Fifth Avenue/53rd Street station

New York City Subway station in Manhattan

The Fifth Avenue/53rd Street station is a station on the IND Queens Boulevard Line of the New York City Subway. Located at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and 53rd Street in Manhattan, it is served by the E train at all times and the M train weekdays except late nights. Fifth Avenue/53rd Street was opened in 1933 as part of the Independent Subway System's (IND) Queens Boulevard Line. It contains two side platforms on separate levels: southbound trains to Lower Manhattan use the upper level, while northbound trains to Queens use the lower level. The station was renovated in the 1980s as part of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's Culture Stations program and was rebuilt with displays showing information about the cultural institutions in the area. Further improvements to the station were proposed in the 2010s.

The Queens Boulevard Line was one of the first built by the city owned Independent Subway System (IND), and was planned to stretch between the IND Eighth Avenue Line in Manhattan and 178th Street and Hillside Avenue in Jamaica, Queens, with a stop at Fifth Avenue. The line was first proposed in 1925. Bids for the 53rd Street subway tunnel were received in October 1926, and work started in April 1927. The 53rd Street Tunnel was fully excavated between Queens and Manhattan in January 1929. The Fifth Avenue/53rd Street station opened on August 19, 1933 with the opening of the IND Queens Boulevard Line to Roosevelt Avenue in Queens. Service was initially provided by E trains running via the IND Eighth Avenue Line. On December 15, 1940, the IND Sixth Avenue Line opened between West Fourth Street–Washington Square and 59th Street–Columbus Circle. On this date, trains began using this station, diverging west of the station onto the Sixth Avenue Line. In 1959, a project started to replace the four 2 feet (1 m) escalators with new wider 4 feet (1 m) escalators—two at the Madison Avenue end of the station, and two at the Fifth Avenue end. The new long escalators were intended to increase capacity, and could run at speeds of per minute. On September 8, 1959, the first of the four new 4 foot wide escalators was put into place at the Madison Avenue entrance, replacing one of the 2 foot wide escalators. The entire project cost $1.2 million. As part of the project, other improvements were made: the lighting at the station was replaced with fluorescent lighting, and the stairways at the station were moved.

In 1981, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) listed the station among the 69 most deteriorated stations in the subway system. That same year, the MTA announced the creation of its Culture Stations program to install public art in the subway. The Culture Stations program was started to deter graffiti, and was inspired by legislation in the New York City Council that mandated that 1% of the cost of constructing public buildings be used for art. The program was modelled on the Louvre – Rivoli station on the Paris Métro, which featured reproductions of the artwork on display in the Louvre. Four stations, namely Fifth Avenue/53rd Street, Astor Place, Eastern Parkway–Brooklyn Museum and 66th Street–Lincoln Center, were selected for the program due to their proximity to cultural institutions, and would be among the first stations part of the MTA's new station refurbishment program, which began in 1982. The Fifth Avenue station was chosen for its proximity to five museums, the New York Public Library Main Branch, and major corporations. The stations in the Culture Stations program were to be completed by making use of both private and public funding. This station was redesigned by Lee Harris Pomeroy Architects. The modernization project was opened to bidders on November 9, 1982, and was expected to cost between $4 and $6 million. Some funding for the renovation came from a $66 million grant that the Urban Mass Transportation Administration had given to the New York City Transit Authority in 1982. In addition, Fisher Brothers (the developers of the nearby Park Avenue Plaza office building) had contributed $100,000 to a special fund for improvements to the Fifth Avenue/53rd Street station. Design work was completed in 1983. The renovation was originally scheduled to be complete in December 1984 but was pushed back by two years. As part of the renovation, 400 feet (122 m) rows of light boxes containing displays showing information about objects in nearby museums such as the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), as well as points of interest in the vicinity, were installed on each platform. The light boxes were designed by the project's graphic designers, Pentagram. In 1996, Ralph Fasanella's 1950 painting "Subway Riders" was installed outside fare control in the full time mezzanine. It was the first oil painting installed in a subway station in New York City. Fasanella had donated it to the American Folk Art Museum on the condition that it stay permanently displayed in the subway under the MTA Arts & Design program, saying, "I'd rather have people see this painting in the subway than any museum."

As part of the rezoning of East Midtown, which was approved in 2017, developers were permitted to construct buildings at the maximum permitted floor area ratio if they transferred landmark development rights, rebuilt overbuilt floor area, or made pre identified improvements to subway stations in the area. The six stations chosen for improvements (Grand Central–42nd Street, Lexington Avenue/51st Street, 42nd Street–Bryant Park/Fifth Avenue, 47th–50th Streets–Rockefeller Center, Lexington Avenue/59th Street, and Fifth Avenue/53rd Street) were prioritized due to high ridership. Improvement projects include making stations compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, improving circulation and wayfinding, and reducing congestion by constructing new entrances, or by installing escalators and wider staircases. A list of three levels of improvements were created by the MTA and the New York City Department of City Planning. Type 1 improvements would give a developer of additional floor area, Type 2 improvements would give them an additional , and Type 3 improvements would give them an additional
Initially, in 2012, two improvements were considered for the Fifth Avenue station. These would entail adding or widening stairs between the upper and lower level platform at the east end of the station, and adding or widening the escalators between the upper level platform and the Madison Avenue mezzanine. The main reasoning for the first of the two improvements was because that staircase is over capacity, clearing in 75 seconds during the morning rush hour, greater than the 45 second guideline. The reasoning of the second was because the escalators are at capacity, and would become over capacity if the capacity of the staircase between the two levels was increased. As approved, the East Midtown rezoning provides for one Type 1 improvement and five Type 2 improvements at this station. The Type 1 improvement would entail constructing a new street entrance on 53rd Street west of Madison Avenue. One of the Type 2 improvements would be the construction of a new staircase between the upper level platform and the mezzanine, as well as a new staircase between the upper and lower level platforms. Developers could also elect to install an elevator between the mezzanine and the two platforms. Another potential improvement would be the installation of two escalators between the upper level platform and the mezzanine.