Gov. Hochul’s state budget proposal earmarked $25 million for a westward expansion of the Second Avenue subway on Tuesday as the governor also kicked off the state’s environmental review process — an indication that Hochul is serious about expediting a crosstown subway line in Harlem.
The project, touted among Hochul’s State of the State announcements last week, would build a new subway tunnel beneath 125th St. in Manhattan, eventually connecting the nascent Second Avenue line to the Nos. 2 and 3 trains at Malcom X Blvd., the A, C, B and D trains at St. Nicholas Ave., and the elevated No. 1 train station at Broadway.
The plan — unofficially dubbed “Phase 2 West” — would effectively extend the ongoing “Phase 2” of the long-awaited subway line, keeping a pair of specialized tunnel-boring machines in the ground to dig across Manhattan.
Hochul first highlighted the idea in 2024, when she pledged $16 million to study how feasible the proposal was. The $25 million proposed Tuesday would fund the design of the extended subway tunnel, but not the layout of any of the three proposed stations along the way.
A Second Avenue line of the New York City subway system has been an oft-reneged promise for decades — first proposed in the 1920s, waylaid by the Great Depression, then promised again in the 1940s and ’50s when elevated lines serving Manhattan’s East Side were demolished.
Work began in the 1970s, only to quickly halt amid the city’s fiscal crisis.
Three Upper East Side stations — together dubbed “Phase 1” — finally opened in 2017, and currently operate as the three northernmost stations of the Q train: 72nd, 86th and 96th Sts.
So-called “Phase 2,” which would add stations at 106th and 116th Sts. before turning northwest toward 125th St. and Lexington Ave., is currently in the early phases of construction.
Phase 2 will see 2,500 feet of abandoned 1970s-era tunnel between E. 116th St. and E. 120th St. converted into a new 116th St. station.
At E. 120th St., a pair of tunnel-boring machines — currently under construction in Germany — will bore new, 8,400-foot tunnels north from the end of the 1970s-era tunnel at 120th St. and Second Ave. to 125th St. and Lenox Ave.
The governor’s plan would then see those machines stay in the ground and dig their way west to Broadway — which proponents say is effectively getting two expansions for the price of one set of machines.
But the timeline of Phase 2 — which is necessary before any westward expansion can begin — is currently at the center of Donald Trump’s war on “woke.”
In October, the president halted all federal funding for the project, reportedly until the MTA can prove it’s in compliance with a newly issued directive forbidding the use of race- or sex-based factors in selecting disadvantaged businesses for the project.
Nevertheless, Transit officials say Phase 2 remains on schedule.
The tunnels are not expected to be completed before 2029, the earliest point at which a westward expansion along 125th St. could begin.
The westward expansion, including the tunnels and station, is estimated to cost $7 billion.
