Briarwood (IND Queens Boulevard Line)

Briarwood
New York City Subway rapid transit station

One of the platforms with the old "Van Wyck Boulevard" mosaic.
Station statistics
Address Main Street & Queens Boulevard
Queens, NY 11435
Borough Queens
Locale Briarwood
Coordinates 40°42′35″N 73°49′11″W / 40.70969°N 73.8196°W / 40.70969; -73.8196Coordinates: 40°42′35″N 73°49′11″W / 40.70969°N 73.8196°W / 40.70969; -73.8196
Division B (IND)
Line IND Queens Boulevard Line
Services       E  (nights after 9:00 p.m. and weekends)
      F  (all times)
Transit connections NYCT Bus: Q20A, Q20B, Q44 SBS, QM21, X63, X64, X68
MTA Bus: Q60
Structure Underground
Platforms 2 side platforms
Tracks 4
Other information
Opened April 24, 1937 (1937-04-24)
Accessibility Same-platform wheelchair transfer available
Wireless service [1][2]
Former/other names Van Wyck Boulevard (1937–1988)
Briarwood – Van Wyck Boulevard (1988–2015)
Traffic
Passengers (2015) 1,479,278[3] Increase 3.7%
Rank 311 out of 422
Station succession
Next north Sutphin Boulevard: F 
Jamaica – Van Wyck (Archer): E 
Next south Kew Gardens – Union Turnpike: E  F 

Briarwood, formerly Briarwood – Van Wyck Boulevard or Van Wyck Boulevard (/vænwaɪkˈ/), is a local station on the IND Queens Boulevard Line of the New York City Subway. Located at the intersection of 84th Drive, Main Street, Queens Boulevard, and the Van Wyck Expressway, in Briarwood, Queens, bordering Kew Gardens, it is served by the F at all times and the E at all times except rush hours and middays.

Station layout

G Street Level Exit/ Entrance
M Mezzanine Fare control, station agent
P
Platform level		 Side platform, doors will open on the right
Southbound local ← toward World Trade Center (weekends) (Kew Gardens – Union Turnpike)
← toward Coney Island – Stillwell Avenue (Kew Gardens – Union Turnpike)
Southbound express ← does not stop here (weekdays)
Northbound express → does not stop here (weekdays) →
Northbound local → toward Jamaica Center – Parsons/Archer (weekends) (Jamaica – Van Wyck) →
→ toward Jamaica – 179th Street (Sutphin Boulevard) →
Side platform, doors will open on the right
Police station

This station has two side platforms and four tracks. The platforms have Slate Blue columns, a Jasmine Yellow tile trim with black borders, and name tablets containing "VAN WYCK BLVD." in white lettering on a black border with matching yellow trimming.

The full-length mezzanine is directly above the platforms. It is separated into three sections with two black fences. Fare control is in the middle and there is no free transfer between directions. The full-time exit is via a long passageway to Main Street and Queens Boulevard. Another pair of exits exists at the southwestern corner of Queens Boulevard and Van Wyck Expressway, one next to Maple Grove Cemetery, the other next to the Van Wyck Expressway. Another entrance on the north side of the Queens Boulevard overpass over the Van Wyck Expressway formerly existed, but was later demolished. The station mezzanine has hosted the NYPD Transit Bureau's District 20 station house since the mid-1990s.

Track layout

To the west of this station are track connections from both the express and local tracks to Jamaica Yard.

Just to the compass south (railroad north) of this station, the IND Archer Avenue Line splits from the Queens Boulevard Line in a flying junction; trains to/from the Archer Avenue line can serve the station as local trains or bypass it as express trains. At the split, the Archer Avenue tracks originate between each respective pair of express and local Queens Boulevard tracks. The connection uses trackways that were constructed at the same time as the station, part of the section of the Queens Boulevard Line from Kew Gardens – Union Turnpike to 169th Street. The provision (then known as the "Van Wyck Stub") was intended to be used by the proposed Van Wyck Boulevard Line going towards Rockaway Boulevard, part of a planned major system expansion that was never built. When construction of the Archer Avenue Line began on August 15, 1972, as part of the Program for Action,[4] the original tunnels were used for the project, and new tiles and tracks were added. These tunnels are now used for trains going to and from Jamaica Center – Parsons/Archer, opened in 1988.[5] The Van Wyck Boulevard right-of-way is currently used by the elevated AirTrain JFK, though it makes no stops along the corridor.

There are punch boxes on the Jamaica-bound track of this station to allow trains to go to either the Hillside Avenue or Archer Avenue lines.

Renovation

Former northern stair, demolished in 2011

The station was rebuilt, with new exits, as part of the $147 million Kew Gardens Interchange reconstruction project, which includes bridge replacement of the Queens Boulevard overpass over Van Wyck Expressway. The contract for reconstruction of the station, was bid on and won by Ecco and costed $9.9 million.[6] In 2011, the north entrance was demolished as part of rebuilding the interchange, leaving the southern exit bordering Maple Grove Cemetery as the sole entrance and exit.[7] A new entrance is being built next to Archbishop Molloy High School on Main Street; another exit on the same site had been closed since 2010.[8] Another new entrance currently exists on the south side of Queens Boulevard between the Van Wyck Expressway service and main roads.

Renovation, started in 2010, will be completed by 2016, and will include a new elevator entrance and rebuilt, widened mezzanine corridors.[8] However, delays abounded, including the fact that the new Main Street exit was delayed, having been pushed back from August 2012, to October 2013, and then again to March 2014; lead paint needed to be removed, costing $0.3 million; and plans were changed during construction, costing $1.7 million.[9] The opening of the new Main Street exit was subsequently pushed forward to February 2014, then back again to May 2014 with elevator work to begin after the new entrance opened; the elevator was to be complete by late 2014 or early 2015.[10]

Naming

The station's original name was Van Wyck Boulevard. Van Wyck Boulevard was the name of the wide thoroughfare that existed when the station opened in 1937. The Van Wyck Expressway was built over the boulevard in the early 1950s. The name was changed to Briarwood – Van Wyck Boulevard in 1997 or 1998 to avoid confusion with Jamaica – Van Wyck on the IND Archer Avenue Line.[11]

In August 2014, it was announced that the station would be renamed again, to Briarwood since it better reflected the neighborhood of Briarwood, serviced by the station, and since "Van Wyck Boulevard" does not characterize the area well (the now-expressway runs through several other neighborhoods in Queens).[12] State Senator Tony Avella and local community groups pressed for the name change. The legislation, proposed in January 2013, passed the New York State Assembly on June 19, 2014.[13] The station was formally renamed on April 17, 2015.[14][15]

In popular culture

In the 1988 comedy film Coming to America, Eddie Murphy's character, Akeem, tries to persuade his love interest to marry him and go to Zamunda, a fictional kingdom in Africa. He follows her onto the Briarwood station. When Akeem jumps the turnstile, "Van Wyck Boulevard" can be seen in the background above the token booth. They board the train which next stops at the Sutphin Boulevard station where she gets off.[16] This scene, however, was actually shot at the unused platform and tracks of Hoyt–Schermerhorn Streets station in Brooklyn.

References

  1. ↑ NYC Subway Wireless
  2. ↑ More Subway Stations in Manhattan, Bronx in Line to Get Online, mta.info (March 25, 2015). "The first two phases included stations in Midtown Manhattan and all underground stations in Queens with the exception of the 7 Main St terminal."
  3. ↑ "Facts and Figures: Annual Subway Ridership". Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Retrieved 2016-04-19.
  4. ↑ nycsubway.org—The 1968 MTA "Program for Action"
  5. ↑ Johnson, Kirk (1988-12-09). "Big Changes For Subways Are to Begin". The New York Times. Retrieved 2009-07-05.
  6. ↑ Joe Marvilli (2014-01-02). "Briarwood Construction End Date Pushed Back". Queens Tribune. Retrieved 2014-08-27.
  7. ↑ Melissa Chan. "Construction to close subway entrance". Queens Courier. Retrieved 2014-08-27.
  8. 1 2 Ewa Kern-Jedrychowska (2013-05-28). "Entrance Slated To Open in Fall". DNA Info. Retrieved 2014-08-27.
  9. ↑ Ewa Kern-Jedrychowska (2013-12-19). "Entrance Slated To Open in Fall". DNA Info. Retrieved 2014-08-27.
  10. ↑ Christopher Barca (2014-01-23). "Subway station work continues in 2014". Queens Chronicle. Retrieved 2014-08-27.
  11. ↑ A neighborhood association for the area in which the station lies campaigned for the name change in 1997 ("What's in a Name? All Aboard for Briarwood!". Newsday. 1997-04-13. Retrieved 2013-02-07.) A page on the Queens Boulevard line on New York City Subway Resources accessed in 1998 includes this phrase in the station's description: "This station has a new secondary name, Briarwood, that hasn't appeared on the map yet."
  12. ↑ Greg Mocker (2016-04-10). "Neighbors want the name of subway station changed". PIX11. Retrieved 2014-08-27.
  13. ↑ "Briarwood station closer to renaming". Queens Chronicle. 2014-08-07. Retrieved 2014-08-23.
  14. ↑ "Briarwood-Van Wyck Boulevard Subway Station Gets Simpler Name". NY1. 2015-04-17. Retrieved 2015-04-22.
  15. ↑ Alina Suriel (17 April 2015). "Briarwood station name shortened". Queens Courier. Retrieved 22 April 2015.
  16. ↑ "'COMING TO AMERICA'". Queens Chronicle. Retrieved 28 April 2016.

External links

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