If New York City doesn’t recover quickly and robustly from Covid-19, April 30, 2020 will mark the inflection point: when the city and state, afflicted with a historic crisis, decided to give up. That day, Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that New York’s subway system will begin shutting down overnight, from 1 A.M. to 5 A.M. The shutdown is indefinite, so there’s a real chance that New York’s identity as the “the city that never sleeps” is gone.
The ostensible reasons for the shutdown are public health and public safety. Earlier this week, Cuomo called conditions on the subway “disgusting.” The state and city want the state-controlled Metropolitan Transportation Authority to shutter the subway system so that it can deep-clean stations and trains. “During this overnight period, the MTA will intensify disinfecting operations, cleaning its fleet of thousands of cars and buses every night, and further testing new and innovative cleaning solutions, including UV, antimicrobials and electrostatic disinfectants,” the authority said. The city also wants these closures to discourage the estimated 2,000 people— mostly adult men—who regularly use the subway system as overnight shelter. Though it’s hard to get a firm count during a pandemic, this number is likely higher now, as homeless individuals’ usual refuge points—public libraries and fast-food seating areas—are closed.
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