About the Museum

Founded in 1976, the New York Transit Museum is dedicated to telling and preserving the stories of mass transportation – extraordinary engineering feats, workers who labored in the tunnels over 100 years ago, communities that were drastically transformed, and the ever-evolving technology, design, and ridership of a system that runs 24 hours a day, every day of the year.

Housed underground in an authentic 1936 subway station in Downtown Brooklyn, the Transit Museum’s working platform level spans a full city block, and is home to a rotating selection of twenty vintage subway and elevated cars dating back to 1907.

Visitors can board the vintage cars, sit at the wheel of a city bus, step through a time tunnel of turnstiles, and explore changing exhibits that highlight the cultural, social and technological history – and future – of mass transit.

The New York Transit Museum is a self-supporting division of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Friends of the New York Transit Museum, a 501c3 not-for-profit organization, was established in 1995 to promote and raise funds for the Museum’s operations and programs.

View Friends’ Annual Report:
2019 2018 2017 2016

New York Transit Museum programs are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, and supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. Online programs are supported by Con Edison.