New York City's Potential First New Train Line In Years Will Slash Travel Time Between Boroughs

Over 4 million people ride New York City's subway every day, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). The city operates the largest mass transit system in the country, though that scale doesn't always translate to efficiency or accessibility. The vast system can seem chaotic to first-time visitors, and several areas — including Staten Island and eastern Queens — remain comparatively underserved by rail transit. Fortunately for many, a new light rail line could bring train service to subway-deprived areas of the Big Apple, cutting travel times between outer boroughs.

First proposed in January 2022, the Interborough Express is a planned rapid transit line designed to connect Brooklyn and Queens, with convenient connections to existing subway routes and the Long Island Rail Road. The project would repurpose an existing freight corridor running between Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, and Jackson Heights, Queens, one of New York's most diverse neighborhoods – a line currently used to transport goods including flour and beer, earning it the nickname the "pizza-and-beer railroad." Because existing infrastructure is already in place, the MTA notes that the line could be built more easily than a brand-new subway route.

The Interborough Express would span 14 miles and serve 19 stations. The MTA estimates that an end-to-end ride — between the Brooklyn Army Terminal and Roosevelt Avenue stations, per the proposed map — would take about 40 minutes, offering a faster alternative to current cross-borough trips that typically involve multiple transfers through Manhattan. If completed, it would mark New York City's first entirely new train line since the Second Avenue Subway's Q line extension opened in 2017.

The Interborough Express is a win-win for New Yorkers, said Kate Slevin, executive vice president at the Regional Plan Association, an organization promoting economic growth and quality of life in the New York-New Jersey-Connecticut metropolitan area. "It's an exceptionally good project in terms of how many people it will serve and how effective it will be at reducing commute times and giving people a faster ride," she told Bloomberg.

Indeed, as the MTA pointed out on its website, the project's impact is not only ridership numbers. While the Interborough Express could serve roughly 260,000 people in Brooklyn and Queens — and nearly 900,000 residents living along the corridor — transit officials say the proposal is notable for who it would reach. The planned light rail line would pass through several historically underserved communities, where roughly one-third of residents live below the federal poverty line. In a city where one-quarter of the population lives in poverty, that number carries particular weight.

As of December 2025, the MTA's most recent update indicates that the Interborough Express is undergoing an environmental review, a required assessment of the project's potential impacts that must be completed before construction or funding decisions are finalized. For more guidance on how to commute around the Big Apple, read over the best transportation tips to blend in like a local on your next trip to New York City.