I have gotten the remains of a 7-day Unlimited that expires on Tuesday, so the next couple of days will be extremely busy for me with nothing else to do really this week except continue my massive project of having every NYC Subway Station on this website. My current focus seems to be getting Brooklyn completely finished. So today which was hot and sunny seemed a perfect day to go out and finish photographing the rest of the Brighton Line.
I started by leaving my house and taking the A Train to 59 Street where I waited a little bit to transfer to a downtown B train. I was planning to take this to 7th Avenue but had reached a chapter break at Atlantic and looked up from by book, fittingly enough Paul Theroux’s The Patagonian Express, and noticed that I had completely missed an exit from the B,Q platform that’s at the extreme Eastern end of Atlantic Avenue. So I had to hop off and rode up to the surface ending up at an entrance that’s at street level inside the Williamsburg Bank Building, the tallest building in Brooklyn, now being converted by Magic Johnson to luxury condominiums (wikipedia). I decided that since I was at the surface at Atlantic Avenue, I might has well photograph Station entrance until I decided to see how the connection to the subway works from the Atlantic Center, a new shopping mall. It sent me the the LIRR Station that is a complete wreck right now because of construction and directed me to use an LIRR platform (these look ultra modern now and have been refurbished) so I used Platform B and swiped my MetroCard directly at the turnstiles on that platform to get back on the Subway.
I took a Q train one stop to 7th Avenue, did a photo essay, went up to the surface walked down Flatbush Avenue the short distance to Bergen Street on the 2/3, swiped back into the subway rode one stop to Grand Army Plaza, walked through the plaza and found Eastern Parkway, where I walked down to Brooklyn Museum. There I decided I would get a bit more of the Brooklyn IRT and took the next train, a 3 train to Kingston Avenue, did a photo essay there, leaving fare control breifly before going downstairs and taking a Manhattan-bound 3 train to Nostrand Avenue. This stop is only a couple of blocks north of President Street, so I walked down to President Street on the 2/5 (there subway line runs underneath Nostrand Avenue), did a photo essay and decided to go one stop south to Sterling Street. Did another photo essay, leaving fare control briefly I considered simply finishing off this branch, the Nostrand Avenue subway of the IRT but decided with the beautiful day I would finish off a subway line that runs outside and one of the most scenic in the system, even though I wasn’t really going out for rolling stock photos, I only had my standard shooting (and great for underground work) Image Stabilized 18-55mm lens, not my 75-300mm telephoto.
I took the next 2 or 5 train (NOTE: as of today, I saw quite a few signs as I was out, all #5 trains will continue to Brooklyn during weekday middays, in addition to rush hours, all station signage, and service times signs seem to have been updated to reflect this) back to Franklin Avenue, and used the transfer to the Franklin Avenue Shuttle at Botanic Garden. Here I left fare control briefly and when I tried to get back on got the “Just Used” message on my MetroCard. I found this strange because I thought it was simply not within 18 Minutes at the SAME station or on the SAME bus. (NOTE: I just looked it up on the MTA’s Website and I was right, guess there was some software glitch with my MetroCard at Botanic Garden). I’ve done this loads of times and went to the station agent and gave her my card. She informed me that it was 18 minutes between swipes at any subway station, and that I had two more minutes until I could use it next. So I wondered back outside and walked around, and swiped back into Botanic Garden, taking the next Prospect Park Shuttle train to its terminal at Prospect Park.
At Prospect Park I did a full photo essay leaving the subway again and walking between the station’s two entrances and station houses that are at either end of the station. Here I had my worst moment of the day with a passenger that looked like he was a street performer or some kind of performer in costume, yelling at me about not asking before taking pictures, other obsenities, and how I was being disrespectful. He did have a point but I wasn’t even intentionally photographing him. I was taking pictures of the artwork, and don’t even think I got him on a frame. I got on the next Coney Island-bound Q train and took it to the next stop, Parkside Avenue. Here I left through the station’s single full service station house and walked down to Church Avenue, making a brief stop at the Exit Only exit I didn’t realize existed at the southern end of the Coney Island-bound platform. At Church Avenue I did something that I rarely do, swiped in at the northern end of the station, walked and photographed as I walked a platform before leaving the system again at the southern end of the station and walking to Beverly Road. This stop has a single station house for an entrance, so I got back on the Q train, skipping the next four stations that I had photographed last summer and ended up continuing all the way to Sheepshead Bay. Currently the CI-bound platforms at Neck Rd and Avenue U are being completely rebuilt, there physically not there actually right now, and all CI-bound Q trains are even running on the express track. Here at Sheepshead Bay I used the temporary overpass that has been built for everyone having to change direction, and took the next Manhattan-bound Q train to Neck Rd. I did a photo essay of the portion of the stop that was open and walked up to Avenue U, there I did another photo essay. I took the next Manhattan-bound Q train to the only other stop, north of Brighton Beach I was missing on the Brighton Line, Avenue M. Here I did a photo essay, leaving fare control briefly to get an exterior shot of the station house, and took a Coney Island-bound train to Coney Island.
My original plan was to get another subway branch finished but I had had enough, except I wanted to investigate a portion of the 4th Avenue-9th Street stop I hadn’t been to yet. The transfer from the F to the Manhattan-bound 4th Avenue Subway. So I took the next F train, an R160 (it was kind of ridiculous watching the FIND display since the F has so many (44 total. This made me thinking what subway line stops the most, which is close but not quite the record for rush hour service, A, when running local to Far Rock has 61, a tie with #2 train when it runs local, but the A has 39 when express, #2 49 when express. C train has 40 total-go Locals. The R train has 45 in total on its long local run, i could go on for awhile with this). I took this F train to 4th Avenue where I used the transfer to the Manhattan-bound BMT platform that has an abandoned exit at street level. I also noticed that many of the transfer signs have been replaced to include the G, guess its extension to Church Avenue is immanent. I left the station through the full service fare control on the Manhattan-bound platform for some exterior photos and re-entered through the main F train’s entrance underneath its viaduct that will soon get a much needed rehabilitation. I decided I would get photos outside of fare control at another 4th Avenue local stop, taking the R train one stop south to Prospect Avenue, here I left the subway again, crossed the street, and got back to the Manhattan-bound platform.
The next train came in, it was a R160 M train that I took, with one more errand I needed to run for the day. A visit to B&H Photo and Video, that also now sells computers and had basically cheapest price I could find on the internet for a 1 TeraBite external hard drive, all these photos I’m taking for Leave No Station Unphotographed are really eating up hard drive space, and I wanted to back everything up. So I took the M train to Fulton Street, transferred to Broadway-Nassau, and took an A train to Canal Street, where an empty R160 E train (somehow I had yet to ride one, all E trains seem to now be R160s) was across the platform and took that to 34th Street. I made a quick trip to B&H on 9th Avenue and picked up my new My Book external Hard Drive, that’s currently backing up everything through Time Machine so I can use my existing external hard-drive that I was using as a back-up for space for new photos. I walked back to 8th Avenue and took the A Train home. I saw the train after entering the subway at the downtown local platform and somehow ran down and under to the underpass to catch.
All in all, it was a very productive day, albeit long.
Total Number of swipes into the subway, on the 7-day unlimited I’m using the remains of: (8+7) 15 (a new record!-at least for Summer 2009), if I had been paying the full $2.25 fare (it increased on Saturday at midnight), my day would have cost $33.75, if I had bought at least $8 worth, bringing it down to $1.96 per ride, the day would have cost $29.40. I paid for the cost of a 7-day Unlimited today alone. My current project wouldn’t be happening the way I’m doing it 11 years ago, before the invention of Unlimited Ride MetroCards.