New York Sells the Naming Rights to Subway Station

New York’s MTA announced with little fanfare that they have finally found a buyer for the naming rights for a subway station.

If a four million dollar deal is approved tomorrow, the subway stops that converge at Atlantic Avenue, Pacific Street and Flatbush Avenue in Downtown Brooklyn will add the name Barclays, in honor of Barclay’s Bank, a London-based bank which will have its name on the Barclay Center, the sports arena at the center of the Atlantic Yards development project. The developer has agreed to pay the MTA $200,000 a year for twenty years for the naming rights. The change would be scheduled for 2012, coinciding with the opening of the arena, and the exact name has not yet been decided, although it will likely use punctuation, ie Barclays-Atlantic Avenue.

Though Citigroup paid $400 million to sponsor the new Mets stadium in Queens, the company refused to pay the authority to rename the subway and railroad  stops nearby, which are now known as Mets/Willets Point, previously Shea Stadium.