New York City Rides Out an Unprecedented Transit Crisis

The coronavirus pandemic struck the largest public transit system in the U.S. just as it was beginning to recover from a long-standing funding and service crisis. Back in 2017, New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo declared a “state of emergency” for the New York City subway system and the agency that runs it, the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Aging infrastructure, political squabbles and crowding had pushed the system to the brink, and the MTA embarked on a $54 billion campaign to improve service, with new subway cars and buses, refurbished tracks and stations, and modernized signals.

But progress on those investments has been dramatically disrupted by Covid-19, which saw MTA ridership plunge by more than 90%. As the city went into lockdown in March 2020, New Yorkers were faced with an unprecedented mass transit challenge: how to save the system that keeps the city alive.