The Lexington Avenue/51st Street station is a New York City Subway station complex on the IRT Lexington Avenue Line and IND Queens Boulevard Line. The station is located on Lexington Avenue and stretches from 51st Street to 53rd Street in Midtown Manhattan. It is served by the 6 and E trains at all times; the F train on weekdays during the day; the <6> train during weekdays in the peak direction; the <F> train during rush hours in the reverse peak direction; and the 4 train during late nights.
The complex comprises two stations: 51st Street on the Lexington Avenue Line and Lexington Avenue–53rd Street (originally Lexington–Third Avenues) on the Queens Boulevard Line. Originally two separate stations, these were connected in 1988 via a transfer passage, which was opened with the construction of 599 Lexington Avenue. Approximately 50,000 riders transfer between the Lexington Avenue and Queens Boulevard Lines each weekday.
In 2024, the station complex had an annual ridership of 12,536,617, making it the twelfth-busiest in the system.
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History IRT Lexington Avenue Line
Planning and construction Following the completion of the original subway line operated by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT), there were plans to construct the Broadway–Lexington Avenue Line along Manhattan's east side. The New York Public Service Commission adopted plans for what was known as the Broadway–Lexington Avenue route on December 31, 1907.Engineering News, A New Subway Line for New York City , Volume 63, No. 10, March 10, 1910 The Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company (BRT; after 1923, the Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit Corporation or BMT) submitted a proposal to the Commission, dated March 2, 1911, to operate this line as part of the tri-borough system. Originally, the commission had assigned the operation of the Lexington Avenue Line in Manhattan to the BRT, as the IRT had withdrawn from negotiations over the proposed tri-borough system. The IRT proposed in December 1911 that it be assigned the Lexington Avenue Line, in exchange for dropping its opposition to the BRT's operation of the Broadway Line. The Lexington Avenue Line was to connect with the IRT's existing subway north of Grand Central–42nd Street. The IRT submitted an offer for what became its portion of the Dual Contracts on February 27, 1912.
The Dual Contracts, two operating contracts between the city and the BMT and IRT, were adopted on March 4, 1913, and signed on March 19. The IRT was authorized to construct a local station on its Lexington Avenue Line at 51st Street. The Public Service Commission planned to split the original Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT) system from looking like a "Z" system (as seen on a map) to an H-shaped system. The original system would be split into three segments: two north–south lines, carrying through trains over the Lexington Avenue and Broadway–Seventh Avenue Lines, and a west–east shuttle under 42nd Street. This would form a roughly H-shaped system. It was predicted that the subway extension would lead to the growth of the Upper East Side and the Bronx. The IRT was authorized to construct a local station on its Lexington Avenue Line at Lexington Avenue and 51st Street. Contracts for the section of the line south of 53rd Street had still not been awarded by early 1914 because of the changes to the original plans.
In May 1914, the Public Service Commission began soliciting bids for the construction of section 7 of the Lexington Avenue Line, which stretched between 43rd and 53rd Streets and included a station at 51st Street. IRT subsidiary Rapid Transit Subway Construction Company received a $1,915,164 contract to build section 7 the next month. The Public Service Commission received the rights in July 1915 to build subway entrances within the Nursery and Child's Hospital at the southeastern corner of Lexington Avenue and 51st Street, which would have served the IRT station there. Although the Lexington Avenue Line north of 53rd Street was almost completed by the end of 1915, that segment could not be opened because the rest of the line was not complete. In particular, the section between 43rd and 53rd Streets was only 37 percent done. Work on section 7 of the line was delayed in mid-1916 when numerous workers went on strike. Section 7 was 42 percent complete by September 1916 and was 77 percent finished by the following March.
Opening and early years The 51st Street station opened on July 17, 1918, with service initially running between Grand Central–42nd Street and 167th Street via the line's local tracks. On August 1, the "H system" was put into place, with through service beginning on the new east and west side trunk lines, and the institution of the 42nd Street Shuttle along the old connection between the sides. The cost of the extension from Grand Central was $58 million. As part of an experiment, the IRT installed four "feather-weight-pressure" turnstiles at the station in 1921 to speed up passenger flow. The city government took over the IRT's operations on June 12, 1940.
IND Queens Boulevard Line The Queens Boulevard Line was one of the first built by the city-owned Independent Subway System (IND), and was planned to stretch between the IND Eighth Avenue Line in Manhattan and 178th Street and Hillside Avenue in Jamaica, Queens, with a stop at Lexington Avenue.See:
Board of Transportation of the City of New York Engineering Department, Proposed Additional Rapid Transit Lines And Proposed Vehicular Tunnel, dated August 23, 1929 The line was first proposed in 1925. Bids for the 53rd Street subway tunnel were received in October 1926, and work started in April 1927. The 53rd Street Tunnel was fully excavated between Queens and Manhattan in January 1929. The First Avenue Association suggested that an entrance to the Lexington Avenue/53rd Street station on the Queens Boulevard Line be built on Second Avenue, but the New York City Board of Transportation declined to do so, citing high costs and underground obstructions.
The Lexington Avenue/53rd Street station opened on August 19, 1933, with the opening of the IND Queens Boulevard Line to Roosevelt Avenue in Queens. Service was initially provided by E trains running via the IND Eighth Avenue Line.* The opening of the 53rd Street Line caused a steep increase in business activity along the corridor. By January 1934, the Lexington Avenue station was the busiest on the Queens Boulevard Line, surpassing the Roosevelt Avenue station. On December 15, 1940, the IND Sixth Avenue Line opened between West Fourth Street–Washington Square and 59th Street–Columbus Circle. On this date, trains began using this station, diverging west of the station onto the Sixth Avenue Line.*
Modifications and station renovations
1960s and 1970s In 1966, an agreement was reached with the developers of 345 Park Avenue to remove the entrance at the corner of 51st Street and Lexington Avenue and replace it with a new entrance at the same corner adjacent to the building. A group of private citizens, the Fund for Better Subway Stations, announced in September 1968 that it would donate $450,000 to beautify the station. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) intended to provide matching funds for the project, but it had not approved a contract for the renovation by early 1970.
In July 1968, MTA subsidiary New York City Transit Authority (NYCTA) completed plans to construct a -long free transfer passageway between the north end of the 51st Street station and the Lexington Avenue mezzanine of the Lexington Avenue station. Construction on the project was supposed to start in early 1969. On December 12, 1969, the NYCTA put the estimated $2.5 million contract up for bid. The passageway was not built at the time; passengers still had to exit to the street and pay an extra fare to transfer between the stations. This caused overcrowding on the Flushing Line, which did have direct interchanges with the Lexington Avenue and Queens Boulevard lines. By 1970, the IND's Lexington Avenue station was among the subway system's 12 worst bottlenecks for passenger flow. The escalators at the western end of the IND station were replaced in 1977, and a new subway entrance was built as part of the construction of Citicorp Center in the late 1970s.
1980s Renovations of the IRT's 51st Street station and the IND's Lexington Avenue station were funded as part of the MTA's 1980–1984 capital plan. Madison Equities, the developer of an office building at 875 Third Avenue, agreed in 1981 to expand the IND station and add a retail arcade in exchange for of additional space. The developer was unable to complete the subway expansion because of the presence of holdout tenants in four brownstones, which occupied the site of the proposed subway entrance. The New York City Planning Commission mandated that two floors of 875 Third Avenue could not be occupied unless the subway improvements were completed, or unless Madison Equities had attempted to buy out the holdout tenants. Following various legal disputes, Madison Equities finally bought out the holdout tenants in the late 1980s and completed the subway expansion.
Boston Properties, which was developing a skyscraper at 599 Lexington Avenue between 52nd and 53rd Streets, proposed in 1984 to construct a passageway between 52nd Street and the IND mezzanine at 53rd Street. The MTA would concurrently build the section of the passageway between 51st and 52nd Streets. The 36-foot-wide passageway would be bisected by a glass wall, which would allow passengers to transfer between the stations within fare control while also allowing the public to use it without paying a fare. In exchange, Boston Properties would be permitted to add to its building, expanding the structure's floor area by 20 percent. Manhattan Community Board 6 endorsed the plans in January 1984, and New York City Board of Estimate approved the proposal that April. Vollmer Associates was hired to design the free transfer passageway. Gerald D. Hines, the developer of the Lipstick Building at 885 Third Avenue, was similarly allowed to expand his building's floor area by 20 percent in late 1984 after he agreed to add an entrance to the IND station from just outside his building.
Construction of the transfer passageway had begun by early 1986 and lasted three and a half years. During the passage's construction, in June 1986, an old water main broke and flooded the station. To speed up passenger flow, dozens of platform conductors were assigned to direct crowds on the IND platform during the late 1980s. Additionally, the MTA began installing elevators at the 51st Street IRT station in 1986, making it one of the first wheelchair-accessible stations in the subway system. By December 1988, Boston Properties had completed its half of the transfer passageway and opened a new subway entrance. However, the MTA's portion of the passageway was delayed by the presence of utilities, as well as the fact that workers had encountered solid rock rather than soft ground. The passageway between the IRT and IND platforms opened on June 26, 1989, two years behind schedule. Boston Properties had contributed $13 million on the project, while the MTA spent $10 million. The passageway was expected to be used by 20,000 daily passengers at the time of its completion. A reporter for Newsday wrote: "Were it not for the concept of developer shakedown, those two lines would still not meet."
1990s to present