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I totally agree. On Thursday at 23 St at about 6:30 PM, I was waiting for a southbound that took 15 minutes to come. During that time, I think there were one or two trains that bypassed the station and were jam-packed. It's honestly like this every other day I take the . Northbound is a little better, if you consider actually stopping at the station as an improvement.

That, and east of 51 Av, the subway tracks are right next to the LIRR tracks, which presents a whole new set of problems (i.e. FRA regulations, which is the reason that the PATH needs an expensive positive train control system). Even getting past these regulations, west of the 51 Av bridge, there's not that much space for the bypass to dip underground or rise above the LIRR tracks due to the proximity of the Winfield Junction to the 51 Av overpass. I'd estimate that there is only about 200 ft of space at most, which would make for a pretty tight ramp. The question then is, underground or above the LIRR? Underground is expensive, but it should cost "only" 750 million to a billion dollars if there are no intermediate stations and you use a TBM. Overground is cheaper until Woodside, where the line would either need to divert over Woodside Avenue and the train, or over the train using a very high viaduct to clear the 's already high structure. From there, I guess you can go underground at Sunnyside Yard, right after Woodside locals finish complaining about how the 60-foot-tall bypass is ruining their view of Manhattan. Or you can use underground bores the entire way, spend $3 billion on the 71 Av station and the tunnels between Sunnyside Yard and 71 Av (well, assuming the 71 Av station is built in a minimalist fashion and no intermediate stations are built, otherwise expect $1 billion per intermediate station). You could connect it to the AirTrain JFK. Not very good in practice, but it's another option that at least one organization is seriously considering (the RPA).

Oops, I forgot the Dyre line was open this weekend. I see the point of the now. I must have confused this GO with the one when the ran only to 180 St, which was the pattern I was confused about. That makes sense. .

I know about the loop situation. I meant that the was made redundant and could have been suspended entirely. If anything it could have been the that short-turned so the wouldn't be as redundant.

At 42 St-Grand Central I saw trains terminating at the uptown express track because of the switches. That was interesting. Forgive me for my ignorance, but was there a particular reason why the is even running at all if it's only running between 180 St and 42 St? The seem to be providing all the alternate service.

The sign use to say "QUEENS BLVD EXP" but now it says "QUEENS BLVD EXPRESS" and the rollsign doesn't have enough room to display the latter text in a single line.

Exactly, because like I said... So two plans, one started but never finished, the other never started.

This still has the problem of Jamaica Center not having enough capacity for the and . And the can't skip 80 St. The switches don't exist. Other than that, there is no point in having the skip just two stations in the peak direction, one of which is a major transfer point. At the very least, the can be sent down the RBB with the to the Rockaways. And the should go via 53 St. Otherwise, 63 St doesn't have capacity for all of the and turquoise . It also distributes 6 Av riders better along Lex Av.

The actual tunnel provision was built south of 59 St, not 95 St. It was a spur line built for about 150 feet. The 95 St station was for another plan for a tunnel to SI, and that project was never started. I think there were plans for a tunnel at 2 separate places over time. Thanks for the info. I think we can use either 4- or 10-car R32 trains, unless the MTA can't run 4-car trains either, in which case we run 8-car trains.

That's what the already does now, running local on Broadway at nights and on weekends...

Not sure eliminating the on weekends would be a help to the QBL: 1. For one, it has no more direct service to Broadway on weekends, while it has 2 services to 6 Av. In case of the ubiquitous weekend construction, Broadway riders (like myself) would have to travel a long way, maybe to Herald Sq, to get a transfer from the QBL to the Broadway Line. 2. Also, QBL construction for CBTC means that there will be longer headways, with shorter trains (480 vs. 600 ft) while crowding gets worse. This will be especially true since riders will have to backtrack on the QBL local stations as well. If we do OPTO, that's even more undesirable. 3. The non-direct yard access won't be a problem, but the proposed route changes don't have particularly increased headways either. Right now, 95 St and Whitehall St can only turn a combined 20 tph (10 tph to 95 St, and 10 tph to Whitehall). This offers little benefits over the current setup since the current 4 Av Line, Broadway local tracks, and Astoria Line have virtually the same service frequency anyway, minus a few tph. 4. With the aforementioned bottleneck at 95 St, you can't add another local service to 4 Av unless it diverges at 36 St and goes to at least 9 Av. I think it's reasonable to send some more trains to 96 St and some more trains to Astoria, though. To address the 2 Av line crowding, I would maybe do Astoria-Whitehall at all times except nights, and all weekend & night trains to 96 St. Late nights, the and can be combined, but I would definitely not eliminate weekend service to the QBL.

Both good ideas. I think if the bypass were built, it should not be directly perpendicular to the QBL. It should curve northeast and run parallel to the QBL only at the 36 St station, where a transfer passageway can be built. Or, if it has a connection to Queens Plaza, the very western end of the bypass platform could connect to Queens Plaza station via passageway. The connection would be about as long as the connection from the to the at Court Sq. I'd add the Woodside station too, but the 51 Av station would have low ridership, so it can be completed later as an infill station. Woodhaven Blvd might be a transit hub for the buses and an RBB spur, but it's a little far from QCM. (51 Av is in the middle of an industrial area with typically 2-story houses, so that's why I suggest it be an infill station first.)

True, but it also helps the riders at 96, 77, and 68 St, in addition to the aforementioned at 86 St. Now only people west of 3 Av find it convenient to take the , instead of the entire UES. It could possibly help the gain 3 more tph in the peak, like you said. There could be 12 local and 12 express in the peak direction, similar to the service headways.

I also think that would happen, which is why there should be more service to 96 St and more service to Astoria to cover the s diverted from Astoria to 96th.

According to the reports found on www.straphangers.org, on the express tracks, the tph ought to be: AM rush - 25 - 13 trains, 12 trains PM rush - 24 - 14 trains, 10 trains What it really is: - Only 71% of trains on time http://www.straphangers.org/statesub15/lines/4profile.pdf - Only 67% of trains on time http://www.straphangers.org/statesub15/lines/5profile.pdf So I think with 70% of all express trains on time during the rush hour, I'd say the actual frequencies are probably around 17-18 tph, which is really low for a line that was supposed to have about 27 tph. Also the actual tph may be more than my cited figure, so if there's actually a timetable for 30 tph, then the actual number of trains may only be 21 tph. (Edit: Added breakdown of trains per service.)

Agreed, but the bypass would only feed into the 63rd Connector, unless someone wants to build a huge flyunder from the bypass to the mainline QBL to Queens Plaza. It would be the . The would go regular express all the way from 179 to Queensbridge then use the 2 Av Line. Yes, I do mean HHE, though RBB does seem busier. Since the already uses the RBB south of Rockaway Blvd, this can also be an opportunity to cut the to use only the Lefferts branch. I'm not sure Rockaway riders want QBL local though...

If we're talking SAS Phase 3 and Queens Bypass, I'd also like to see a three-stop spur off the QBL to 108 St, Main St, and Kissena Blvd/Queens College. The spur would go off the QBL local and express tracks. The Woodhaven Blvd station could be converted to an express station. Now the questions are: Which services go QBL local to 71 Av? Which services go QBL express? Which services go QBL super-express? Which services split off the QBL at Woodhaven? This is also a chance for all you guys asking for the to be re-extended to actually extend the . After CBTC installation is complete, you can fit up to 78 tph collectively on the QBL and bypass: 32 tph on each of the local and express tracks west of Woodhaven, plus 14 on the bypass, merging with the up-to-16 tph that use both 63rd and QBL express. Big improvement from the 45-50 tph using the QBL now. (Assuming, of course, that there are theoretically extra cars available for this extension.)

If worse comes to worst, the R32s can go on the or (not that many non-transit enthusiasts would like it). During the AM rush southbound, the is timetabled for every 4-5 minutes for a frequency of 12-15 tph, the every "3-6 minutes" according to the official schedule (which is a huge difference between 10 and 20 tph), and the collectively is timetabled for every 2.5 minutes for a total 24 tph. So on the express tracks at 125 St, there is supposed to be between 22 and 35 tph according to the timetable, which I'll take with a grain of salt since express trains definitely do not run every 100 seconds. During the PM rush northbound, the is timetabled for every 4-6 minutes for a frequency of 10-15 tph, the every 5 minutes for a frequency of 12 tph, and the collectively is timetabled for every 3-5 minutes for a total 12-20 tph. The express tracks at 125 St would have 22 to 27 tph, which is around the block signals' capacity.

Let's just install CBTC on the , add more cars, extend the to Co-op City, and build a three-track terminating facility at City Hall to increase Lex service instead. (Kidding, that'll happen only in a foamer's dream.) Seriously, though, the MTA should consider connecting the local tracks to the 63 St Connector tracks at 57 St-7 Av for greater service flexibility. Then the can be extended to 9 Av with increased frequency. A few trains per hour, displaced by increased service, can then go up the 2 Av line to 96 St. I don't predict there'll be much of an effect unless people really want to skip 28 St, 23 St, 8 St, and Prince St during weekdays, in which case some s can go up Second Avenue instead, with all and the rest of the going to Astoria. For this, I agree you might need to keep some R32s for service. Of course, like all other proposals to improve MTA operations, this will probably take 20 years...

I thought Kew Gardens was talking about going to the from Downtown Brooklyn, but yeah, the and then the makes sense too. I forgot to add this: As for transferring to the from the southbound , you could transfer to the at Bway-Lafayette and then the at Canal. Thanks for the link. I noticed in the article that although Lex ridership is down and 2 Av ridership is pretty high, the cumulative ridership from UES stations has risen from last year to this year (e.g. 96th St went from 30,000 riders at one station to 55,000 at two stations).

You can transfer at Atlantic Av from the to the respectively, then go to Canal St for the . It doesn't explain why the connection wasn't built during the Manhattan Bridge closure, though.

That would mean even more tunnels to bore diagonally through the earth, which costs major $$$$. It could work for the relatively shallow Phase 2, though. A smaller side entrance might also work for 96 St since it's closer to the ground and the mezzanine is right under the street

For some reason, the wheels on trains (doesn't matter if it's R188 or R62A) make a loud grating noise on the curve between 39 St and 10 Av. It's quieter than the screeching noise on other lines, but it's still a loud annoying buzz noise. I haven't ridden the new in a while but I think the same annoying sound occurred. I rode a R68A from Times Sq to Q-boro Plaza yesterday. While on that train, I saw two consists of R68/A trains going in the opposite direction.

The runs 8 tph and the has 9 tph, so a higher-frequency service to serve the SAS wouldn't interfere much with regular service if there were only 3-4 more tph added. The 9 Av short-turns would need to coordinate with both the and mainline though. Even if this were feasible, I wouldn't do this until after the R179s arrive. About 50 or 60 R32s would need to be transferred to the so 40-48 of the 's R68s can go to the . This may require either a second crew member on the or shorter trains, but that's the price we're going to have to pay if we increase service to 96 St. Now that I think about it, if we use 96 St as an overflow terminal for the , everything is fine on the northern end, at least until Phase 2 SAS opens. But I agree that it is heavily used.

That's pretty sad. I think the man was dead on the scene, though, since the hospital is a block away. Maybe it had to do with his being homeless in this cold weather? (http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Body-Found-Subway-Train-New-York-City-Q-Second-Avenue-NYPD-Police-Investigation-412259933.html) ---- Nope, but when it does happen, it's creepy. Like this one: http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/dead-man-aboard-m-rush-subway-corpse-rode-no-1-train-hours-article-1.839339