When Do the Streets Reopen After the NYC Marathon? The Verrazzano at 4, the Course in Stages Until 10:30 Tonight

Every marathon Sunday has two races: the one on the course, and the one to reopen the city behind it. The reopening schedule, as published by the MTA and the weekend's closures guides, runs in stages from early afternoon until late tonight — and it follows the runners, because no street reopens until the last participant has passed it and the barricades come up.

Staten Island comes back first. The Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge, closed to all non-emergency traffic from 7 a.m., is scheduled to reopen at 4 p.m.; its upper level has been closed since 11 p.m. Saturday. The Bay Street and Lily Pond Avenue exits, closed since 3 a.m., reopen at about the same time, around 4 p.m. Drivers who have waited out the morning on either side of the Narrows should still expect the bridge's approaches to crawl while the pent-up traffic clears.

Across the course itself, streets reopen in stages between about 2 p.m. and 10:30 p.m., working north from Staten Island to Manhattan as the field thins. The Central Park transverse roads at 65th, 79th and 96th Streets stay closed for most of the day, and buses are not permitted to cross Fifth Avenue while the race is on it — crosstown trips stay difficult until the Fifth Avenue barricades move, which is among the last jobs of the day.

Two honest cautions. First, every time in this file is a plan: a street full of runners at its scheduled hour stays closed, and the tail of a 60,000-person field moves at the pace of its final finishers. Second, the evening commute inherits whatever the afternoon leaves behind. If you are driving tonight, the subway is still the better bet until the last barricade is on a truck — and if you are waiting for your own street, listen for the sweeper trucks. They are the sound of the city coming back.