The opening of Lower Manhattan’s soaring Fulton Street Transit Center, scheduled for this Thursday, has been pushed back an additional 60 to 90 days.
The megaproject is delayed thanks to testing delays and unfinished elevators, transit officials said during a Monday board meeting. Already years late and millions over budget, the hub will eventually link 11 different subway lines at six different stations, joining with the Port Authority’s World Trade Center Transportation Hub by 2016.
The MTA’s No. 7 train extension to the Far West Side of Manhattan is delayed as well, slowed by elevator issues and other problems at the 34th Street and Eleventh Avenue station. That project was scheduled to open by the end of this year, but will not be completed before February 2015 even with a newly accelerated timeline, engineering consultant Darlene Rivera told board members in the Monday meeting.
Engineers are also struggling to repair eight high-speed ventilation fans along the No. 7 line extension, according to the Times. The fans, which are designed to push hundreds of thousands of cubic feet of air per minute, currently are vibrating during tests — an issue officials are attempting to evaluate and correct. [NYT] — Julie Strickland
