Boerum Hill woman creates ‘CityMD Line’ to track wait times for COVID-19 testing

CityMD lines are continuing to grow and people are spending hours on line to get in. Now, a Boerum Hill woman is taking matters into her own hands and tracking which lines are longer and shorter on social media.

News 12 Staff

Nov 26, 2020, 2:50 AM

Updated 1,419 days ago

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CityMD lines are continuing to grow and people are spending hours on line to get in. Now, a Boerum Hill woman is taking matters into her own hands and tracking which lines are longer and shorter on social media.
Francine Ricchi is changing the way people decide which CityMD line to hop onto for a coronavirus test.
Ricchie created an account on Twitter named @CityMDline. "I walked by it every day and saw the lines getting longer, and I just thought this was information people want to know,” said Ricchi.
At the CityMD in Boerum Hill on Atlantic Avenue, Ricchi says she walked down street blocks--counting how many people are on line, then tweeting pictures with timestamps in hopes to help people decide which location to head to.
"So, based on the number that we started at this morning, which was 97, having to go down to 50 at this time is actually a really great time,” said Ricchi.
People on line told News 12 that the wait time checkpoints put in place by CityMD are helping them but that getting to the front of the line and getting into the facility is taking longer than what people expected the wait time to be.
Ricchi says she hopes to alleviate the stress of waiting on line at CityMD by letting people know ahead of time.
"I'm trying to repost on the account to help everyone else because it's hard to sort through all this,” said Ricchi.
Ricchi says anyone can tag @CityMDline to spread awareness on wait times at CityMD.
"The more exact information you can give me the better,” said Ricchi.