A Trains Skip the Lefferts End of Queens All Week: Nine-Day Suspension Runs to November 16, With Free Shuttles
No A service between Rockaway Blvd and Ozone Park-Lefferts Blvd until early Monday, November 16, for signal modernization — Lefferts-bound trains turn at Howard Beach-JFK Airport, and free buses cover 104th, 111th and the terminal at all hours, the MTA says.
The weekend's biggest subway change does not end with the weekend. The MTA's Weekender page carries a major heads-up for A train riders: a nine-day continuous service suspension between Rockaway Boulevard and Ozone Park-Lefferts Boulevard, which began Saturday, November 7, and runs to early morning on Monday, November 16. A trains are not running between Rockaway Blvd and Ozone Park-Lefferts Blvd at any hour during the suspension, while crews carry out signal modernization work. Trains that would normally terminate at Lefferts are rerouted to Howard Beach-JFK Airport, and the rest of the line runs its normal pattern between Inwood-207 Street and Far Rockaway-Mott Avenue or Howard Beach.
The replacement is a bus, and it runs around the clock. For service to and from 104th Street, 111th Street and Ozone Park-Lefferts Boulevard, free shuttle buses operate between Rockaway Blvd and Ozone Park-Lefferts Blvd, stopping at 104 St and 111 St, at all times during the suspension. Queens reporting on the closure puts the same plan in plainer terms: three stations out of service for nine days, free 24-hour bus service arranged while signal upgrades and track maintenance proceed. Riders at the three closed stations should build the bus leg into the trip — the shuttle is the service, not an alternative to it — and the MTA urges riders to check its site or app before traveling, since the Weekender's changes are subject to change.
The A suspension is the week's headline, not its whole story. The same MTA page closes out the weekend's other work on Monday morning: 1 trains did not run between Van Cortlandt Park-242 Street and Dyckman Street from 11:30 p.m. Friday to 5 a.m. Monday for structural work, with free shuttle buses on that segment, and J and M trains did not run between Myrtle Avenue and Manhattan from 3:30 a.m. Saturday to 10 p.m. Sunday for track and switch work, also with free shuttles. Those two end with the weekend. The A line's does not: for Ozone Park, Richmond Hill and the Lefferts corridor, the shuttle week runs through next Sunday night, and the first normal A train to Lefferts is an early-Monday, November 16 train.
