Subways - How safe are they at night?

We%26#39;ve taken subways in NYC before but never at night. Is it safe to go pretty well anywhere on the subway at night or are there areas we should avoid?

Subways - How safe are they at night?

They are fine.

By the way, when you say ';night';, do you mean 8 pm (that%26#39;s not night, that%26#39;s early evening...) or 11 pm (not all that late, and there are lots of people around) or 3 AM (the subways are still running -- they run 24/7 -- but they are in late night mode)?

Very late (e.g., 3 AM) you have long headways between trains, and you will find the trains and stations emptier, and this makes some people feel nervous. The homeles are often also more in evidence. I will say, though, that I have taken the #7 train from Times Square to Main Street in Flushing at 2 in the morning on a weekday, and had to stand all the way because there wasn%26#39;t an empty seat.

As for places not to go, I don%26#39;t recommend, say, the end of the New Lots Line late at night, or hanging around on the platform at Kingston-Throop or at Park Place on the Franklin shuttle at 2 in the morning, but then again I can%26#39;t imagine that you would be going there even in the middle of the day. Any place you are likely to go in tourist Manhattan is going to be perfectly all right even late at night.

Subways - How safe are they at night?

Greenwhiteblue,

Thanks for replying. When I said ';night,'; I meant probably 11 p.m. - midnight would be the time we%26#39;d be returning to our hotel. We are going to dinner at John%26#39;s Pizzeria near Times Square and were thinking of going to City Bakery afterwards, which is on 18th St. Do you know if City Bakery is in Greenwich Village? I%26#39;m assuming that area would be fine to walk around up until 10 p.m. or so. What about Central Park - is that also okay to be walking around up until maybe 10 p.m.?

City Bakery is in the Union Square area, and they are not open late, here are the hours:

Weekdays 7:30am-7pm; Sat 7:30am-6:30pm; Sun 9am-6pm

I would not walk in any park in any city at 10 PM, except in the summer for special events, like the NY Philharmonic or a concert in Central Park, where there are lots of people and a large police presence.

The subways are quite busy and very safe quite late into the evening. I have been on the subways at ALL hours of the night, whether heading to an airport or train station for a 5:30AM departure or coming home late during Grad School, all hours.

There are certain neighborhoods I wouldn%26#39;t go through alone at the middle of the night if I could avoid it but none of them are in Manhattan.

Union Square is busy well into the night, its a major shopping, bar, restaurant, nightlife, NYU student, etc area. Times Sq. is also very busy well into the night and the yellow trains between Union Sq. and Times Sq. could not be any safer, they%26#39;re extremely safe.

I travelled all the way to West Farms and Grandconcourse in The South Bronx on the 2%26#39;s%26amp;5%26#39;s and all the way out to Coney, Bushwick %26amp; East New York in Brooklyn without problems, I found the Subway to be extremely safe, clean and efficent.

Travelling on the subway at night, no problem NYC is a lot safer than London IMHO.

Obviously be vigilant travelling anywher after dark.

It%26#39;s safe. People are coming home from work, bars, going to work, etc. There are times when the subway is really crowded at 2:00 am. The only drawback is that the schedule is reduced, so if you miss a train it could be 20 minutes+ until another one comes. So while I encourage people to take the subway over cabs, late at night is one time where you might want to take a cab (I%26#39;m talking after midnight) not because of safety but because of convenience.

Generally you shouldn%26#39;t have to wait more than 20 minutes for a subway, EVER. That is the general rule. Occasionally things don%26#39;t go according to plan, a bunch of people called in sick, equipment problems, who knows, but generally you shouldn%26#39;t have to wait more than twenty minutes.

On a number of lines in Manhattan there are two trains running at night so the wait shouldn%26#39;t be very long at any time of the night. This applies to the Green trains (Lexington) between Brooklyn Bridge and 125th Street, Yellow (Broadway) between Canal and 57th (the Q is express even at night), Red (7th Avenue) between Chambers and 96th Street, the Orange (6th Avenue) between Broadway-Lafayette and Rock Ctr, the D train is express even at night, and the Blue (8th Avenue) between Chambers and 50th Street. Hey, thats every line that goes up and down in Manhattan, I didn%26#39;t realize that until now.

And they%26#39;re safe.