I own a 6 family apartment building in Brooklyn, and the electric was upgraded back in 2000.
I noticed on these panels in the basement, the feed coming straight from the meter to the panel, there is no main disconnect. Only way to disconnect the electric to the apt is to shut off the individual breakers ( see pic), or in the more recent renovations, shut off the main breaker in the basement panel feeding the sub-panel in the apartment.

https://plus.google.com/118428219834...ts/F9zvftJ7EvL

(Only the 2 apartments on the first floor do not have a sub-panel within the apartment).
All of the panels in the basement are main lug.
There is a main 200A disconnect for the entire building.

Is this correct? Isn't it necessary to protect the wiring or provide a means of disconnect from the meter to the panel?

I'm asking because we are doing a bathroom reno on the first floor, and I ran a new 12/2 BX just for the bathroom. And when I installed in the panel, to be safe I wanted to de-energize the entire panel, but the only way to do that was to turn off the entire building.

I managed to install it anyway while the panel was live.