M (New York City Subway service)
The M Queens Boulevard/Sixth Avenue Local[3] is a rapid transit service in the B Division of the New York City Subway. Its route emblem, or "bullet", is colored orange since it is a part of the IND Sixth Avenue Line in Manhattan.[4]
Northern end
Clockwise direction:
- Forest Hills–71st Avenue (weekday rush hours and middays)
- Essex Street (Weekday evenings and weekends except late nights)
- Myrtle Avenue (late nights)
Counterclockwise direction: Middle Village–Metropolitan Avenue
36
13 (Weekday evening and weekend daytime service)
8 (late night service)
1914
- October 4, 1969 (MJ service only)
The M operates at all times. On weekdays from 6:00 a.m to 9:00 p.m., the M operates local between 71st Avenue in Forest Hills, Queens and Metropolitan Avenue in Middle Village, Queens; weekend daytime and late evening weekday service is cut back to Essex Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan; late night service short turns at Myrtle Avenue–Broadway in Brooklyn.
The M is the only service that travels through the same borough via two different, unconnected lines. Additionally, the M is the only non-shuttle service that has both of its full-run terminals in the same borough (Queens). Though the full route length between 71st Avenue and Metropolitan Avenue is about 18.2 miles (29.3 km), the stations are geographically located 2.47 miles (3.98 km) apart, marking this as the shortest geographic distance between termini for any New York City Subway service that is not a shuttle service.[5]
An MJ service ran the entire BMT Myrtle Avenue Line until 1969, when the section west of Broadway in Brooklyn was demolished. Before 2010, the full-length M ran from Middle Village to southern Brooklyn via the BMT Nassau Street Line and Montague Street Tunnel. The M had originally run on the BMT Brighton Line to Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue until 1987. Afterward, it used the BMT Fourth Avenue Line and BMT West End Line in Brooklyn, terminating at Ninth Avenue or Bay Parkway.