NYC subway ridership breaks post-COVID record; ‘Proof our recovery is on track,’ says Hochul

It’s beginning to look a lot like crowded.

Transit officials said subway ridership across the city has reached its highest level since the COVID-19 pandemic started — a telltale sign that the Big Apple is making a comeback

The subway system logged more than 3.9 million riders on Thursday, a number not seen since lockdowns sent people inside and working from home, MTA officials said.

The underground system’s turnstiles have not seen more than 3.9 million riders since March 12, 2020, days before citywide COVID restrictions were put into place.

The ridership news was an early Christmas present for city and state officials looking for some holiday cheer in their subway stockings.

“This ridership record is proof that our recovery is on track,” said Gov. Hochul. “Whether it’s tourists coming back to New York or local residents going out to enjoy holiday attractions, the energy and vitality of this city, above and below ground, is back.”

The figure is a huge uptick from another record-breaking day for the MTA. On the Sept. 9, the first day of school for many kids in the city, the agency recorded 3,641,033 million entries.

In addition to this week’s milestone, the MTA’s OMNY tap-to-ride fare-paying program is also setting records.

OMNY readers, which allow passengers to pay for trips using smartphones or credit cards, clocked 1,561,846 taps Thursday, the MTA said.

The readers are in all 472 subway stations and have been installed on 5,800 city buses, the MTA says.

About 40% of subway riders have switched from swiping their MetroCards to using the contactless system. The city plans to completely phase out the magnetic stripe cards by 2024.

The number of riders is likely higher because the figures don’t account for passengers who jump the turnstiles. An MTA survey earlier this year found 12.5% of subway riders and 29% of bus riders don’t pay for their rides.

Otherwise, it’s Come All Ye Faithful.

“Yeah, the city is coming back,” said Adrianna Acheampong, 19, a service representative at a Queens car dealership. “The subway proves that. But we’re a year or two away from when we get there.”

Acheampong was on her way from to Sunset Park in Brooklyn, and lucky enough to find a seat on the D train in Herald Square. But she worries that the subway surge could increase the number of coronavirus cases across the city.

“COVID is still out there,” Acheampong said. “It’s riskier now. It’s still in my mind that we’re going to have the pandemic again, if not COVID, then something else.”

Riders recalled the stressful days at the height of the pandemic when the 24-hour system was shut down for several hours a day so work crews could sanitize the stations and the subways.

Round-the-clock subway service returned to New York City on May 17, 2021 after more than a year shuttered overnight for COVID cleaning and to evict homeless riders out of stations.

Lola Said, 30, an architect from Brooklyn on her way home from Manhattan to Midwood, said she is alarmed to see the homeless have also returned to the trains, and that the threat of being a crime victim puts a crimp in her commute.

“Yes, it’s more crowded, but I don’t feel safe,” she said. “Now there are more homeless on the subway, too. The homelessness on the train is definitely a function of COVID. People lost their homes, their places to stay. Where else are they going to go, especially now, as it gets colder?”

And there’s the fear that COVID will come back and stop the subway’s revival in its tracks.

Bobby Straughn, 25, fished through his bag for a mask as he stood Friday night on a platform at Herald Square waiting for a train to take him to Queens.

“I wear my mask, but only sometimes,” Straughn said. “COVID is still out there, and I don’t want to catch it.”