21st Street–Queensbridge station

The 21st Street–Queensbridge station is a station on the IND 63rd Street Line of the New York City Subway. Located at the intersection of 21st Street and 41st Avenue within Queensbridge in Long Island City, Queens, it is served by the M train only on weekdays during the day and by the F train at night and on weekends. The station contains two tracks and two side platforms, connected by an overhead mezzanine. It opened in October 1989 with the opening of the 63rd Street Line. From its opening until 2001, this was the terminal of the line, although it was not originally intended as a terminal station. The 63rd Street Line was originally part of a plan for a Queens Bypass Line running along the Long Island Rail Road Main Line. However, due to a lack of funds, the line terminated here, with layup tracks going up to 29th Street. As a result, the tunnel became known as the "tunnel to nowhere." In December 2001, the 63rd Street Tunnel Connection opened, allowing trains from the IND Queens Boulevard Line to use the line. This station then became a through station, serving express F trains since then. In 2025, local M trains began serving the station only on weekdays during the day; F trains continue to stop here at night and on weekends.

The current 63rd Street Line was the final version of proposals for a northern midtown tunnel from the IND Queens Boulevard Line to the Second and Sixth Avenue lines, which date back to the IND Second System of the 1920s and 1930s. The current plans were drawn up in the 1960s under the MTA's Program For Action, where the 63rd Street subway line was to be built in the upper portion of the bi-level 63rd Street Tunnel. In the original 1960s plans, there would have been a station (in addition to or as an alternative to 21st Street–Queensbridge) located farther east at Northern Boulevard, one block north of the Queens Plaza station of the Queens Boulevard line. There would have been a pedestrian transfer passageway between the two stations. The station was placed at 21st Street, serving the Queensbridge Houses to the west, and commercial and industrial buildings to the east. The station was added to the plans following lobbying from the local community. During construction, a large amount of disturbance was created along 41st Avenue, which runs through the heart of Queensbridge. The project faced extensive delays. As early as 1976, the Program for Action had been reduced to seven stations on the Archer Avenue and 63rd Street lines and was not projected to be complete for another decade. By October 1980, officials considered stopping construction on the 63rd Street line. Usage estimates for the 21st Street–Queensbridge station were calculated in 1984 at 220 passengers per hour unless a connection was made to the rest of the system. The MTA voted in 1984 to connect the tunnel to the local tracks of the IND Queens Boulevard Line at a cost of $222 million. The section of the line up to Long Island City was projected to open by the end of 1985, but flooding in the tunnel caused the opening to be delayed indefinitely. The MTA's contractors concluded in February 1987 that the tunnel was structurally sound, and the federal government's contractors affirmed this finding in June 1987. This station opened on October 29, 1989, along with the entire IND 63rd Street Line, serving as the line's northern terminal prior to the connection with the IND Queens Boulevard Line. The Q train served the station on rush hours and weekday middays, the B train stopped there on evenings and weekends, and the F terminated here during late nights; all services used the Sixth Avenue Line. For the first couple of months after the station opened, the JFK Express to Kennedy Airport also served the station until it was discontinued on April 15,

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