125 years old New York Metro now struggling for survival 

New York, United States (Urban Transport News): USA's 125-year-old metro in New York City is part of the lifestyle here. The New York City subway is among the few metro services in the world that run 24x7. The Covid-19 epidemic has also affected it badly. The subway is on the verge of closure due to the reduced number of passengers.

The New York Metro, which had not stopped in over a hundred years, was temporarily closed at night from May 6, 2020, due to the epidemic. During this time trains and stations were disinfected. Before the pandemic, on average, 55 lakh people used to travel by it every day. The figure has been 3.85 lakh in the last year.

New York City Transit senior officer Sarah Feinberg said, "The epidemic has created a crisis over the existence of the metro." The metro management had given McKinsey & Company the responsibility of studying the decline in passenger numbers. It has been reported that more than 80% of passengers will not return to the metro before 2024-2025.

Most people have adopted safe alternative means of transport. Public health campaigner Nick said that how the metro will assure people that it is safe? Most metro employees also believe that it will be totally closed one day. The subway had become a hot spot of infection during the Covid-19 peak. Thousands of its workers were infected and 140 lost their lives.

Subway driver John Ruskin said, when Corona was on peak, there was not a single ride on the train, we had to run an empty train. Most of the population of 8 million depended on subways before the transition. Last year, Subway officials told the government that if time does not help, operations will have to be stopped. The government provided $14 billion in aid, which would enable it to run for a few months. However, officials say nothing will happen with this help.

Fact file

• Metro operations begin on October 27, 1904
• With the 399 km network, it is the longest metro network in the world
• 472 stations in the metro network, highest in the world
• New York is World's 9th Busiest Metro City where the Rapid Rail network is operational
• The record for the highest number of passengers in a day of 61 lakhs was made on September 23, 2014.