East Broadway (F) - The SubwayNut

East Broadway is the last stop before F trains run through the Rutgers Street tubes to Brooklyn. This means the station is quite deep with 3 complete length mezzanine levels above the single platform for the two track line. The track walls have a blue trimline and text beneath that says E Bway. One reason the station has so many mezzanine levels is the station was designed to be a connection point to the never built Worth Street subway. This IND Second System extension would have crossed above the current subway platform on a route from just south of Canal Street on the A,C,E (there are still bellmouths on the local tracks), stopping at a stop at Worth Street-Chatham Square (just north of Brooklyn Bridge), here at East Broadway, and a final stop in Manhattan at Montgomery Street before continuing to Brooklyn in a new Subway tunnel close to under the Williamsburg Bridge. After arriving in Brooklyn, this tunnel would join up with tunnel from the never built subway that has provisions to become the Express tracks on the F train at 2nd Avenue, plus 1 to 2 additional proposed East River tunnels branching off the Second Avenue subway. These proposed two track tunnels to Brooklyn would all join up to become the proposed 6 track South 4th Street mega-subway through Williamsburg and into Bushwick.

Today there are only two levels of mezzanines that are obvious to the public: an upper mezzanine right beneath the street that is mostly outside of fare control, that is narrow but provides a continuous passageway between all of the station’s entrances, along with an Intermediate mezzanine that has been split into two by a non-public area and is no longer a continuous mezzanine. Staircases down to the platform stop at the Lower Mezzanine passing through on short intermediate landings, this level of the mezzanine was never actually finished since it includes the provisions for the Worth Street's line's station. Evidence of access to these intermediate and lower mezzanine areas are via a staircase to nowhere that’s locked in the middle of the platform and fencing and closed gates along the Upper Mezzanine.

For entrances, starting at the southern end of the station is a street stair at the NW corner of Madison Street and Rutgers Street. There is also a closed streetstair at the NE corner. This leads to a small fare control area with the token booth and turnstiles that lead to ramps down to the Intermediate mezzanine level before two staircases (that pass through the lower mezzanine level at short intermediate landings where they jog slightly) down to the platform.

On the Upper level there is another long passageway outside of fare control that is amazingly still open that runs with some short ramps up and down almost an entire platform length. First it passes an abandoned entrance area that one had now closed streetstairs up to the NE and SW corners of Henry and Rutgers Street, next to 2 sets of abandoned staircases down to the intermediate mezzanine.

Towards the northern end of the out of fare control upper mezzanine is another now unstaffed fare control area with a bank of turnstiles and some high ones as well. First are street stairs up to the NE and SW corners of East Broadway and Rutgers Street. From this entrance area there are two wide staircases down to the Intermediate mezzanine, where they become three staircases down to the platform. One set of these staircases divides into two sets of staircases on the intermediate mezzanine before combining back into one staircase down to the platform on the lower mezzanine. There is also a narrow up escalator that goes directly from the platform to the upper mezzanine area arriving at this same fare control area. This escalator leads closest to a high exit only turnstile that goes to the station's most northern street stair along Straus Square, next to Seward Park across from the intersection where Straus Square becomes the start of Canal Street and Essex Street changes names becoming Rutgers Street.
Photo 1-16: July 24, 2009; 17-32: May 24, 2010; 33-36: September 3, 2012