SUBWAY STOP NOT SO AMAZIN’ FOR KELLNER
By Dan Rivoli
Posted by Our Town on April 16, 2009 · View Comments
Assembly Member Micah Kellner, a proud Mets fan, was at Citi Field on April 13, the day of the team’s first home opener. Kellner, however, was not there to celebrate the team, but rather to criticize the MTA’s Citi Field/Willets Point stop on the 7 train for being inaccessible for Manhattan-bound disabled transit riders.
Kellner and Council Member John Liu, chair of the Council’s Transportation Committee, along with advocates from the city chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, criticized the stop for not having a ramp or elevator for paratransit riders in need of getting to Manhattan, a likely need after a game lets out.
“You can go out to the ballpark but you can’t get home,” Kellner said.
To get Manhattan service, disabled riders would have to take the ramp that leads to the Queens-bound station, take the train to the last stop on Flushing Avenue in Queens, then transfer to a Manhattan-bound train.
“The Mets went beyond the distance to make Citi Field totally accessible,” Kellner said. “The MTA really struck out by failing to make the stop fully accessible.”
Comments
View Comments to “SUBWAY STOP NOT SO AMAZIN’ FOR KELLNER”Trackbacks
Check out what others are saying about this post...[...] The entire process is an enormous inconvenience and totally unnecessary. The MTA could have easily installed a ramp on the Manhattan-bound side of the station. I hope that because of this protest, they will now rectify their error. The protest received some great coverage including a story by the Associated Press that was picked up by most sports news outlets, including CBS Sports (“Disabled fans protest poor accessibility near Citi Field”), and a local piece here on the Upper East Side in Our Town (”Subway Stop Not So Amazin’ for Kellner“). [...]