Subway Conditions--Astor Place and 33rd Street

Difference in Subway Stations on Lexington Avenue line is typified by contrast between Astor Place station and 33rd Street, which are about a mile apart...

Astor renovation was done many years ago with help from Cooper Union and the heiress Brooke Astor, whose family made their initial fortune in items such as beaver skins ( thus inset in station wall--)--

33rd Street station is in poorer condition, ( worse than it looks in this photo) more typical of Lexington Avenue line...stop at 33rd Street is under what used to be called Fourth Avenue in the beginning....

For years "Park Avenue South" ( as it is called now) was center for big photographic studios that did major catalog work and the like...Now 33rd Street station is major stop for students from Norman Thomas High School there, and busy 34th Street...lot of old commercial buildings have been turned into apartments.

Biggest hodgepodge of half-renovated subway station work is at Union Square, which I hope to document someday. 

At the time I right this, Transit Authority is in crisis again... service cuts and fare hikes are on the way for what are already are overburdened facilities. More suffering to be added to woes of recession...