MetroCards are gradually being phased out to be fully replaced by OMNY, but that’s not the only subway-related era we’re reaching the end of–NYC’s 40-year-old fleet of subway cars featuring the classic orange-and-yellow-seats will soon also be a historic relic.
The MTA’s 2025-2029 capital plan was recently unveiled, and part of it includes some major updates to the city’s subway system. Beginning in 2025, the MTA will begin phasing out the thousands of decades old railcars to replace them with newer train cars, such as the R211 cars which first rolled onto tracks back in March of 2023 and provide straphangers with more amenities and fewer failures.
The oldest subway train cars in the system’s fleet fail about six times more than newer cars, and these older cars also can’t operate on lines with the modern signal system that makes service more reliable, safer, and more frequent.
MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber stated in the plan:
Today, those subway cars that played such a big role in the system’s revival are 40 years old, and it’s time to retire them. It’s time to move to the next generation of train cars, like the R211, with better accessibility, more passenger amenities, and far fewer failures.
With a budget of $10.9 billion, the MTA will replace nearly 2,000 railcars (about 22% of the entire fleet) that, at 40+ years old, are reaching the end of their life. The 1,500 new subway cars will feature “wider entrance doors, brighter lighting, more digital signage, and security cameras” and “be compatible with modern signaling technology.”
The new railcars will replace the R62 cars, circa 1984, that primarily operate on the 1, 3, and 6 lines, as well as all the remaining R68 cars from 1986, that primarily operate on the B, D, N and W lines.
The $10.9 billion isn’t only going to NYC, however–the plan also includes the purchase of 500+ new railcars for Metro-North and LIRR, which will be fully ADA accessible and feature new amenities such as wider seats and electrical outlets. These new cars will allow the Metro-North and LIRR to “retire all remaining M3 cars as well as Metro-North’s passenger coaches first procured in the mid-1980s,” according to the MTA.
Though the agency’s board approved the capital plan on September 25th, state lawmakers must still approve final funding in the capital plan in the new legislative session, which begins in January.