For the first time in its 115-year history, New York City had decided to shut down its entire subway system Wednesday morning.
The big move was made by The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) so they could deep clean the subways stations to avoid the spread of the coronavirus. “Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures,” MTA Chairman Patrick Foye explained during a late-night news conference Tuesday.
It was said that the cleanings will be done on a nightly basis, from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. When the cleaning is done, every single subway car will be disinfected. The New York City subway has been shut down because of weather: Hurricane Irene in 2011 and Hurricane Sandy in 2012. During the blizzard of 2015, the system canceled passenger service but equipment trains kept running. However, as the news site notes, this is the first planned overnight shutdown since the system opened 115 years ago.
So how will commuters travel? Well, according to CNN, the MTA will be accommodating the loss of train service by adding several hundred buses to its typical overnight routes to make sure essential workers have access to transportation.
