RTOPRO

You may missed a slew of the posts prior to posting yours. Those cars have been at Corona for several weeks now and crews are receiving their qualification training on a daily basis.

Then I have to toss it back. Anywhere you find a fault is prone to earthquake activity. How often is a different story.

You start treading a dangerous area when you say NYC is not earthquake prone. Which is false by the way. I guess maybe you mean not seismically active which would indicate that one does not occur very often or is rare then that would sound better. The USGS ranks NYC and the immediate surrounding territory at the midway point in their scale as moderate risk. As you get further out that risks starts to drop off from moderate which is typical for the northeast. NYC is long overdue for its own 5.0 quake and a 5.0 quake at 125th Street along Broadway could prove devastating as the 1 line structure was not built to give way in the direction in which the fault would shift back and forth during a quake. Getting back to the topic at hand mostly and I've said it before and I'll say it again. The study was done and the line up was chosen for a combination of reasons. It's easy to armchair quarterback now and say what should be different without knowing why they chose to go with the line up as is for SAS.

Extending to 10 cars on the structure? Wow that's pricey and I have now seen all of the fantasy proposals I could see.

Both A and B division? The reason why I ask this is because if they don't stop the B division side of it now then it affects the entire pick process as the posting would be ongoing right through the start of the new pick for the B division class.

LOL of course. They're paying more money in OT to have road T/Os cover part of an uncovered shift for a switching job. Hilarious!!!! You can snatch half a shift easy after finishing up whatever other job you completed.

The mid-week OT for RDOs are plentiful. The last few weeks have been insane but a lot of new T/Os are washing out so the CAS seems to be making their reliability list. Jump on it if you dare LOL. Once you work one RDO you'll get called weekly. Just be careful if and how you turn them down when the week comes that you don't want to work an RDO. A lot of them are open during the week too. There aren't enough students to cover all yard jobs on all tours. That's where you get the YD asking T/Os to cover if they can.

It's bad in the A to for T/Os. CAS makes a round of calls every Sunday to fill in the open spots. A lot of stuff open all week long and even weekends. After T/Os finish a road job they are getting asked to cover a switching job for a late clear. Even yard switching T/Os are being asked to stay later to cover the open spot on a later shift. It's the wild west out here.

LMAO you already know the answer to that. As for everyone else patience grasshoppers. There's a backlog on foam. Yes at some point but that's the least of anyone's concerns right now. That will become more of a priority as a lot more of the cars arrive at Westchester. Until then it's not really a concern.

Well I'll say it again especially since I'm as close to being in the know as most will get. There will be no R188 in service today or tomorrow. Crews are still getting familiarization training and until that's done don't look for it in service. The R62A assignments have nothing to do with when R188s go into service on the 7 line. They have everything to do with when Westchester sends another 10 car train back to Yonkers for R188 conversion. As that happens Corona sends something to Westchester, 240th may or may not send something on loan to Corona so the Flushing Line does not end up with a car shortage and so they can use compatible equipment (R62A) and Livonia or Lenox will send something on loan to 240th. Now the paragraph above was the plan to stem the shortage tied but as the brand new deliveries arrive at Corona 240th and Livonia/Lenox can start to take their pieces back.

There are definitely more than 33 cars on TA property. 33 is pure speculation. At minimum there are at least 44 on property overall but no one can seem to get an exact number unless you are a ranking official in new car equipment deliveries department.

11 cars are at Corona. That's it for Corona for now.

I haven't heard anything about them going into service tomorrow. According to the last documentation I've seen road qualifications for the equipment will be going on well into next week for T/Os and C/Rs and in order to do that the only pieces that are in Corona need to be made available for the class.

In all honesty the only thing truly new about these cars is the new addition of the C car and the CBTC equipment which is not really going to be operational for quite some time. So it's debatable as to whether these cars will experience any 30 day revenue testing. The new deliveries are another story.

In any case it all depends on the job and each job is different. It also depends on what line you're working. When you sign in you typically have 15 minutes from your reporting time until the time you're due to depart the terminal with your train. Typically when you go from one end of the line to the other you have about 20 minutes minimum before you are due to jump back on to make the next run back in the other direction completing your trip. When you complete a trip on lines like the 2, 3, 4, 5 your lunch ranges from 30 minutes to 59 and are required to be at least a minimum of 20 minutes or you are entitled to a 30 minute bonus for no lunch. However on these lines you actually get off the train after a run. On the 1 and 6 you don't. You get down to the south terminal and you wait for the lights to head back north. All of your breaks and lunches are at the north terminals.

More specifically you go to Work Programs. Timetables will only show you the schedule for each individual run without giving you any specific info about a job for the crew such as a job number or breaks and lunch. The Work Program gives you that information.

Crew qualifications are only done during off peak hours because there is no room to fit the train in between on peak headways.

Missing a multiple choice question will cost you the job. Misunderstanding a write in will have you walking to the Supt to clarify your position and they will determine if you can go back and rewrite the answer or if it was wrong where you will lose the job.

Looks like those of you reporting tomorrow will be either the last class or the next to last class performing three months yard posting. As matter of fact those of you who end up in the B division class may not do three months yard posting at all.

Re-read that last sentence about hindsight....

Where cut and cover costs start exploding is the utility relocation. NYC is not the city it used to be. The network under the street is massive. The amount of utilities to relocate are staggering. Especially depending on what's nearby above ground. Not directly above buildings close to where you want to cut. Like in the case of 96th and retaining/slurry wall had to be built to maintain the integrity of not only the box but the foundations of buildings along the street near the box and the utilities under the sidewalk. It would've been way more beneficial if the subway line got there before the utilities did 90 years ago but hindsight is as they say 20/20.

The Javits Center extension was built for A division trains only. They used a smaller TBM to bore out the tunnels to 34th than what was used on Second Ave. At the end of the day everyone's dream of turning the 7 line into a B division line has died. It would be too expensive of a project anyway. The line is fine as is. Steinway tube is being carved out to properly fit the systems it needs to function as any other tube. Steinway will not hinder CBTC in the slightest just like 14th St does not hinder CBTC over there. CBTC will be hindered by everything else that can go wrong other than Steinway.

Because in order to replace an existing tube you have to shut down service in the existing tube for an extensive amount of time. What bob was referring to was building a new river tunnel outright.

Excellent point which leads right into another point. And that's the reasons for even going the direction of large station caverns. Yes the technique is very expensive however cut and cover with steel beams to support the tunnel structure is now a high cost technique because steel is no where near as cheap as it used to be. I would even say it's no longer cheap period. Also it's better to invest more now to save a ton later. The island platform via mezzanine set up reduces the ADA costs. Two elevators, two banks of escalators. One of each for street level and one of each for Mezz to Plat level. Obvious escalators there may be more of depending on the number of entrances but the big piece of the costs for ADA requirements revolve around elevators. Not only that but the cavern's support system is the cavern itself helping to reinforce itself with any additional pressure applied. Which brings up a point I forgot. The MTA is required to build elevators and escalators into any newly constructed line to meet it's ADA requirements. A Nassau option would require that each one of the Nassau stations receive ADA compliance work. Even though they are already existing stations part of the compliance requires a certain number of key stations receive ADA compliance work during their rehabilitation yet Nassau would fall under the new line, ADA requirement because all other stations would have ADA compliant elevators and escalators meaning you would be stranding disabled riders at the last newly built station leaving them with very little options. The costs would be enormous. These are all of apart of the issues many are not considering.

You're posting an article based on Lee Sanders vision yet Lee Sanders is no longer the President of the MTA. As a matter of fact he's been replaced three times over. The problem the state saw with Sanders is the fact that he had a lot of grand visions without approval or money to pay for them. Albany likes leaders who worry about dealing with what's currently going on instead of focusing on grand visions. I'm not going to get into how wrong that thinking is but that's real life politics in NY. Going back to what you mentioned about provisions. Yes provisions are being made for future expansion into Brooklyn and Bronx however with no promise of ever doing so. Once again you're missing the point. There are 4 phases approved by the feds for funding and potential funding. Phase 1 is approved for funding. Phases 2-4 are approved for potential funding meaning the feds have approved that they will sit down and visit the issue and vote on whether or not to fund the next phase and how much based on what happens with Phase 1. That's why the EIS suggested the Phases, in order to make funding possible. If you understand the history of the false starts on 2nd Avenue then you'll understand why it's done this way. Money has gone down the drain just trying to get the ball rolling. They don't want that to happen again. Now having said all of that. Bronx and Brooklyn are not included in any of the approved phases. As a matter of fact the MTA didn't even originally draft phases 3-4 until residents, businesses and politicians put the pressure on for the need of a full length line. The MTA then drafted the EIS to include those phases and submitted them for review to the feds. You're saying the Nassau connection would be cheaper. I'm telling you you're wrong and that it would be a waste of money. You're forgetting the fact that every Nassau station would have to be extended to accommodate 10 cars but everyone makes it seem so easy and cheap. Are we forgetting how long and expensive it was just to extend Bleecker Street a little to the south and how much of the above sidewalk had to be turn apart to relocate utilities? And since you're extending you might as well rehab the entire station. Now you're rehabilitating all of the Nassau stations? Cheap? No! And since the intent was always to build the full length SAS line as a fully integrated CBTC line. Now you have to work on converting the Nassau line and it's existing switches signals and switches to CBTC? That's not cheap at all. It's actually cheaper to build signals out brand new into a freshly built tunnel with no preexisting complicated switches. Then once again in order for the T to run to Brooklyn you have to buy more rolling stock than what you originally intended for a Manhattan line north to south then you have to build more facilities to lay up these trains. The extra rolling stock cost money and the additional spur, lay up, siding and yard area tracks to be built are additional costs. Everyone is pulling random estimates out of the sky based on personal theories yet no one here is a transit planner nor has anyone pulled out the calculator. It's cheaper to build a brand new line in an area where there is no line than to connect to an existing line that's currently inadequate and would need to go through major structural changes to accommodate all of the requirements of said new service not to mention the fact that the connection to the existing line would defeat the purpose of what the people demanded which is a line along the east side all the way from the Upper East Side and East Harlem all the way to the Lower East Side and the Financial District along the eastern section. The plans were drafted based on pressure from the people. Not fantasy transit planning.