The Town of Huntington restored elevator service Friday at the Long Island Rail Road station.
“This was an ongoing problem for many years,” Supervisor Ed Smyth said.
Because of sporadic problems with the elevator over the years, the town shut down service completely last January, with a plan to reopen by the end of March.
Instead, Smyth said, the project, which cost $936,000 was completed this week.
“This will alleviate a lot of issues, especially for the people who are traveling,” Smyth said, and can’t get around easily.
During the shutdown,the town said, it provided drivers to move those in need from one track to the other.
Councilman Sal Ferro said it was time to “Stop putting Band-Aids on a problem and start fixing them.”
“With an elevator in a train station like this, wow, that’s a big one,” said Marianne Iannaccone, chair of the town’s Citizens Advisory Committee for Persons With Disabilities. “The fact that this got done ahead of time is really, really wonderful.”
They did NOT provide drivers to get people from one track to another. They had a shuttle service which you had to reserve in advance, which only operated between the hours of something like 9 to 5, completely useless for City commuters.