bobtehpanda

14 hours ago, Lil 57 said:

Talking about the skipping patterns on the Port Washington Branch, why is peak service on the line west of Bayside (and to an extent west of Great Neck) so poor? Frequencies are often less than off peak frequencies with trains often being 45 minutes to an hour apart. Do they want those riders to take the QM3 or something? (Even though the wants to eliminate it in the queens bus redesign)

So like, to be fair, neither Douglaston or Little Neck have a great parking situation, and they're kind of a pain in the ass to drive or take the bus to, and the stations are located smack dab in the middle of an extremely low density area. which basically just leaves Great Neck.

In general, the MTA does not really do systemic thinking related to its rail network.

8 hours ago, Via Garibaldi 8 said:

I wouldn't call it an imaginary line though. All they need to do is look at Metrocard swipes vs. LIRR ticket sales to Broadway & Auburndale to see exactly how people travel and the closer to Flushing you get, the more people likely take the subway because it's easier to reach, cheaper and more frequent. It's just common sense. The  runs much more frequently than the LIRR could ever run service just based on an equipment situation. No comparison. Now that doesn't mean that I'm saying that there shouldn't be more service to the stations in question, but my point is the levels of service vs ridership can easily be studied and confirmed and for the most part, the  usually does look at such data.

FWIW the last service plan I saw for ESA, whenever that actually opens, is that PW service will essentially be doubled at all hours of the day with trains alternating between NYP and GCT. Not sure how they plan on treating intermediate stations in that scenario. But they definitely have the equipment available to run that kind of service.

That being said, Bayside is a lot denser, but Broadway wouldn't necessarily be a slouch if some basic things were done (say, have bus fare be included in LIRR rides). Buses already run past Broadway, they're just not dedicated shuttles, and then that way the LIRR also saves money not having to run free shuttles. (Auburndale I'm a little bit less optimistic about, just because the stop is located between and a bit far from two bus corridors.)

7 minutes ago, Trainmaster5 said:

I hope you aren’t being serious with the suggestion that Eagle teams patrol the subway. I’ve operated trains after 9/11 with extra police patrols and it was a disaster. We had undercover cops who carried special tech, especially on trains that traversed the under river tunnels. There were some medical institutions on the East Side that did chemo work. Riders enter downtown  or  .  Union Square was one stop that stood out. Train gets to Bowling Green and we wait while the officers pull people off the train because the instruments detected something out of the ordinary. RCC is on the radio asking me, my C/R, and the ATD what’s going on. The other riders are agitated and delayed. Finally the police let the medical patients back on the train and we close up and head into the river tube. Now multiply that because the medical patients readily complied with the police and the farebeaters will definitely do the opposite and you have a recipe for disaster. My take. Carry on.

You can have POP style checks on the trains, or even on the platforms or by turnstiles. That's more of an issue with how NYPD operates.

NYPD? Operate in a way that is inconvenient because they said so? What a surprise.

On 4/22/2022 at 2:49 PM, Gotham Bus Co. said:

Maybe that's because Suffolk County is 86 miles long.

 

That might lead to union issues. (Will MNRR employees be willing to maintain a machine that sells LIRR tickets, and vice versa?) 

I mean, allegedly OMNY is coming to both the railroads.

Why would they give af if they're getting paid the same for the same amount of work in the end? Not like they make commission on tickets.

CNG isn't really low emissions. Ultimately the goal is zero fossil fuels.

Hydrogen is a pain in the ass to setup. You can't just get hydrogen. That's always been the problem with hydrogen, its distribution and manufacturer.

Biodiesel has more or less been a bust.

On 4/27/2022 at 4:33 PM, shiznit1987 said:

Maybe I'm missing something, but considering one already gets a free subway-to-bus transfer and virtually zero people that ride this thing aren't already coming off the subway or LIRR doesn't this make the move pointless?

Basically it just avoids having to bother fumbling around getting an SBS ticket. 

There was some talk with doing this for the Manhattan crosstowns, to be paid for by the 2007 version of congestion pricing, for largely the same reasons.

On 4/23/2022 at 7:00 AM, Via Garibaldi 8 said:

 

It comes down to revenue as well. If those stations saw more ridership, it would be easier to justify having more trains run at them. I can say firsthand that I have used some stations that receive little service and often times, I was the only one getting on there, so it's kind of a situation where if they're going to run more service, there needs to be enough riders to justify stopping there. The fares have decreased at stops in the City, while they remained relatively high going to the suburbs, so naturally there are going to be more express trains since that's where the revenue is. 

To be clear, I have no issue with increased service at any station if it is justified. I'm simply stating how they operate and why since the question was why they provide the service that they currently do. Again, if  @Gotham Bus Co feels so strongly about it, he should write the  (the LIRR) and his elected officials, otherwise nothing is going to change.

But also ridership is a function of frequency as well; a station is less useful if only half the trains stop there.

On 4/24/2022 at 7:12 PM, Via Garibaldi 8 said:

How is parking at Broadway or Auburndale though?

The same as at Bayside, which is to say there isn't really parking.

On 4/27/2022 at 9:40 PM, Around the Horn said:

I'm pretty sure HEETs are no longer manufactured or something along those lines...

Cubic makes a version of this turnstile with metal/plastic paddles. We could use those instead.

These are quite effective (mind the source, it's the only one with the video still) https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5221063/Fare-dodger-suffers-ultimate-humiliation.html

 

Quote

Mind the chap! 'Fare-dodger' suffers the ultimate humiliation after getting his manhood STUCK while leaping the barriers at a London tube station

A 'fare-dodger' who apparently tried to jump the barriers at a London Underground station really was struck by karma after his manhood became stuck in the doors.

The man's screams of agony can be heard as people line up to witness the incident.    

Police and London underground staff members worked to free the young man from his entrapment at Covent Garden tube station. 

Crowds gathered around the gates to watch as the man's screams became louder and some called for 'butter' to free him. 

Finally, officers are able to free the man to cheers from the growing crowd as the man is let down safely. 

Before he staggers away the man can be seen turning back on himself to hug the members of staff and police officers who helped.

At first his friends seem to be trying to calm him down but as the video continues and the audience expands, a jeering nature seems to occur. 

HEETs are an obvious solution to having riders

On 4/24/2022 at 12:47 PM, Amiri the subway guy said:

What about this. The  runs express on 2nd Avenue and runs via montugue street tunnel. And the  runs local to Bay Ridge 95th street. PS it also skips Chantom Square and Seaport.

With what express tracks

2 hours ago, Amiri the subway guy said:

What with the Obsession with sending the 2nd Avenue via Manhattan bridge and rerouting the 6th Avenue express to Williamburg. Where did the idea frost came up 
 

I asked this because many people on the transit NYCT forums plan to have the 2nd Avenue line take over service on the Manhattan bridge and reroute the 6th Avenue route to Williamburg and removing Nassau street service. Questions why that? I don’t see what benefits come from a change like this.

They are a whole bunch of south Brooklyn riders that use 6th Avenue service you know. It will be a expensive project would eating up resources for no valid reason. And it take long causing delays for all routes involved. Where did this proposal idea came from anyway. Besides the J L and M traina is ok. But we could sent 2nd Avenue routes there instead it won’t make a difference. And people on Williamburg use Nassau street to get to Williamburg. For east side access in Brooklyn the 4/5 trains are there for that, more train should come but demand for east side isn’t even that high in southern Brooklyn . And it make Broadway more crowded than it is. Now people won’t like that would they. Think of it your removing two heavily used services in Brooklyn via Manhattan bridge for two likely underused services in Brooklyn via Manhattan bridge 

If you wanna improve Williamburg than expand to 10 cars install CBTC and expand 2nd Avenue service to Williamburg. But the 2nd Avenue should definitely go to Fulton street

Transfers. Fulton St has very poor transfers in Downtown Brooklyn and SAS transfers in Manhattan are worse. Compare that to Atlantic Terminal.

Also speed. The main point of SAS is to relieve the  . This is a little difficult if the SAS makes more stops than Lex express, so the idea is that by skipping downtown entirely via Manhattan Bridge you can be much faster that way.

The Sixth Av situation doesn't have to be so bad if the transfer at Grand St is cross platform.

On 4/20/2022 at 7:34 PM, Joel Powers said:

The question is, will the MTA allow Amtrak to use their tracks for their own service expansions? 

I mean, Metro-North does.
Then again, LIRR is run differently than Metro-North, although usually for the worse.

On 4/10/2022 at 10:55 AM, Gotham Bus Co. said:

Agreed. Maybe one could argue (tenuously) for through ticketing, but not direct service.

Eh, there's a lot of value in reducing the amount of seat changes, particularly as it relates to avoiding having to exit a platform, go up, go through the boarding process, and then get onto an Amtrak train.

Also, don't a fair amount of trains from the west and north terminate in Penn Station itself? The terminating procedure takes a long time, so maybe it should be moved to somewhere that isn't the most congested station in the rail network.

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I think Amtrak as part of its Amtrak Connects plan has talked about extending Empire Corridor trains to Ronkonkoma. Stony Brook would make more sense if speeds on PJ were improved, but it takes about an hour less to catch a train from Ronkonkoma than from Stony Brook, and PJ has a lot of curves compared to how straight the route to Ronkonkoma is in comparison.

On 4/12/2022 at 7:02 AM, Joel Powers said:

Anytime I'm on a bus ( be it high-floor or not) these idiots always, ALWAYS slow the bus down with their drama. I always believe that strollers and wheelchairs/shopping carts should be outlawed on buses. You don't see bicycles on buses, so why should these other transport devices be?

People need to get to work. It's a civil rights issue (no literally, the ADA is civil rights legislation)
 

Expanding paratransit would be a huge mistake. It already costs $1B+ a year to provide, and that's for the current service which is shitty, requires predetermined appointments 24h in advance that the vehicles are often late to, etc. Serving disabled riders with the actual bus services is a win-win-win; it costs less money and it's more convenient for those passengers. Would you support the service cuts required to pay for more paratransit?

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It always shocks me to see such callous indifference about these kinds of topics, particularly since in this society everyone is one unfortunate event from being broke or disabled (temporarily or permanently.) Crutches gave me a new perspective on how hard it was to be transit-dependent and not have full motor abilities, and that was temporary.

On 3/30/2022 at 5:13 AM, Cain said:

They should consider center running bus lanes if it is feasible. It is more expensive to implement but this is the more logical solution for that area and even if double parking/truck loading is present, buses still has easier access with center running lanes.

Ehhhh, median bus lanes would take an extremely long time to construct given current construction standards. The Van Ness BRT in SF took six years.

IMO the best would be a busway with the rest of Fordham being converted to one-way westbound.

Today we have

EB bus lane -> EB travel lane -> EB travel lane -> WB travel lane -> WB travel lane -> WB bus lane

And that could be converted to

EB bus lane -> WB bus lane -> bus stop/median -> WB travel lane -> WB travel lane -> WB parking

21 hours ago, Trainmaster5 said:

Let me take this sideways for a moment. A Motor Instructor told our class 40 years ago about the long term goal of the . Reduce payroll costs.  The R46 class of subway cars were designed to eliminate personnel,  period. OPTO in the subway. Removal/reassignment of Station Agents Everything that he and his fellow instructors taught us back then is happening in some shape or form now.  We were told that the hardest nut to crack would be the  B/O title. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if route consolidation or outright eliminations is not an underlying factor here. Just my take. Sorry for veering off track.  Carry on. 

My understanding (and I don't think the MTA has ever actually tried to hide this) is that part of why there is this aggressive bus stop removal is to speed up bus times. I would also not be surprised if, as many people do on the various bus proposal threads,  the bus routes are being calculated to minimize idle times so that runtime + required layovers = some nice multiple that fits in an hour. (In fact I would be surprised that they weren't doing either of these things.)

Reducing payroll costs is not really some ahistorical thing, or even some weird thing. Literally every company everywhere in this country is trying to do that at all times. We don't have ticket collectors or manual door operations anymore, now that we have turnstiles and door controls inside the cab. If anything, the weird thing is that unlike the rest of the economy the MTA stopped trying to save labor.

On 4/13/2022 at 1:57 AM, B35 via Church said:

This is exactly why I don't see the need for a route like that proposed Q26... It sacrifices overall patronage too much for speed, which isn't as big a problem on the Q27....

I think the problem is more how to do rider distribution on the Q27. West of QCC even on weekends it's not uncommon to have lots of people passed up on 46th and 48th Av because the bus is full coming from QCC and points east.

I'm cautiously optimistic that the split will be okay, since it more or less splits the Q27 into its three distinct rider bases, QCC to Flushing, SE Queens to Flushing, and SE Queens to QCC.

1 hour ago, Cain said:

Has this changed now that parts of Jamaica got a new busway and bus lanes (as useless they are when its blocked by taxi drivers and waiting cars for LIRR passengers)?

It's not just about getting through Jamaica but also to it as well. Hillside is heavily congested until you pass the Clearview Expressway for buses coming from the east.

The Q27 is busy, but it's not really slow, and very few of the roads it's on are heavily trafficked until you hit Flushing itself, and that you'd have to deal with no matter which way you try getting into Flushing.

9 hours ago, Q43LTD said:

I'm just throwing this out there. What would have happened if the Q88 went to 120 and not the 27 in 2004?

It probably wouldn't do a whole lot.

There isn't a whole lot on 188 that would draw SE Queens, and there are faster ways to get to QCM. For all its faults, the Q27 is definitely one of if not the fastest way to get to Flushing from SE Queens, and it's one seat to boot.

14 hours ago, BM5 via Woodhaven said:

While I don't have much of a problem with having a 73rd Avenue route, it has to go places where people want to go, which it largely fails to do so the further out east you go (save for QCC, at the very end of the route). Also, quite frankly, I don't know what to do with the Q73 out east. I don't know whether Little Neck would be as receptive to Forest Hills for subway access versus Flushing (and there's more around Main Street than at Continental Ave), so I think the ideal route headed east of Springfield on Horace Harding might actually be the Q17 instead of the Q73. The Q17 would serve more of HHE than the existing Q30, along with Kissena Boulevard and downtown Flushing. If that were to happen I would have Q17 short-turns during the day at 188th Street, since the proposed headways would be more than double the frequency for the existing Little Neck Q30. Perhaps I would have the Q73 head up 188th Street to 64th Avenue and terminate there instead of heading out to QCC.

I don't really know what to do with that route once you get to 188th Street, especially since much of the route along 73rd Ave is residential, so it's not like having the Q73 on HHE or 73rd Avenue east of 188th Street would provide a non-duplicative service on either corridor of importance. 

So I think I have a reasonable way to do all that;

• Q88 - unchanged
• Q17 - HHE
• Q73 - weekdays only to QCC, weekends terminate at 188th. I think the routing to QCC is important, but AFAIK QCC isn't open much weekends anyways. I prefer 73rd over HHE to Springfield, if only because the HHE in that stretch is taken up mostly by highway interchange.

13 hours ago, B35 via Church said:

The SE Queens folks will have that Q78 for service to/from QCC... Anyway, while the current Q27 from end to end does too much & has too many patterns (in terms of short turns), I'm uneasy with this whole Q26/Q27 bit they have proposed for some reason.... I'm not sure what you're saying regarding the Q26 though, as the proposed Q26 doesn't run to Jamaica.... It's essentially a Q27 that takes 73rd av & Hollis Court blvd. to get to Flushing, running b/w Cambria Hgts. & Flushing... Basically a QCC bypass...

So looking more into this, I get what I deserve for looking at this PDF before the morning coffee. The route by route for the Q26/27 doesn't mention the Q78, and I skipped over the map on page 35. It's pretty shitty IMO that the full map is buried in a 515 page PDF, and even in the "high-res" version it isn't particularly easy to read.

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The Q78 is a good idea. Personally, I still don't think that people from 120 Av to Jamaica Av are really using the route to get to past QCC in large numbers, because it usually isn't the most direct way to get to those places from those routes.

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As far as other changes go, the one that sticks out to me is the Q88 and Q73. I think the Q73 is probably long overdue, as some kind of 73rd Av route. I'm not super convinced that this is the correct solution.

What I observed when I rode the route was that a lot of people on the Q88 on both the 73rd and HHE portions, used it to go to the little shopping center on 188th St. The new route configurations more or less cut off both roads from direct access to the shopping center, and it's not that far of a walk, but I personally wouldn't have made that decision. Also, I'm not sold on this whole HHE only thing; east of 188 there isn't a whole lot on HHE itself.

(Also, I don't like the change because it would've made my personal trips to QCM more annoying, but that's me.)

2 hours ago, B35 via Church said:

The SE Queens folks will have that Q78 for service to/from QCC... Anyway, while the current Q27 from end to end does too much & has too many patterns (in terms of short turns), I'm uneasy with this whole Q26/Q27 bit they have proposed for some reason.... I'm not sure what you're saying regarding the Q26 though, as the proposed Q26 doesn't run to Jamaica.... It's essentially a Q27 that takes 73rd av & Hollis Court blvd. to get to Flushing, running b/w Cambria Hgts. & Flushing... Basically a QCC bypass...

To clarify, I mean Jamaica Av (& Springfield) not Jamaica the neighborhood. My bad.

Huh, missed when this came out.

Looking at this and how it pertained to bus routes I used to use

• Q20/Q44: lol @ the Q44 they finally did it. Q20s at Briarwood makes more sense, they carried air east of there. Can't speak about College Point, though 20 Av is just a bunch of big box stores that I can't imagine had high ridership anyways.
• Q43: thankful that the awful Winchester routing proposal is dead. All day limited service west of Springfield is nice.
• Q46: not sure how I feel about the limited sections being moved west to 188. Seems like it'll slow things down.
• Q45: the effort to put lipstick on the LNP pig continues, it's not a good road for bus service.
• Q17: totally nonstop between HHE and Sanford is overkill. There should at least be a stop on Holly. Glad they shortened the Jamaica end.
• Q26/27
  • The current Q27 does too many things and struggles. That being said I don't know this was the right call. I think a lot of SE Queens folks going to QCC are going to be inconvenienced. This has been talked about before but I think I would split the current version of the Q26 they have to end at Jamaica, and then have a separate SE Queens-QCC route for the rest.
  • I'm not sure how I feel about the Sanford routing. It'll probably be faster, but would've been mildly inconvenient for me when I was riding buses in Queens.

On 3/10/2022 at 3:31 PM, QM1to6Ave said:

Thanks! Any specific reason for the upgrade? I only saw upgrades to the advertisement system, and the MTA isn't exactly great at selling ads lol

On 3/10/2022 at 4:49 PM, BM5 via Woodhaven said:

Since they can scroll through ads, it'll probably mean more revenue in the long run.

The screens in some stations also do this, although I wish they also showed real time information too (or more often). Its annoying to have to look for a countdown clock, which are not very convenient to locate. 

Idk about the in-train ones, but the station ones are actually paid for by an ad agency, not the MTA, so the fact that they show more ads than info is a feature, not a bug.

On 2/23/2022 at 4:22 PM, Vulturious said:

It's not even just B division lines, A division lines couldn't get them anyway because of the door positions being different on the R62/A and R142/A. Hopefully, if the MTA were to expand upon the R211 order, maybe all the old tech won't be around to interfere. Although, it's definitely going to take a while until we see anything done for both, even longer for A division.

Vertical PSDs exist for different door configurations:

A single bus from Port Jeff -> SBU -> LIRR Ronkonkoma -> Patchogue? Sign me up.

I wonder if the bus + LIRR at Ronkonkoma will end up being faster than changing at Huntington.