NYC straphangers go from ‘summer of hell’ to winter nightmare with line shutdown: ‘Worst thing that could happen’

Thousands of Queens straphangers are going straight from the “summer of hell’’ to a winter nightmare — with another key subway service about to get iced for months for repairs.

Service on the A line and its shuttle to the Rockaways — the only trains to the area — is set to be cut from Jan. 17 to May 19 to repair damage from Hurricane Sandy, the MTA announced last week, causing frustration among public transit-customers on the peninsula who will now have to wait for shuttle buses or ferries in the freezing cold.

“Why make [straphangers] wait outside during the winter?” said a local walking on the Rockaway Beach boardwalk over the weekend.

The woman, who declined to give her name, told The Post she has to travel into Manhattan regularly for work.

“It’s cold, it gets rainy. It’s beautiful now, but you don’t know what will happen in January,” she said. “A lot of people here work in Manhattan or another place. I just know I don’t like it.”

An employee at the Baya Bar smoothie shop in Rockaway Park called the looming service cut “the worst thing that could happen.

“It’s the one train that we have here,” she said.

Under the shutdown, A trains won’t run at all between Howard Beach-JFK Airport and the end of the line – either Far Rockaway-Mott Ave. or Rockaway Park-Beach 116 St., the MTA said in its announcement.

At least 9,000 daily riders will be affected.

The extended closure will take effect to complete “major upgrades” to protect the viaducts and bridge that carry trains across Broad Channel from future storms such as Hurricane Sandy, which caused a seven-month disruption to service in the area in 2012.

Rockaway Park Shuttle trains also won’t be running to and from Broad Channel – effectively cutting off all train service to the peninsula.

While ferries and buses – including free bus shuttle service to Howard Beach-JFK Airport – will still be available, some residents still anticipate a longer, more stressful commute.

“With the shuttle buses, I’ll have to get up at 6 a.m.,” said local Peter Campbell, 46-year-old state worker who commutes to Manhattan – and estimates his journey will take him up to 45 minutes longer given anticipated traffic.

“It’s going to affect all the kids in school,” Campbell said. “[A closure] in the summer would’ve been a more equitable time.

“But even then, there’s probably a way to do it that wouldn’t have been a full shutdown – like when they did work on the L train,” he said.

Patricia, a Rockaway Park resident who works in finance at a literary agency in Manhattan, said she also expects the service cut to add up to 40 minutes to her hour-plus commute.

“I know the G train [shutdown] was bad for people, but they could take an Uber to [Brooklyn’s] Williamsburg, not to be insensitive,” she said, referring to the six-week nixing of the Brooklyn-Queens crosstown subway that started in June and became infamous for creating a “summer of hell” for commuters.

“A [shutdown] out here is cutting off a lot of people,” Patricia said.

Some Rockaway Park residents told The Post that the planned shutdown is all too familiar in the South Queens neighborhood, with sporadic subway closures frequently causing headaches.

Others said the upcoming shutdown won’t affect them as they, along with many other locals, own a car.

But Rockaway Beach local and subway rider Christine told The Post that the 2025 service suspension will impact her visiting her mother, who already lives about a two-hour train ride away in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

“It’s very inconvenient,” she said of the shutdown. “We always get the s—ty end of the stick.”

Marine veteran Mike Carroll, 44, said, “They should’ve fixed it all after Sandy.

“You gotta wait all these years later? It doesn’t make sense.”

But the MTA has remained adamant that the wintertime closure is the best course of action.

“This next phase of the A train resiliency work has undergone internal and external expert review to weigh alternate delivery and construction methods,” said MTA Deputy Chief Development Officer of Delivery Mark Roche said. “It was determined that the plan presented is the best option for getting this work done as quickly as possible, with the least impact to commuters.”

Mayor Eric Adams also defended the shutdown at a news conference last week while calling for a robust system of alternatives for Rockaways residents.

“The MTA, you know, they don’t close these stations just to be cruel or rude,” the mayor said.

“They’re making a call that they have to close it for that period of time. We have to have alternatives … and we must make sure we have a good ferry system to get those New Yorkers in the Rockaways around,” he added — though it’s unclear if ferry service will be expanded during the shutdown for the A train’s riders.