The MTA recently released new photos of the 2nd Avenue Subway project showing the progress—yes, progress!—deep down under the Upper East Side's crust, where workers have been toiling for years on the project. At the beginning of March, they finally finished the infernal blasting necessary to create the enormous underground cavern out of bedrock for the 72nd Street Station. Here's a look at where they are over two months later.
"The $4.45 billion project to extend the Q Line along Second Avenue is the largest expansion of the subway system in generations," the MTA announced in March. "The subway line will have new stations at 72nd Street, 86th Street and 96th Street, and is expected to open for service in December 2016. The future 72nd Street Station will have three new entrances including two escalator entrances at 69th Street and 72nd Street containing, 11 escalators and 5 street-level ADA accessible elevators at the southeast corner of 72nd Street and Second Avenue." As of April 1st, the 72nd St Station was 78.8% complete.
To round things out, here's video of one of the blasts, which occurs at the 50 second mark. How many coworkers did that guy fight off to be the one who gets to push the button?
