New York ends subway, bus, train COVID mask mandate after 28 months; Gov. Hochul cites ‘new normal starting today’

New York transit riders are allowed to uncover their faces for the first time in more than two years.

Gov. Hochul on Wednesday dropped the mask requirement that’s been in effect for the state’s public transportation systems since April 2020, when former Gov. Andrew Cuomo launched a mandate in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I know this is a big change,” Hochul said during a news conference. “The MTA will be rolling out the signage but basically we’re going from mandatory to optional.”

Mask mandates would also be dropped for homeless shelters, detention centers and correctional facilities, Hochul said.

Masks will still be required in New York’s hospitals, nursing homes, and adult care facilities.

“We’ll be talking about a new normal starting today,” the governor said as she announced an end to the mask mandate imposed 28 months ago.

New York is one of the only states in the country that’s had a mask mandate for transit facilities and airports since April, when a federal judge in Florida struck down President Biden’s executive order requiring face coverings on public transportation.

Cuomo in Sept. 2020 put teeth behind the mask order by announcing $50 fines for anyone who refused to wear a mask on public transit. But the order was hardly enforced, as Metropolitan Transportation Authority Police issued just 41 summonses to riders who flouted the rule over the following year.

The bulk of the MTA’s effort to get riders to wear masks centered around public education. The agency launched ad campaigns telling riders about the mask mandate, and during the first two years of the pandemic held regular events where transit officials and volunteers distributed free masks to straphangers.

The MTA launched a new ad campaign Wednesday, which states “masks are encouraged, but optional. Let’s respect each other’s choices.”

MTA spokesman Tim Minton said free masks would continue to be available at subway token booths for riders who want one.

The policy change upset disability advocates, who fear a reduction in mask wearing on trains and buses will make transit less safe for vulnerable New Yorkers.

“It’s an extraordinary misstep that just doesn’t make sense in the face of all the evidence that we have,” said Joe Rappaport, executive director of the Brooklyn Center for Independence of the Disabled. “The BA.5 variant of omicron is particularly virulent. You can get it very easily from someone sitting next to you on a subway train.”

“Some people are avoiding the subways and buses already. This certainly doesn’t make it any easier for someone who’s immunocompromised or otherwise at risk to feel safe on mass transit.”

At a separate news conference following Hochul’s announcement, two top MTA officials gave conflicting views about their own mask use on transit.

MTA chairman Janno Lieber said he’d continue to wear a mask within indoor stations and on trains and buses. NYC Transit president Richard Davey — a Bostonian who wasn’t in New York during the darkest days of the pandemic — said he finds the face coverings uncomfortable.

“My personal choice would probably be not to wear a mask,” Davey said.

Hochul said dropping the mask mandate was a positive sign towards a sense of pre-pandemic normalcy, and that her decision was sparked by the launch of new vaccines targeted at the omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus, which were approved last week by the Food and Drug Administration.

Hochul got one of the new booster shots during her news conference.

Just 40% of New York City residents have received a COVID-19 booster shot since they became available last year, city data show.

At least 41,656 people have died from COVID-19 in New York City since the start of the pandemic, according to the city Health Department.

State Health Commissioner Dr. Mary Bassett urged New Yorkers to “pay attention to their community level” of infections and wear a mask if they go near someone vulnerable to the virus.

“All individuals may have their own reasons,” said Bassett. “I have a 94-year-old mother.... she’s the reason that I’m very careful about wearing a mask.”