NYC Is Building A Big Steel Wall To Save Subways From Future Flooding

Flickr / MTAPhotosTo protect a stretch of New York City's A subway line from the kind of severe damage wrought by Hurricane Sandy flooding, the city's Metropolitan Transit Authority is building a two-mile wall of steel between the tracks and the water.

The wall will run on the eastern side of the tracks on Broad Channel, an island in Jamaica Bay. The project will cost $38 million and should be completed by May 1, according to Transportation Nation.

Crossing the bay, the A train leads to the Rockaways, the peninsula that was severely damaged by Hurricane Sandy.

That section of the train, which carries, 30,000 riders per day into Queens, has been out of service since the storm.

The wall is made of thick steel designed to withstand erosion from salt water, and each section is being planted 30 feet into the ground. Once finished, the wall will stand seven feet tall, which the MTA believes is high enough to stop future storm surges from damaging the tracks.

Here's the MTA building the new wall:

Flickr / MTAPhotos

Flickr / MTAPhotos

And what the tracks looked like just after Sandy hit:

Flickr / MTAPhotos

The steel wall will protect the A train tracks on the island of Broad Channel, in Jamaica Bay:

MTA