Good news, Bushwick commuters—after a five-month renovation, the Central Ave M station is back in business today!
The station's been shuttered since March, thanks to an $11 million makeover that included an entire reconstruction of the control house, the replacement of all street and platform stairs, the installation of new drainage system and significant structural repairs all over. And there's new artwork, too; Brooklyn-based artist George Bates was commissioned to create a sculptural panel piece called Generation Dynamica that now hangs in the station.
The MTA has been intermittently closing M train stations for considerable repair since last year, kicking off with a five-month renovation of the Knickerbocker M station last August. They'll be working on the on the Seneca, Forest M and Fresh Pond Road stations next, although those will only be subject to partial closures. Which is good news; though the renovations are welcome, commuters have been frustrated that the stations were ignored so long that such long-term closures were necessary in the first place.
"It should never have gotten to the point. You have people who depend on this station," one rider told NY1 of the Knickerbocker closure last year. And businesses by the Central Station are pretty excited about getting their foot traffic back. "We got affected because we lost like 50 percent of the income for the business," an employee at the Central Deli Express told NY1. The station will reopen at 4 p.m. this afternoon.
