CITY HALL — Queens subway stations are about to get wired.
The MTA is set to expand cell and Wi-Fi service to 76 new subway platforms by the end of 2013, including 40 stations in Queens, officials announced Wednesday.
Officials would not disclose which Queens stations will be included in the rollout.
The 36 other stations are mostly in Midtown, including Columbus Circle.
As DNAinfo.com New York first reported, the 1,2 and 3 lines between 59th Street and 96th Street, the B and C lines between 59th and 96th, and the Rockefeller Center and Times Square stations are expected to be up-and-running by December of this year.
An additional 40 stations, concentrated mostly in upper Manhattan, are set to go online in 2014.
The service, which is available to ATT and T-Mobile customers, is already up and running on the L train platforms at 14th Street and Sixth and Eighth avenues, as well as the 14th St. A, C and E and 1, 2, 3 stops, and the C, E station at 23rd and Eighth Avenue in Chelsea.
Officials said they hope expanded cell and Wi-Fi service will give straphangers access to information about the system as well as boost safety on the tracks.
“As we open up the network for cell phone, they’ll be able to call us as well as the NYPD [to report problems],” said Craig Stewart, a senior corporate management officer at New York City Transit, following a City Council hearing on transportation technology.
All 277 underground MTA subway stations are slated to be online by 2018, but officials with provider Transit Wireless have said they hope to finish by 2016.
