167 Street
167 Street is another Concourse Line subway station where the subway line crosses above a nearby street, in a box above a street underpass. This street is 167 Street and at one time there were exits directly to both sidewalks on the sides of the underpass, plus down to two separate narrow islands between two lanes of traffic that led to bus boarding islands first for streetcars until 1948 and later buses. The Bx35 stopped in the underpass until 1990 at their own dedicated platforms. In 1990 for safety and security concerns Bx35 buses were relocated to stop on the service roads/ramps and the surface of the Grand Concourse removing it's dedicated bus stops in the underpass.
The station is a Concourse line local stop with two side platforms for the 3 track subway line. The platforms have the yellow color scheme with a two tile wide yellow trimline that has a narrow black boarder. The name tablets say 167 St. and are simply white text on black with no border. Name tablets at IND stations without a border are extremely unusual and the only other stop with them is this station's sister station 170 Street. The platform and mezzanine area columns are yellow. The white tiles that line the station are unusual since they are brick shaped and not normal square subway tile shaped.
The namesake 167 Street entrance has four levels. Starting at street level there are entrances from all four corners of the local/service roads of 167 Street and the Grand Concourse, these lead down to a narrow by IND standards mezzanine nestled beneath this intersection. The full-time token booth faces a bank of turnstiles and a single staircase down to each platform. On the mezzanine outside of fare control are closed, fenced off staircases that once led to small on platform 'mezzanine' areas that had High Entrance/Exit turnstile equipment only and never a token booth or change booth. Both of these mezzanines contain 4 abandoned staircases that lead down from each platform to the 167th Street underpass running beneath the subway station. The outside staircases led down to the sidewalks that ran the full length of the underpass, these sidewalks have been closed and covered over with angled barriers. The underpass today is officially for automobile traffic only (no pedestrians). The inside staircases, very visible on Google Streetview led down to each end of a streetcar and later bus island for surface transportation in each direction. Traffic would go around the streetcars on the outside lane, streetcars and later buses stopped on the inside lane.
At the southern end of each platform is a secondary on platform exit. From the Manhattan-bound platform, High Entrance/Exit Turnstiles lead out past MVMs, to a single streetcar at the SW corner of the Grand Concourse and McCellan Street. The 205 Street-bound platform has only High Exit Only Turnstiles that lead out to an Exit only staircase up to the SE corner of McCellan Street and the Grand Concourse.
Photos 1-6: July 29, 2004; 7-28: January 7, 2011
