But the mysterious fumes that have permeated the L train this week, and made some subway riders and transit workers feel ill, go beyond the usual odors a New Yorker endures.
On Tuesday, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority temporarily suspended service for several hours to investigate harsh fuel smells at the Graham Avenue stop in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. On Thursday, subway riders and transit workers said the odor, a dizzying chemical stench that forced some to breathe through tissues over their faces, continued to linger.
Amie Roe, 34, who is eight months pregnant, said the smell hit her especially hard Tuesday. “It was really intense,” she said, swaying side-to-side to pantomime her dizziness.
“I’m happy it’s no longer going to be shut down,” she said about the L train, “but I’m upset that this happened.”
The now multiple-day episode is just the latest in a series of troubles for the city’s subway system, coming on the heels of the aborted L train shutdown and near constant complaints from the public of poor service.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority said Thursday that the stench was caused by nonflammable heating oil from a source, not yet identified, outside the subway system. The oil leaked onto the tracks between the Graham Avenue and Grand Street stations.
On Wednesday, the transit authority’s chief safety officer, Pat Warren, said the agency had removed “almost all” of the oil from the tracks.
Warren also said there was no health or safety threat to riders and that the transit agency had worked with experts at the fire department and the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation to determine that there was no risk to the public.
“The air on the L train and in the stations is 100 percent safe,” he said.
Not every subway rider was convinced. Jerry Holste, 69, said that when he got on the subway Tuesday, he became terrified when the fumes filled the train car.
“I don’t like being exposed to that,” he said. “I don’t trust it. They need to clean it up.”
Sandhya Jain-Patel, 45, an art specialist, said the situation had made her furious.
“Yesterday I got down here and my eyes started watering,” she said. “I said, ‘If my eyes are watering’ it’s not safe for children.”
She and other nearby parents from her children’s school hired a Lyft to take them to their children’s school in Manhattan.
“So that’s money out of my pocket in addition to the money I pay for a monthly MetroCard,” she said.
Warren said Wednesday that officials were not sure why the smell was so strong. He could not estimate when the fumes would dissipate and said he was surprised that they had lingered this long.
In the meantime, the authority has been continuously monitoring air quality in stations as complaints about the smells have continued, Warren said.
To help remove the scent, the agency placed heavy-duty fans on subway grates near the Graham Avenue station, the authority said. Workers were also using absorbent pads and blankets to soak up the oil.
Despite the authority’s efforts, station agents and subway conductors have reported feeling nauseous and suffering headaches the past several days.
Dozens of transit workers have complained about the smell, and at least four have gone to the hospital, according to the New York City’s transit workers’ union.
“The L-train situation is completely unacceptable,” Tony Utano, president of a local union chapter, said in a statement. “The air still stinks and we are concerned about long-term exposure and the health of our members working 8-hour shifts along the line.”
He said the union had pulled workers from several locations and would “take further action” if the smell did not improve over the weekend.
On Thursday morning, the fumes continued to penetrate subway cars traveling between the Grand Street and Graham Avenue stations, upsetting riders’ stomachs and irritating their throats.
The scent appeared to have migrated as well. At the Lorimer Street stop, one stop west of Graham Avenue, the smell was so powerful that groups of riders were bunched underneath a subway grate in order to inhale fresh air. The odor was also noticeable at the Bedford Avenue station, the westernmost Brooklyn stop on the L train.
The New York City subway system has been plagued by high-profile issues recently. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has criticized the transit agency several times in recent weeks. The system’s ridership has been in decline amid competition from ride-hailing services as well as delays caused by deteriorating infrastructure.
As a result, the transit authority has been facing a growing budget hole. But in January, after transit leaders spent months urging the need for a fare increase to fix the issue, the MTA’s board delayed a vote on the fare hike.
The L train has been especially beleaguered. After the transit agency spent years preparing to shut down the subway line to make repairs to a tunnel between Brooklyn and Manhattan, Cuomo halted the plan and introduced an alternative proposal that he said would be less disruptive.
Though the transit authority has said it would follow the governor’s plan, it remains unclear when the repairs would begin and exactly how service would be affected.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.