P3F

Keep the B2, 31, and 100 the same (routings) as today west of Gerritsen, and send the B2 via Fillmore to Flatbush Av and then Kings Plaza.

That keeps the stop on the 100 at Madison HS, and consolidates Marine Park service without cutting half of it.

I'm not super politically active with regards to community boards and such, but would anyone be able to point me to where I might be able to voice opposition to the Quentin Rd and Avenue S stop removals on the Q35? As a child, my family took the B2 or B100 to the Q35 to the beach, and it would be quite disappointing if folks of the future were denied this choice. Especially considering the very high parking fees at Jacob Riis Park.

45 minutes ago, QM1to6Ave said:

Great video as usual! Is this rail that runs on the street commonly used? WHere is this exactly? THat's gotta be quite a sight for a driver who is new to the area!

1st Avenue between 39th and 43rd Streets, and also between 52nd and 58th Streets. The vast majority of the time, there are no trains running there.

Those tracks connect to the subway east of 3rd Avenue between 38th and 39th Streets, with grade crossings at 2nd and 3rd Avenues.

I wasn't aware that the  made a study in 1995 about discontinuing most of the NYCT non-Staten Island express bus routes, but I just saw this thread about it: https://twitter.com/Union_Tpke/status/1488623769035943940
I find it interesting that most of the routes depicted as unsuccesful were eliminated anyway more than a decade later, aside from the queens X-routes. (X25, X29, X51, X90, X92 eliminated, X63/64/68 kept).

It's interesting how @Union Tpke has gravitated towards twitter in terms of where he spends a majority of his time posting about transit, as I feel like he was disappointed by these forums not being an echo chamber for his particular viewpoints. Would he be able to post his opinions about express buses being discontinued here and actually withstand criticism? (I genuinely respect his efforts towards looking up archived transit related material, but I just think his change of platform is just too convenient).

6 hours ago, bobtehpanda said:

One interesting thing to note: the proposed renderings have no faregates. Even the rail version does not, having direct exits to the sidewalk in a similar fashion to Murray Hill station in Queens. Perhaps SBS-style proof of payment?

I imagine this is what the future holds for the Staten Island Railway as well.

Living in southern Brooklyn, my main memories of PBLs were the Command B100s and Green Bus Lines Q35s. I did also see Q22s terminating while waiting for the Q35 home from the beach. I remember the first time I saw a Q35 with a green flipdot front sign, thinking it was a nice upgrade over the rollsigns they usually had.

3 hours ago, CenSin said:

If I’m up early enough tomorrow, I’m going to check up on the too. I rode it several times since they installed the new switches in the tunnel south of Church Avenue. But the MTA seems to not use them, opting for the old switches on the el instead.

I rode it southbound like a month or two ago, and somehow without any announcements it ended up on the central track at Ditmas, and then (after an announcement) ran express from 18 Av to Kings Highway. People needing local stops got pretty screwed as the next  was quite a while away.

On 12/29/2021 at 12:42 AM, BM5 via Woodhaven said:

I was looking at some old bus maps through the Brooklyn Public Library's Public Transit Map Collection (which BTW, has quite a few gems), and I glanced over at the September 1995 Brooklyn Bus Map. Interesting to seem some old service patterns there (like the B41 to DUMBO), but what caught my eye was actually on the Queens side of things, particularly the Q11 route.

There's the two branches to Old Howard Beach and Hamilton Beach, but it also apparently had two part time branches. One went to 157th Ave/Cross Bay Boulevard in Lindenwood (basically today's Q21), while the other was a northbound only (I'm guessing this may have been an AM rush branch) from 165th Avenue & Cross Bay Boulevard, bypassing most of Lindenwood. Does anyone have any information on when those two branches ran, service levels provided, and when they were discontinued? The wayback machine info doesn't seem to go far enough. 

Did the B68 ever actually go down Beach Walk? I always assumed that was a misprint.

What's with the B7's western terminal? It used to terminate at the Quentin Rd exit of Kings Highway station? I thought the extension always went to Coney Island Av.

Weird that they show the B100 on the map, but not the B103.

7 minutes ago, mrsman said:

If all Brighton trains were routed to the Broadway express and all 4th Ave express trains were routed to the 6th Ave express, the junction is eliminated.  For those who need the other trains, they can still utilize existing transfers at Atlantic or Herald Square, but very likely most passengers will not need to transfer since 6th Ave and Broadway trains run close together in most of Midtown.

Repeating something a hundred times won't make it true.

The transfer at Atlantic from BMT to BMT is a very long walk, not to mention the stairs and passageways were already crowded even without these supposed service changes.

Removing 6th Av access from either Brooklyn line means that they no longer have easy access to West 4th Street, meaning going to 8th Avenue now requires extra transfers. West 4th Street itself is also a very high ridership station, mind you.

Removing Broadway access means that folks no longer have a simple and timely way of getting to Canal Street or Union Square (without stuffing yourself onto the already crowded  or  anyway). Also, you have now cut off DeKalb Av station (and its connections) from 6th Ave completely?

2 hours ago, Lex said:

Personally, I'd have three tracks along at least 70% of the alignment and mandate all freight operations to use electric locomotives. The third track would be used primarily for daytime freight operations, but a select number of stations would come with island platforms as a backup for passenger service. (Naturally, daytime freight trains would be on the shorter end in order to reduce the odds of conflicts.)

For the parts of the ROW with four trackways, they could use the northernmost one for freight trains, second to north for westbound trains, second to south for island platforms, and the southernmost track for eastbound trains. At least that would line up with the pre-existing abandoned island platform at East New York.

7 hours ago, RapidoNewLook said:

The tracks are still there, and used for freight services nightly. It probably won't be a full subway line, more like a frequent service  operating with DMU vehicles. There is only one track, so another one will be required, or at the very least several passing sidings will be needed. It is also likely that some excavations will be necessary to widen the open cut where the tracks are. The real question I have is how the TA will surmount the public opposition to this proposal that is sure to be heavy, as the line runs through heavily residential neighborhoods who are not likely to want the noise and people passing through that a transit line would bring. 

If you have crossovers on either side at every station, and freight runs only nightly, I presume you could have the passenger service run on a single track between stations at night headways, while freight runs on the other. (Assuming the line gets upgraded to at least 2 tracks everywhere).

7 hours ago, EastFlatbushLarry said:

is there an article or pdf you can provide for more reading on this subject? I'd be very interested in understanding more. much appreciated 

I'm having trouble finding a source, but years ago I read that some FRA-required features were removed from the R44s during an overhaul. This may have been in the "New York Subways" book by Sansone.

Looks like this will build upon an earlier study they contracted, relating to the feasibility of running passenger service on an active freight line.

Press release from January 2020:

https://www.mta.info/press-release/mta-headquarters/mta-begins-study-bay-ridge-branch-passenger-service

If they end up determining that they want to start running service, I'm curious what type of rolling stock it would use. Would they buy a fleet of LRVs, or just have some R211s specced out to FRA standards? Probably wouldn't be too different from what SIR is getting, even though SIR is no longer required to conform to FRA standards. If they do use some kind of heavy rail cars, I would expect them to have 4-car trains, maybe 5 cars at most.

22 hours ago, MTA Researcher said:

Welp, all is lost in de-interlining the system. I emailed the MTA with my suggestions. Here’s what they said:

 

https://share.icloud.com/photos/0f7LNC-Udt9AXpg5zRveFifEQ

 

At least it was worth a try…

Did you expect anything else in reply? No, emailing MTA customer service is not going to make them consider your proposed major service changes...

17 minutes ago, CenSin said:

If they continue the Astoria Line by tunnelling under Flushing Bay to College Point, that area would get a pretty fast ride to midtown, possibly beating the which only runs express in one direction at any given time if it runs at all. 🤔

That's something I've thought about in the past. If the Astoria line was underutilized, that would be a pretty cool way to take pressure off the . But the Astoria line already has high ridership, and although you could run extra service via the center track, I'm not sure the capacity for significantly more service exists on the Manhattan end.

On 12/23/2021 at 1:07 AM, MTA Researcher said:

Well aren’t you the ignorant one?

 

I have googled “CBTC N Train skip 49 street” and I found nothing that intrigues me or that’s pertaining to the premise of the topic.

 

If you think I’m a meme researcher, then FFS find me something that has something to do with N train skipping 49 Street and stop making fun of me! Jeez!

 

Here’s the challenge:

 

Find a thread that discusses N train skipping 49 street and goes to Astoria. No 96 St / 2nd Ave.

 

If you don’t find it then let me share with you an idea I have been thinking on for a week now on how to correct Broadway.

 

I keep it civil, even though I feel like raging at disagreements. Now you do the same!

Oh no, the children of the forum are getting aggressive.

On 12/15/2021 at 12:02 AM, MTA Researcher said:

What are your thoughts?

My thoughts are that this is a pointless thread, and you have put no effort into looking up previous discussions of this topic, which there has been a significant amount of. Your username is laughable.

Congestion pricing would do nothing here... The plan supposedly includes a discount for the Holland/Lincoln tunnels, which means that those who drive from NJ and back each day (who are already paying whatever the PA charges), wouldn't pay anything more. So the traffic into the Holland tunnel would be mostly unchanged, except for the drivers who are using it as a free way to get into NJ (and likely aren't doing so during rush hour).

I would normally fault the NYCDOT as they have made a mess of the entire city since deBlasio took office, but in this case I'm not sure they're actually at fault since the physical limit of the Holland tunnel being 2 lanes westbound is what causes the gridlock leading into it. Simply more demand than supply. The real solution would be to provide a third tube like on the Lincoln tunnel, but we are beyond the age of significant investment into road infrastructure in NYC so it will never happen.

Some bus drivers would call out major transfer points, but many just never said anything over the PA system. This being in the 2000s - 2010s.

41 minutes ago, Lawrence St said:

https://giphy.com/gifs/jerseyshore-jersey-shore-family-vacation-gk9vWUE6EAgQKtAqaX

Well, I've found the profile of the guy who called him out, assuming the dude was legit.
https://www.nyctransitforums.com/profile/16341-carinspector-848/

Wow, I can't wait for Brooklyn to get royally screwed. At least the pandemic delayed the service cuts for a couple of years.

3 hours ago, Lawrence St said:

They actually did that?

I can't find the specific posts with the search feature at the moment, but I certainly recall an MTA employee occasionally saying that @TransitJusticeForAll was annoying the yard personnel by calling them about the R179s regularly.

1 hour ago, jammerbot said:

Why is OPTO even seen as desirable? This whole thread seems to take that assumption as truth.

It allows the amount of crew required to run the (and any other lines considered for OPTO) to be reduced.

Whether this would actually make an impact is up for debate, but in our universe where nearly every service improvement the MTA implements is cost-neutral, less crew on the could potentially allow for service increases on other lines without increasing costs, without impacting  frequencies. This could be offset by the additional costs involved with actually preparing the  crew for OPTO, but if it remains OPTO for a while, that's there the savings would accumulate.

Just saw this bus stop on Google Street View... The street view is from November 2020 so I sincerely hope this has been fixed since then.