Broadway Line)

23rd Street is a local station on the BMT Broadway Line of the New York City Subway. Located at the intersection of 23rd Street, Broadway, and Fifth Avenue in the Flatiron District of Manhattan, it is served by the R train at all times except late nights, the W train on weekdays, the N train during late nights and weekends, and the Q train during late nights.

History

This station opened on January 5, 1918, as the BMT Broadway Line was extended north from 14th Street–Union Square to Times Square–42nd Street and south to Rector Street. Service at this station was provided by local service running between Times Square and Rector Street. Service was extended one station to Whitehall Street–South Ferry on September 20, 1918. On August 1, 1920, the Montague Street Tunnel opened, extending local service from Lower Manhattan to DeKalb Avenue in Downtown Brooklyn by traveling under the East River.

On January 3, 1999, a schizophrenic man, Andrew Goldstein, pushed 32-year-old journalist and photographer Kendra Webdale onto the tracks from the Brooklyn-bound platform of this station. Webdale was then struck and killed by an oncoming N train. After two mistrials due to his mental incapacity, Goldstein pleaded guilty of manslaughter in October 2006 and sentenced to 23 years in prison. The incident led to the passing of Kendra's Law, which allows judges to order people suffering from certain psychological disorders to undergo regular treatment.

Station layout

This underground station has four tracks and two side platforms. The two center tracks are used by the N train on weekdays and Q train at all times except late nights. The platforms have their original trim line, which has "23" tablets on it at regular intervals and name tablets, which read "23RD STREET" in Times New Roman font.

This station's 1970s overhaul included fixing its structure and the overall appearance by replacing the original wall tiles, old signs, and incandescent lighting to the 1970s modern look wall tile band and tablet mosaics, signs and fluorescent lights. It also included fixing staircases and platform edges. In 2001, the station received a major state of repairs, including upgrading for ADA compliance, restoring the original late 1910s tiling, repairing the staircases, re-tiling for the walls, new tiling on the floors, upgrading the station's lights and the public address system, installing ADA yellow safety threads along the platform edge, new signs, and new trackbeds in both directions.

The 2002 artwork here is called Memories of Twenty-Third Street by Keith Godard. It consists of mosaics on the platform walls containing hats that famous people of the Flatiron District wore, including Oscar Wilde, Sarah Bernhardt, and W. E. B. Du Bois.

Exits

Each platform has two same-level fare control areas. The primary ones are at the north end. The Queens-bound platform has a bank of regular and high exit-only turnstiles, the station's full-time token booth, and four street stairs. Two go up to the northeast corner of Broadway and 23rd Street (outside Madison Square Park) and the other two go to the southeast. The Brooklyn-bound platform has a bank of regular and high exit-only turnstile, a now defunct customer assistance booth, and two street stairs. One is connected to fare control via a passageway and goes up to the southeast corner of 23rd Street and Fifth Avenue outside the Flatiron Building while the other goes up to the northeast corner of Broadway and Fifth Avenue, near a midblock pedestrian crossing.

The station's other two fare control areas are at the south end of the station. The one on the Manhattan-bound platform is unstaffed, containing High Entry-Exit Turnstiles and one staircase going up to the northeast corner of 22nd Street and Broadway. The one on the Brooklyn-bound platform is exit-only and has one staircase to the northwest corner of 22nd Street and Broadway. There is a crossunder here that is only used for emergencies and station facilities.

Text imported from Wikipedia article "23rd Street station (BMT Broadway Line)" and modified on June 2, 2020 according to the CC-BY-SA 4.0 International license.