Fulton Street (New York City Subway)

Fulton Street is a station complex on the New York City Subway in Lower Manhattan, New York City, United States. It consists of four linked stations on the IRT Lexington Avenue Line, the BMT Nassau Street Line, the IRT Broadway – Seventh Avenue Line, and the IND Eighth Avenue Line. The first three cross Fulton Street at Broadway, Nassau Street, and William Street respectively; the Eighth Avenue Line station is underneath Fulton Street, between Broadway and Nassau Streets. The station is the eleventh busiest in the system as of 2010 with 18,303,963 passengers.^[2] The complex is served by the following trains:

• 2, 4, and A trains at all times
• 3, 5, and C trains at all times except late nights
• J trains on weekdays
• Z trains during rush hours in the peak direction

The Fulton Street Transit Center is a project, currently in progress, that will improve access throughout the transfer station, introduce a new station building, and provide easier access to the World Trade Center site.

IRT Broadway – Seventh Avenue Line platform

Fulton Street on the IRT Broadway – Seventh Avenue Line opened on August 1, 1918 as part of an extension towards Brooklyn but originally opened to a temporary terminus at Wall Street before the Clark Street Tunnel could open.

Station layout

Fulton Street station has a standard local configuration of two tracks and one island platform. Brooklyn-bound trains use track K2 while uptown trains use track K3. These designations come from track chaining which measures track distances and are not used in normal conversation. Based on this chaining, Fulton Street is about 19,700 ft (3.73 mi) from post zero at Broadway and 44th Street since this is where the West Side Line "merges" with the 42nd Street Shuttle. This is slightly non-standard signage because it is a local station using express track numbers as these tracks become the express tracks on the main line, providing a reasonable explanation.

The station has two mezzanines, separated at Fulton Street. The full-time entrance is to the south mezzanine, at the southeast corner of Fulton and William Streets. There are also part-time entrances mid-block on William Street, and through an office building on John Street. The north mezzanine is open part-time, with an entrance through an office building on the northeast corner of Fulton and William Streets. Like Wall Street, the next station south, there is a narrow island platform and a number of comparatively narrow staircases up to the mezzanine level.

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IRT Lexington Avenue Line platforms

Fulton Street is a stop on the IRT Lexington Avenue Line.

History

Opened on January 16, 1905 as part of a one-stop extension southbound from Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall.^[3] This marked the first time that the subway had been extended further downtown and towards Brooklyn; the previous terminus, Brooklyn Bridge, was also the original subway's southern end.

Station layout

Despite being on the Lexington Avenue Line, the station actually lies underneath Broadway between Cortlandt and Fulton Streets, as the line takes its name from its Upper East Side trunk avenue. A number of exits to street level are available at Dey, John, and Fulton Streets, while the connecting passage to the other stations within the Fulton Street complex lies underneath the latter.

Because the local tracks loop at the abandoned City Hall station to the north, Fulton Street has only two tracks and two side platforms. The station, which is now a registered New York City Landmark, features a mosaic of the steamboat built by Robert Fulton. The southbound platform incorporates an ornate entrance to the building at 195 Broadway, which features fluted columns, engraved metal signs, ornate railings, and blacked out store windows.

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Further reading

• Lee Stokey. Subway Ceramics : A History and Iconography. 1994. ISBN 978-0-9635486-1-0

BMT Nassau Street Line platforms

Fulton Street on the BMT Nassau Street Line has two tracks and two side platforms, with downtown trains on the upper level and uptown trains on the lower level due to the narrowness of Nassau Street. The entrance for uptown trains is on the west side of Nassau Street, and the entrance for downtown trains is on the east side of Nassau Street. It is possible to cross between the uptown and downtown sides via the IND platform, which passes underneath both levels of this station.

Exits are to Nassau Street and Fulton Street. There is a south exit to John Street that is open only during rush hours and a sealed north end exit to Ann Street and passageway to Beekman Street and Pace University to the far north. This passageway was out of system and more than one block long.

Both this station and Broad Street are normally closed on weekends (the only two stations in the entire system that do not operate full-time), when the J train terminates at the next station north, Chambers Street. However, due to the line's proximity to the IRT Lexington Avenue Line, passengers can connect to the 4 and 5 trains at Brooklyn Bridge for service south of Chambers Street while Fulton and Broad Streets are closed on weekends, since they are both in walking distance.

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IND Eighth Avenue Line platform

Fulton Street (formerly Broadway – Nassau Street) on the IND Eighth Avenue Line has two tracks and one island platform. The station is located approximately sixty feet below ground level. Similar to other stations near it, Fulton Street utilizes a tube station design because of its depth. The tile on this station is colored purple, with wall tiles reading "FULTON". An alternating pattern of "BWAY" and "NASSAU" was the original tiling until recently. The station adopted the "Fulton Street" name in December 2010 to become unified with the other platforms in the station complex.^[6] Overhead and column signage carry the new name.

There are two sets of artwork here. One is the Marine Grill Murals, from Hotel McAlpin, located at the William Street entrance (Originally on the mezzanine) and the other is Nancy Holt's Astral Grating, also on the mezzanine.

Notable places nearby

• St. Paul's Chapel
• Brooklyn Bridge

References

External links

• nycsubway.org — IRT East Side Line: Fulton Street
• nycsubway.org — IRT West Side Line: Fulton Street
• nycsubway.org — BMT Nassau St./Jamaica Line: Fulton Street
• nycsubway.org — IND 8th Avenue: Broadway/Nassau Street
• nycsubway.org — Marine Grill Murals, 1913 Artwork by Fred Dana Marsh (2000)
• nycsubway.org — Astral Grating Artwork by Nancy Holt (1987)
• Station Reporter — Broadway Nassau/Fulton Street Complex
• MTA's Arts For Transit — Fulton Street/Broadway – Nassau
• Entrance between Broadway & Nassau Street on Fulton Street to Eighth Avenue Line from Google Maps Street View
• Nassau Street & Fulton Street entrance from Google Maps Street View
• John Street and Nassau Street entrance from Google Maps Street View
• William Street and Fulton Street entrance from Google Maps Street View
• John Street and William Street entrance from Google Maps Street View
• Fulton Street and Broadway entrance from Google Maps Street View
• Dey Street and Broadway entrance from Google Maps Street View
• John Street and Broadway entrance from Google Maps Street View
• Cortlandt Street / Maiden Lane and Broadway entrance from Google Maps Street View