The City Just Painted Over the Graffiti in the 191st Street Tunnel. Here's a Look Back at Its Walls.

The 191st St tunnel as it looked in 2018.

On Friday the NYC Department of Transportation painted over the colorful graffiti inside the 191st Street Subway Station tunnel, surprising—and angering—many in the neighborhood.

Although the passageway has been plagued by complaints over drug use, vagrancy and general neglect, the street art on its walls had always been a source of pride.

The tunnel, which stretches underground for three blocks from Broadway to the subway station at St. Nicholas Avenue, even achieved fame in Lin-Manuel Miranda's 2021 film "In the Heights."

The DOT says the scrubbing is the "first step towards creating new art with the community" and will begin requesting proposals from local artists to repaint the tunnel this week.

But the agency has been down this road before, inviting five artists in 2015 to beautify the passageway. Over the years intrepid taggers mostly covered up the original work.

As the tunnel waits for its latest makeover, here's a look back at its walls in 2018 and 2019.

The entrance to the tunnel on Broadway in 2019.

The tunnel as it looked in 2018.

A bend in the tunnel in 2018.

A detail by artist Queen Andrea from 2018.

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