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New York trains roll on new subway line envisioned in 1920s

Children peer though a train window at the newly opened 86th Street station on the Second Ave. Subway in New York Sunday, Jan. 1, 2017. The opening of three new stations on the newly opened Second Ave. subway marks a decades long plan to bring rail transportation to Manhattan's Upper East Side. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)
Children peer though a train window at the newly opened 86th Street station on the Second Ave. Subway in New York Sunday, Jan. 1, 2017. The opening of three new stations on the newly opened Second Ave. subway marks a decades long plan to bring rail transportation to Manhattan's Upper East Side. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle) Children peer though a train window at the newly opened 86th Street station on the Second Ave. Subway in New York Sunday, Jan. 1, 2017. The opening of three new stations on the newly opened Second Ave. subway marks a decades long plan to bring rail transportation to Manhattan's Upper East Side. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

By ALEX LYNCH, Associated Press 2 min read

NEW YORK (AP) – New Yorkers’ long wait to take a subway under Manhattan’s far Upper East Side ended Sunday when three new stations on the Second Avenue line opened to the public.

The first train left the station at East 96th Street at noon after a speech by Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who pushed to meet a New Year’s Day deadline for the long-delayed project.

“I hope when you go down there you really feel how much hard work and time and patience it’s taken to get to this point,” Cuomo said. “It’s incredible. This is not your grandfather’s station.”

The nearly 2-mile segment adds stations along Second Avenue at 96th, 86th and 72nd streets and a new connection to an existing subway line at 63rd Street.

Seen as crucial to alleviating congestion in the nation’s biggest subway system, it is on a line expected to carry about 200,000 riders a day. The entire system transports about 5.6 million riders on an average weekday.