UPPER EAST SIDE — More people are traveling through the East 96th Street subway station than ever before, according to Metropolitan Transportation Authority data.
While other Upper East Side stations saw a slight change in commuters in 2015 compared with 2014, the 96th Street station, which only services the 6 train, saw more than a 5 percent jump in weekly ridership, the numbers show.
The station, which was the 44th busiest in the city in 2015, saw a 4.2 percent jump in annual ridership. That's 336,525 more commuters than in 2014, the MTA says.
Weekly numbers followed — the station had roughly 28,000 riders each week or about 1,500 more than in 2014, which is a 5.8 percent jump — setting it at the 41st busiest station in the city in terms of weekly ridership.
Since 2014, the Upper East Side saw total increases in annual and weekly ridership at the 86th and 96th street stations, but slight decreases at all the others, including the Lexington Avenue/59th Street station, which is one of the busiest in the city.
Both the Lexington Avenue/59th Street and the East 86th Street stations once again were on the MTA's "Top 10" list of busiest stations at numbers 9 and 10, respectively.
In 2015, the Lexington Avenue/59th Street station, which serves as a hub for the N, Q, R, 4, 5 and 6 trains, saw 150,000 less people than it did in 2014 for a total of 21.4 million people, the MTA says.
And the East 86th Street station saw a slight increase of about 156,000 riders from year to year, from 20.7 million to about 20.9 million.
In comparison, the busiest station was Times Square, which handles the N, Q, R, S, 1, 2, 3, 7, and A, C, and E trains, with 66.3 million commuters in 2015.
Ridership along the Lexington Avenue line may decrease further in the next year when the Second Avenue Subway, which will fill a gap in service along Second Avenue from East 63rd to East 96th Street, is up and running.
As many as 200,000 to 225,000 riders will be shifted to the Second Avenue Subway, reducing crowding on the Lexington Avenue lines by as much as 14 percent and reduce travel time by at least 10 minutes, a spokesman for the MTA said.
