The V Stands Alone

Start saying goodbye to the V train.

The MTA announced Friday that the 8-year-old subway line will be shut down to help the agency deal with a $400 million budget shortfall.

The V train cut was part of a list of revised proposals for service changes the agency released yesterday that, while eliminating some programs, gave other critical ones a reprieve, including free student Metrocards. Some bus routes also got spared.

The MTA board still has to review the new proposals at a meeting next week, but they're expected to approve the plan.

And that means the death of the V train.

Service at V train stops will be taken over by the M train, which is having its route redrawn so it can handle the V's riders in Manhattan and Queens. The M train, which has boasted a brown MTA logo for more than three decades, would be remodeled after the orange logo on the V as it assumes the place of the route throughout the city transit world.

The M train will no longer serve some stops near Wall Street, City Hall and Chinatown. Its part-time service to parts of southern Brooklyn will be eliminated. The New York Times reports that the M would run its normal course from western Queens through Williamsburg, but would take over the V's route and go north to the Forest Hills-71st Avenue stop in Queens.

The MTA announced the planned cut earlier this year. It would take effect in June. The line was supposed to retain its V designation, but M advocates apparently raged against the MTA for considering eliminating a 30-year-old line -- even in name -- in favor of one that's been around for less than a decade, reports the Times.

The last time a subway changed the color of its logo was in 2001, when the formerly orange Q train adopted a yellow logo after its course changed from Avenue of the Americas to Broadway, reports the Times.