Pelham Bay Park
Pelham Bay Park is the last stop on the 6 train Pelham Line and the most southern Bronx terminus, farthest away from Westchester County. It located along the southern portion of Pelham Bay Park, New York City’s largest park. This makes it an important bus connection point for passengers continuing north farther into the Bronx including to post-1950s car-oriented destinations to Co-Op City and the Bay Plaza Mall. Subway extensions to Co-Op City have been proposed ever since 1968 with none ever coming farther than the initial drawing board. The station also has summer only connecting bus service to Orchard Beach, the only public beach in the Bronx, and year-round bus service to City Island one of the Bronx’s most unique communities accessible only via a road through Pelham Bay Park.
The station was renovated with elevators installed in December 1989, making it one of the first ADA accessible subway stations, with the elevator closed for replacement from June 2015 to April 2016 after it reached the end of its 25 year useful life. This 1989 renovation also contributed to unique triangular light fixtures lining the exposed portions of both platforms along with unique signage in a few areas of the station. Some station signs (particularly for the station entrances) are on a unique yellow background.
For trains, the station is like all other elevated IRT terminuses in the Bronx, with two tracks and three platforms. The side platforms are no longer in passenger use, now containing a myriad of small, enclosed areas for crew purposes. All access to the island platform is via exits just beyond the bumper blocks, passengers leave the platforms via two staircases, one at the very end of the island platform, and one at the end of the eastern side platform. Between these staircases is the entrance to the elevator down to the station mezzanine, and very short staircases down to crew quarters at nearly the same level inside the concrete clad station house. Arriving directly along the southern side platform (passengers then walk around the end of the bumper blocks to reach trains) is also an always up-only escalator from the mezzanine up to the platform. The separate and clearly not part of the original station escalator structure is clearly visible from street level.
The mezzanine contains turnstiles directly in front of the two staircases with the elevator on each side plus the bottom of the escalator, facing the token booth. A 1980s touch is a backlit Entry 6 sign above the turnstiles. Exits are a bit complicated; two staircases lead down directly to street-level from each side of the station house. These staircases are in the dark, enclosed by concrete walls and are inside a plaza formed by Westchester Avenue, Bruckner Blvd, and Amendola Place. Entering the station house beneath the elevated in its own enclosed structure, with windows, clearly added on later is an escalator up to the mezzanine from this same plaza. Finally, next to the token booth is the upper landing of the street elevator next to four sets of silver doors that lead to a pedestrian bridge. This pedestrian bridge crosses over Bruckner Blvd that is the service roads for I-95, (at the northern end of the Bruckner Expressway) running in a trench in this area. The bridge ends at a wide gentle exposed to the elements ramp on the opposite side of the Bruckner Expressway. The bridge providing safe pedestrian access to Pelham Bay Park (the station acts as a pedestrian cut-through, not just a subway station entrance) and Bx29 buses to City Island.
Photos 1: May 8, 2004; 2-3: December 29, 2006; 4-25: June 9, 2011; 26-43: September 10, 2012; 44-59: April 4, 2013;
