The era of staring at a blank screen while your train hurtles through the darkness is finally coming to an end for a huge chunk of New York City commuters.
Recent reports suggest that some of the city’s most notorious cellular dead zones are about to get a major 5G glow up.
According to a scoop from the transit insider account @nycsubwaylife on Instagram, cell service is officially “coming soon” to several major stretches of the system.
This includes the busy 4, 5, and 6 lines between 59th Street and 125th Street in Manhattan.
Brooklyn and Queens riders aren’t being left out either, as the update is also slated for the A and C lines across those boroughs.
While we are still waiting for the MTA to drop a formal press release on this specific phase, @nycsubwaylife has a solid track record for spotting new equipment installations before they go live.
This expansion is part of a massive, long-term plan to bring cell phone service to the entire subway system through a partnership with Boldyn Networks. The goal is to eventually wire up every single mile of the 418-mile tunnel network.
We’ve already seen this technology transform other parts of our daily commute.
The L train’s Canarsie Tunnel was the pioneer back in 2020, becoming the first under-river tunnel to offer full connectivity. More recently, the G train saw its own massive upgrade, with cell service hitting the tunnels between Long Island City and Brooklyn.
These upgrades usually happen during those late-night and weekend service changes that we all love to complain about. Crews use that time to install fiber optic cables and small cell nodes that allow carriers like AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile to “light up” the signal.
For anyone who spends their morning trip on the Lexington Avenue line or heading deep into Brooklyn on the A train, this is a total game changer. You’ll finally be able to finish that podcast episode or send a quick “running late” text without having to wait for the doors to open at the next station.
Stay tuned for more information as we await it from MTA, and when you can expect the project to be completed.
