PHOTOS: MTA Holds Board Meeting at Grand Central Madison to Celebrate Terminal’s Second Anniversary

Off-site Board Meeting a First in MTA History

View Photos of Board Meeting at Grand Central Madison

Watch the Board Meeting Here

View Video of Post-Board News Conference

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) today held its monthly board meeting outside its customary headquarters location for the first time and convened at Grand Central Madison. With a special visit from Governor Kathy Hochul, the occasion commemorated the second anniversary of the terminal which introduced full Long Island Rail Road schedules on Feb. 27, 2023, touted the preliminary success of the Congestion Relief Zone tolling program, the urgency to invest in the transit system, and proceeded with routine agenda items.

With the MTA Board gathered on the terminal’s stunning mezzanine level, MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber highlighted the terminal’s achievement over the past two years, noting it has significantly reduced travel times for East Side commuters, created new travel options with 40 percent more service and has made the Long Island Rail Road network more resilient against unplanned disruptions, especially those in Penn Station that interrupt service to and from Manhattan. With Grand Central Madison, LIRR customers have a second way to seamlessly travel to and from Manhattan.

Since its opening, Grand Central Madison has continued to see growing ridership, recently breaking a morning peak record on Tuesday, Feb. 11 with 28, 521 riders. Complementing that, the LIRR’s overall on-time performance for 2024 was 95.65%, the highest outside of pandemic years, and marking the first time the LIRR achieved an on-time performance above the 94 percent goal for every month of the year.

In honor of Grand Central Madison’s second anniversary, here’s a list of ten things about the terminal that may not be widely known:

1. Highly rated by customers: LIRR Ridership is up 16% from 2023 and customer satisfaction is up six points in the latest Customer Counts survey – in no small part because of the many people using the terminal.
   Grand Central Madison could be the safest place in NYC: In over two years the number of serious crimes committed against the more than 30 million passengers is exactly . . . two. One was a domestic incident and one was a robbery where a group of youths stole another youth’s skateboard and the suspects were quickly arrested.
2. “Life-changing”:30 million Manhattan riders have had their lives changed – to use Newsday’s wording – by saving 40 minutes a day compared with traveling to Penn Station and backtracking to the East Side.
3. Passive wayfinding: Pastel colors subtly let users know where they are inside the space, with 45th Street, 46th Street, 47th Street and 48th Street each having different colors. Additionally, there are large numbers embedded into the flooring on both the mezzanine and concourse level with its corresponding street.
4. More new entrances coming: New street entrances will be built inside buildings that are under construction above: One will be inside 343 Madison, at 45th Street, a site that formerly housed the MTA’s administrative offices until they were sold to raise funds for the MTA’s capital program. The other will be inside 415 Madison Avenue at 48th Street.
5. It matters where you sit: While it may take nine minutes to reach 42nd Street the southernmost part the station, savvy commuters know where to sit to make the trip faster. From track level to the street including walking underground to Park Avenue takes just 5 minutes and 33 seconds.
6. There are sights to see: Grand Central Madison is filled with beautiful artwork by world renowned artists like Kiki Smith and Yayoi Kusama that has been well received. There’s also a photo exhibit and a large collection of art rotating on the video panels between 48th and 47th street.
7. You can go here, there and everywhere: Grand Central Madison connects the LIRR to the Metro-North Railroad and five subways that connect travelers to four boroughs: ​​​​ and the Shuttle ​ to Times Square. Connecting to Metro-North is easy with the TrainTime app and you don’t need to go all the way down to 42nd Street. Metro-North’s upper-level tracks (Tracks 11 through 42) can be reached from the 47th Street node and its 100-level tracks can be reached with stairs from the 45th Street node.
8. Avoid the cold, snow and rain: Grand Central Madison affords you the opportunity to walk along Madison Avenue for six blocks (48th-42nd streets) and as far as Lexington Avenue and 47th Street in any kind of weather.
9. Winner, winner transit dinner: Grand Central Madison was awarded UNESCO’s 2024 Prix Versailles Interior Award for the World’s Most Beautiful Passenger Station category. This global architecture and design award for recently opened or renovated metro stations is selected by the Prix Versailles jury, composed of architects, designers and cultural figures around the world. More recently, the terminal received an “Honor Award” for civil engineering achievement from the American Society of Civil Engineers.