Cherish your subway rides while you can, L train riders, for today the soothsayers and doomsday prophets finally heard official word from mount MTA. The Times reported this morning the MTA has come to a final decision about what to do with the L train to repair Hurricane Sandy damage: The train will be completely shut down between Bedford Avenue and Eighth Avenue for 18 months, starting in January 2019. That means no L train whatsoever between Williamsburg and Manhattan, and no trains along 14th street in Manhattan at all.
2019 is a cosmically long way away, so who knows if we’ll all still even still be alive or if President Trump will have replaced all forms of mass transit with mandatory gold SUV ownership by then. But the shutdown will have a huge impact across the borough, not the least of which are dips in rents along the L corridor and a whole new wave of trite jokes about Williamsburg and the people who live there. Here are 10 effects the train’s shutdown may have:
People completely forgetting that lots of families, elderly people and working folks live off the L train, not just young people
A return to the good/bad old days of Williamsburg loft living
Small business opportunities
European tourism market goes bust
The condo boom slows, maybe?
More blue bikes everywhere:
Crown Heights and other neighborhoods get a population boom
The poor little G train has to pick up the slack
Everyone also just takes off
But mostly, literally this: