Manhattan Subway Extension Opens In Booming Neighborhood

NYC’s first new subway station in a quarter-century opened Sunday, linking Times Square to a neighborhood on Manhattan’s far West Side at 34th Street

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NEW YORK (AP) - New York City’s first new subway station in a quarter-century opened Sunday, linking Times Square to a booming neighborhood on Manhattan’s far West Side at 34th Street.

“This is really a monumental day for the city,” Mayor Bill de Blasio told hundreds of guests at the inauguration for the gleaming No. 7 station that’s part of the transformation of a once-desolate industrial area.

The extension is expected to bring more than 30,000 riders a day to a neighborhood where construction is under way for the 50 million-square-foot (4.65 million-square-meter) Hudson Yards complex of office towers and residential high-rises.

The mayor called the neighborhood “a whole new city being created within our city, connected with thousands of jobs.”

A short walk away is the popular High Line elevated park built on defunct rail tracks.

The $2.4 billion extension was funded by the city under de Blasio’s predecessor, Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

It’s the 469th station in a subway system that carries more than 5 million people a day.

Copyright 2015 The Associated Press.