Newsstands In Second Avenue Subway Stations Sit Empty: Report

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — More than ten months after the Second Avenue Subway's grand opening, newsstands inside the new Upper East Side subway stations remain vacant, according to a New York Timesreport.

Each of the new Q line stations — located along Second Avenue at East 96th Street, East 86th Street and East 72nd Street — have dedicated space for newsstands, but nobody manning the convenient retail locations, the New York Times reported. An MTA spokesman told the Times that an agreement with a newsstand operator has been made but the stores have not yet opened.

"We opened the city’s first new subway line in generations knowing that some punch list items would have to be completed after the opening," MTA Spokesman Kevin Ortiz said.

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The fact that the MTA is ten months late in acquiring a newsstand operator for the Second Avenue Subway does nothing to dispel reports that the stations were opened before they were ready. The MTA also lagged in getting the new stations' climate control systems operational and reportedly opened the station prior to completing all safety tests.

The Second Avenue Subway was launched to much fanfare on January 1, with New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo christening the train line with a midnight ride on New Year's Eve. Construction on the project cost $4.5 billion and took the better part of a decade of constant work to complete.

Read the full New York Times article here.

Photo by Yana Paskova/Getty Images News/Getty Images