Jsunflyguy

On 11/20/2023 at 5:38 PM, trainfan22 said:

Is the LIRR short on trains? A bunch of trains are canceled due to slippery rail conditions.

 

One of the Jamaica- Atlantic Terminal shuttles is canceled and there isn't even any leaves on that route LOL

 

 

I'm guessing a lot of LIRR MUs are OOS due to flat wheels? 

 

 

 

Lots of flat wheels means not enough cars in service to make the sets.

The scope includes Huntington, a place with 3rd rail.  Wouldn't get too excited

28 minutes ago, JustTheSIR said:

I was on the 7 yesterday and I saw an Acela on the LIRR mainline next to Sunnyside, does anyone know why it would be there in the first place?

I'm not sure which track you are referring to but the Acela usually runs through BOS-DC so will be on the mainline often, if you meant using the tracks LI typically uses there was a disabled Amtrak train disrupting the normal flow. Elsewise the Acela does use Line 4 during inspections in the other tubes.

On 8/13/2023 at 4:17 PM, Far rockaway said:

Why do LIRR trains go so slow when  entering and leaving long beach.

The yard is on a sharp curve which limits speed and the subgrade is a sand bar so the lower speed is to keep track from shifting.

I don't know what reconfiguration you guys are referring to. Jamaica has been fundamentally the same since WW1.

20 hours ago, QM1to6Ave said:

 

Thank you both! That is very good to know, as I'm taking LIRR more frequently, so I'll just stick to the Traintime app, as that seems most accurate, unless you have a better suggestion. 

Pretty pathetic how far off the data is on the station boards, sheesh. 

The older PIS was implemented prior to GPS being common. The newer color ones ate fairly accurate. Though if a minute or two raises your ire it wont matter where you look. Another thing to keep in mind is the advertised times are *departure* times. So the RR isnt trying to necessarily depict when the train will arrive.

On 8/4/2023 at 4:07 PM, QM1to6Ave said:

How accurate are the arrival times on the display boards in the station? I was at a station on the Far Rock line yesterday and the times seemed inaccurate-- it would say "arriving in 3 minutes" when the train was literally already stopping in the station. The Train TIme app seems pretty accurate, but do the board update with the live info?

The old PIS  Are a little behind due to the information being predicated on the last time the train was clocked at a major location. So if a train makes up time that won't be detected. The newer ones have slightly more data streams but a similar quirk exists.

On 4/5/2023 at 8:42 AM, Gotham Bus Co. said:

 

I was just looking at the "City Terminal Zone - Grand Central" timetable and noticed that train #1413 isn't even listed (even though other PW branch trains are). It shows GC arrivals at 7:02 and 7:09, but none at 7:05.

 

Might that have something to do with why it's always held at or just west of Woodside? Could the dispatchers possibly not know that #1413 is supposed to be there? 

Oooor in an alternate universe, train 1413 was added after the public media was 'printed' in response to public complaints. Just never got updated due to it happening well after the schedule was published and paper schedules being deemphasized.

2 hours ago, Gotham Bus Co. said:

 

My source was a LIRR conductor on a different PW train.

A conductor told you directly that a train being them being short turned entitled them to a penalty claim? 

2 hours ago, Gotham Bus Co. said:

My understanding was that LIRR crews get overtime for everything: being late, train rerouted or turned short, etc.

If its something you would read in NYPost reconsider if its believable. None of those things pay anything. The most you could do is get 5 minutes for free and if that was a pattern then theyd be downloading your train or sending a plain clothes manager. Thats assuming you dont have a deadhead to catch or that youd even want to bother filling out the form for the extra....$5

2 hours ago, Gotham Bus Co. said:

So only PM crews get paid extra overtime when the train is late?

You would get OT beyond your finish time, anything beyond 5 minutes has to be explained in a report. And sometimes claims for less than 5 minutes are hit or miss. An AM crew operating an AM train is obviously nowhere near finishing their shift so you're just wasting your own time.

9 hours ago, Gotham Bus Co. said:

 

I did some digging for specifics...

 

 

 

Of course, the crews like to arrive late so they can collect more overtime, but that doesn't help the passengers.

Ah yes, the very specific baseless speculation. 1611 and 1413 are operated by AM crews, so they don't even stand to make overtime. And good luck getting a 3 minute overtime claim paid. 

1611 is always late because Jamaica is scheduled for 1 minute dwell times instead of the traditional 2, so the surplus time stacks until it spills over and forces track changes...causing more delays. Couple that with the 1-stop local policy and you have trains that stay in conflict for a long time. Usually the first ripple is as early as 6am by the time 1611 is rolling through, it's averaging 5 minutes which is just enough time for every train to start bumping into the next one. Which is basically irrecoverable due to the feedback loops.

12 minutes ago, danielhg121 said:

Just curious, why is there a Train 698 but all the other PJ trains are usually low 600's or 650-672 around those ballparks. What makes Train 698 special?

It used to be trained 666, but someone didn't like the number so it was changed to the next available one.

6 hours ago, xD4nn said:

JAY and JAM are 2 different things. There are really no conflicting moves in JAY...

Trains like 1455 are often delayed during rush by trains coming in East on 1, trains with cross platforms on 5 and 4 are often backwards and therefore in conflict. To say nothing of the eastbound Hempstead  and Long Beach/Babylon  trains that have been in conflict for the better part of a generation, all occurring in Jay.

1 hour ago, QM1to6Ave said:

So my takeaway is that there is a larger systemic issue of poor communication between supervision and front line employees, which is par for the course with the MTA, sadly 

Yes, its almost like if a large group of people in an organization behave in a certain way it's irrational to view it as an individual performance issue. 

On 12/11/2022 at 7:18 PM, QM1to6Ave said:

It's ridiculous that you have to do this, but that is good advice! Those C/Rs get paid well enough that they should be on top of this stuff

6 hours ago, QM1to6Ave said:

Of course, that makes perfect sense. I was referring to these pre-planned weekend track work projects (such as with the ), some of which occur for numerous weekends in a row, and folks on here have posted repeated frustrations that C/Rs hassle them and act as if they've never heard of the cross-honoring plans!

That's because they haven't

The notice to cross honor wasn't posted until the weekend before it went into effect for the , I just looked now and there is no history of such a notice for the , in fact I have no idea what you're talking about. 
Typically for short term outages the stationmaster will inform the conductor as they are approaching Jamaica or leaving the western terminal. If you are in a car being serviced by a regular collector it is unlikely they were monitoring the radio to hear this and may not be aware until they see the conductor, if they ever make contact. But the company doesn't pay enough for employees to develop telepathy, they have to actually give the information.

13 hours ago, Lawrence St said:

 

So they would rather crowd regular line trains with sports & events fans, instead of using a station...that they just spent $50 million renovating? That's beyond stupid. I can understand because of crew shortages, but come on.

This is no different than any other train to Barclays, Forest Hills or MSG. 

On 11/25/2022 at 7:41 AM, Gotham Bus Co. said:

 

Maybe that's why the draft Grand Central schedules have extra running time.

Is it really extra time if its the amount necessary to perform the work required?

On 11/20/2022 at 12:21 PM, Gotham Bus Co. said:

Why do trains have to hold at each station for up to a minute before the doors are allowed to open?

The conductor collects fares and if people are slow or try to drag it out paying on purpose some Conductors will wait on them in a game of chicken. There's also the matter of people being allowed to sit at the door position which means crews have to wait for these people to vacate before the doors can be opened.

7 hours ago, BM5 via Woodhaven said:

Don't know where the incident happened, but was there no way to at least keep partial service on this branch?

----------------------

Suspended

Train service is suspended in both directions on the Port Washington Branch because of an unauthorized person on the tracks being struck by a train.

NYC Transit is cross-honoring fares at Penn Station on the train and at Woodside & Flushing-Main Street on the train. Customers traveling to Woodside from Penn can also use Mainline service.

Customers are encouraged to use other branches where possible, including the Oyster Bay Branch.

See our TrainTime app or visit mta.info for updates.

Posted: 11/11/2022 06:35PM

The person was struck at Flushing so there is nowhere else for the trains to turn from the NY end that won't energize third rail and endanger the people who are trying to clear the problem. 

1 hour ago, checkmatechamp13 said:

@Jsunflyguy I wouldn't throw out the whole thing just off a few inaccuracies. Just look from a case by case basis. I agree he goes a bit overboard in trying to reduce non-revenue mileage (e.g. an 8:52am and 8:54am out of Jamaica to Hunterspoint Avenue) but I generally like a lot of the concepts he's proposing.

I'm saying  whether or not to throw anything out, I don't plan on evaluating it deeply enough to conclude that. I am saying it likely heralds other accuracies.  For example a few trains earlier train 17 departs PGE at 1740 and is followed by 73 a mere 2 minutes later into a manual block section. But again this isn't possible, PD-Y is a manual block thus only one train can be in that section. The manual block signal is also next to a crossing so it is typical to hold in the station until the route is available  to avoid blocking the crossings so likely you wouldn't  leave Patchogue  until ~1745, which is the closest interval in the current schedule. Depending on whether the train ahead is a local the following train may even see an Approach requiring a 50% speed reduction so the following interval between locals can be 8 or 9 minutes. 

The problem is that schedule writing is like the 5pt question on the Math B regents, once you  get that first input wrong all the predicated times become wrong, and based on how tight he's  using  certain stations/junctions, it breaks the schedule (73 is late, it delays connection 181 which interferes with another train etc). 

Also I do want to not my official objection to renaming Nostrand Ave as Crown heights, lol.

On 9/7/2022 at 7:44 PM, checkmatechamp13 said:

 

It's also the only eastbound train directly to Montauk during the midday hours. The next direct train is the 4:30pm out of Hunterspoint Avenue. (There is a 12:43pm out of Jamaica to Speonk, where you wait 36 minutes for an SFCC connection, but that's a seasonal train until October 7th). 

Also, I found this interesting letter of comments (189 pages worth) on the LIRR Today, including some suggested schedules for the diesel branches: https://www.thelirrtoday.com/2022/09/east-side-access-comment-letter.html

 I've been jumping around, I'm going to suppress my groan at the methodology for determining the schedule padding which makes evaluates the GPS arrival time vs the scheduled departure time. As far as the sample schedule I think the RR should implement different service strategies for Babylon and Montauk, though a lot of things occur in these sample schedules that ignore practical operational constraints. Things like using dual modes as Jamaica Penn shuttles including train 1395 as a Penn shuttle (which would require locking out a route in Hall for several minutes due to how interlocking is laid out, and then having the train sit in Penn at the platform for 35 minutes, a total blunder. Even the Cannonball is only allotted 15 minutes. Then there's some weirdness about train 85/86 turning at Sayville in between other traffic and being followed at a 5 minute interval, which impossible (you can google map and apply some basic known rules to figure out why this doesn't work). Stuff like that makes me wonder if the other proposed changes are even possible or if other such interactions are missed/not considered properly.

4 hours ago, trainfan22 said:

Why is the 11:25AM out of Jamaica to Montauk on a regular Monday morning so busy? I could understand a friday train to Montauk being busy (city folks heading to their vacation homes in the Hamptons) but a Monday morning Montauk train going E/B? I never been on this run but according to the app this is an busy run.

"The help" and other people who would rather escape the hampton crowd that use the train as long distance travel. The reciprocal train 2709 on Friday is also jam packed with people leaving the hamptons in advance of the weekend crowds.

On 8/26/2022 at 12:09 PM, shiznit1987 said:

Considering the fit the North Shore is having over the elimination of Port Washington skip-stop I had a thought: 

There's an area just past the Bayside station that has room for a couple of sidings that could turn trains. With this in mind, my proposal is to basically split the Port Wash into an "inner" and "outer" zone with two predominant service patterns: 

"Outer Zone" trains stop at Woodside then continue express to Bayside, afterwards making all stops to Port Washington. 

"Inner Zone" trains make all stops to Bayside, then turn around at new sidings just past the station. 

there would be 30 mins off peak service on both zones with trains alternating between GCT and Penn. 

That area was surveyed by the RR and doesn't  fit trains without demolishing homes. Also having trains cross over to the yard in 3rd rail gaps on one of the biggest grades in the system  is begging  for an operational issue. May as well run the extra 5 minutes to Great Neck and get your money's worth out of the crew.