Union Tpke

Just now, RR503 said:

We sure do. Also some electric trackage on the core routes, with timed transfers to steam shuttles into the pits.

Any plans to replace your locos with GG1s?

38 minutes ago, trainfan22 said:

Yes, they have an maintenance shop there. 

 

In fact, some D trains used to go to Euclid as it was once inspected there.

45 minutes ago, RR503 said:

Friendly reminder that the easiest, quickest and most impactful way to reform the MTA's cost structure is to get a handle on its productivity and process issues. Break down silos, do OPTO, reform maintenance procedures, etc. I would personally start with maintenance: NYCT spends more facility maintainer-hours per mile than does any US system outside NYC *by a factor of 5*.

It's nice to be back.

How do you get the union on board with OPTO? Telling them many of them will be laid off as fewer service will need to be run?

1 minute ago, RR503 said:

Walking the coals, tending the furnaces.... 

Do they have steam trains there?

Montague's issue was with cabling toward the top. The racking is on the side.

Adding another branch is not what we need to be doing and limits capacity.

Did you seriously wait for an R160? In a pandemic?

11 hours ago, CenSin said:

The Astoria Line extension has a single distinct disadvantage compared to the : it requires all airport passengers to go through all the residential station stops in Astoria sharing space with those passengers. The first available opportunity to relieve itself of airport passengers is at Queensboro Plaza (), and the second at Lexington Avenue–59 Street ().

 

All the studies that have looked at that extension have presumed that airport trains would run express on the Astoria Line.

There are updates on bus lanes in Jamaica and on Hylan Boulevard

https://www1.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/jamaica-ave-archer-ave-cab1-jul2020.pdf

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https://www1.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/hylan-blvd-lincoln-ave-nelson-ave-cab-jul2020.pdf

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12 minutes ago, R10 2952 said:

Then they should just lower the cost, instead of cutting it entirely.  Cutting off the nose to spite the face is simply bad policy for long-term planning.

If I recall correctly, the feds threatened to cut off funding for Archer and 63rd sometime in the mid-1980s, but the MTA lobbied hard for the money and the issue was eventually resolved.  Personally, I'd hate to think where we'd be if the was still slogging along 53rd, the along Hillside, and the was still ending at that crappy, makeshift stub-end terminal that they made out of 121st.

As much as I love the Archer Avenue and 63rd Street Lines, they were mistakes to build. If the agency hadn't gone gung ho for expansion in the 1970s, they would have spent the money to keep the agency from falling apart. Instead of spending the last 40 years trying to achieve a state of good repair, the system could have been kept in a good state, and then expansion could have begun.

Just now, R10 2952 said:

A lot can happen between now and November.

We are not getting federal funds until January at the earliest, and that is if Biden wins. The whole Capital Program is still not going to happen, and something needs to be cut. It should be SAS, which at its ridiculously high cost is not worth it.

3 hours ago, R10 2952 said:

You're forgetting the Great Depression; that didn't stop the building of the IND, did it?  Just imagine where we'd be if construction had halted on everything the day the stock market crashed in 1929.  We'd be stuck with rickety wooden cars running on ramshackle iron trestles on 9th, 6th, and Fulton instead of what we have today.  As they say on Broadway, the show must go on.

Doesn't mean there's no room for improvement; the MTA definitely needs to look at lowering costs and re-designing infrastructure for Phase 2 to make it more practical than what's on the drawing board currently.  But to drop it entirely? If they drop it now, then it will never get built.

The IND was saved with federal funds. We are not going to get federal funds so we have to use the funding to make sure that our system does not fall apart and become "rickety".

They are using the same racking system as in Canarsie.

53 minutes ago, R10 2952 said:

Gonna have to disagree with you there; of all the phases of the Second Avenue Line, Phase 2 is easiest to build because of the already-existing infrastructure.  They'd be shooting themselves in the foot (and the residents of East Harlem in the head) if they chose to cancel it.  If the line is destined to remain a stubway for the , then they should at least extend it since the tunnels are already there.

However, if the agency does choose to modify the project, I could possibly seem them dropping the extension along 125th Street to Lexington, and hopefully finding a way to bring down the projected costs for the 116th Street station. 

An expansion project that costs billions should not be a priority when the agency is in the worst financial state it has ever been in.

21 hours ago, BM5 via Woodhaven said:

Yikes:

WEEKEND SERVICE  Posted: 07/18/2020  2:24PM

trains are running approximately every 40 minutes between Myrtle Av and Middle Village - Metropolitan Av.

That one is bad. Have they every pulled this one before?

This had been holding up 8th Avenue CBTC.

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M9/A updates

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With the MTA in such a bad financial state, Phase 2 needs to be cancelled. The 2020-2024 capital program was already an unrealistic wishlist. I would much rather have 70 more stations be ADA-accessible than a short extension of the Second Avenue Stubway.

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@RR503 Given that the signaling limits capacity on the line to 20 TPH, is it correct that not building this substation in now won't hurt capacity further? 

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I wonder what percentage of all the posts in the 383 pages of this thread are just people being impatient waiting for updates.