ASTORIA — The MTA will close two subway stations on Astoria's N/W line for up to eight months starting Oct. 23, with two other stations on the line slated to shutter next summer, under a plan to modernize more than 30 stations across the city over the next few years.
Both the 30th Avenue and 36th Avenue N/W stations will shutter next month for the repair work, an overhaul that's expected to take no longer than eight months, according to an MTA spokesman. Signs announcing the closures will be posted in the coming weeks, the spokesman said.
Another two N/W stations, the Broadway and 39th Avenue stops, will be closed for up to seven months starting in July to make way for similar renovations, according to the MTA.
The closures come after track work halted service on Astoria's N/W for eight weekends this summer, with the work just wrapping up this past weekend.
The upgrades will include structural repairs, new or revamped station entrances, improved mezzanines and train platforms, and additions like USB ports, digital screens and countdown clocks, an MTA spokesman said. The plans will not include the addition of elevators at any of the stations.
The overhauls are part of Gov. Andrew Cuomo's plan to "rapidly redesign and renew" dozens of the city's subway stations.
The work — which has already been rolled out at R train stops in Brooklyn — is intended to "completely renew" the designated stations, making them "cleaner, brighter," and easier to navigate, according the governor's announcement last year.
Shuttering the stations for months at a time will allow crews to get renovations done faster, according to the MTA. Repairs would otherwise have to be done by closing the stations during nights and weekends, stretching the repair work out as long as three years, according to the agency.
