danielhg121

They let me know they were conducting the background check. Pretty sure you sign a waiver letting them know, it's handled by an outside company too.

There are stop markers if you're looking closely enough. There aren't for every station or platform but if you notice there are white numbers on a blue background usually hung around an advertisement board on the Harlem line. There are smaller ones that face the engineer as well that are a tiny white square with black lettering or they also say E + [however many cars are in the consist] usually on the Hudson and New Haven lines.

If I had to fathom a guess, the retailers definitely take a percentage of each OMNY transaction so I’m guessing to offset it, it’s a $5 fee as opposed to if MTA collects directly, it’ll only be $1 fee. Unsure if they’ll change that going forward but I think it’s likely as no one would buy an OMNY card from a retailer otherwise.

You should know your results by today or tomorrow. Keep an eye on your phone because they might be moving quick to schedule an interview.

It's at the bottom of the employment application form that was emailed to you with the test confirmation when you replied back to the initial email.

The last of the MNR Fortieth Anniversary wraps will be New York Central themed, Penn Central themed and a unique employee tribute wrap.

Yea, I was in for a rude awakening when I swiped went downstairs. Saw that trains were only going to Qboro Plz, made a U-turn and went for the LIRR. Headed to Grand Central anyway.

Most of it was hypothetical for me. I’m currently studying to be an loco engineer. I’m going to assume they’ll ask you questions about how you would deal with a non-paying passenger? and other aspects of how you would approach certain scenarios. Brush up on the job description too as they might ask you what do you think it takes to become a Conductor. @Lawrence St or @NycHopeful718 would know better.

For me, I believe it was a little under a week? I think in 2-3 days they called me for an interview. But they really had to rush me if I wanted to make it into the next class so I guess that’s really the ultimate factor.

Good to hear the news! Welcome. As for you question, I believe it's the interview then the background check. It's really the final go-ahead before HR starts with the hiring process and background checks are expensive.

Work Trains/Misc Equipment

Nvm we good 5999 has it. Pretty sure all of the 2016 CS XD60 has it by now.

5987, 5989, 6005, 6029 have ver 2 screens. The only one I believe that doesn't is 5999.

I’d recommend listing it but I’m not sure it’ll help with the software when picking up keywords and phrases. So list both and hope you get a good match. Even if you don’t necessarily have customer service, teamwork and getting along with others is really important to being a good conductor or engineer.

Well, I can really only speak about Metro-North's signal system which to be frank, I'm quite new at myself so I'll probably get some things wrong. The way it works for Metro-North is we only have signals located at interlockings which is more or less where switches or movable bridges are and these can be directly controlled by the Rail Traffic Controller to display a stop signal, the rest of it is located in the transponders on the roadbed so locomotive engineers mainly read their cab signal (other than also knowing the track speeds ourselves as it's part of the physical characteristics that we're tested on) which shows either an indication or speed that the track is good for. These signals also can only display proceed (we're governed by the cab signal speed) or a Stop Signal (effectively we're a stop-and-go railroad). Metro-North already has its train dispatching centralized in Grand Central whereas the LIRR does not. LIRR has to share territory with Amtrak as they own the tracks from Harold Interlocking into Penn Station. I'm sure you have some understanding of what a block is which is these lengths of track between trains and they can move depending on the distance you encroach up to another train. So if I'm catching up to my leader, the cab signals will get more and more restrictive until I'm literally behind the train. I believe the LIRR also utilizes cab signals but they use more wayside signaling so they have signals not only at interlockings but straight track that will let you know what's coming up whereas we will just crash into the block (it's a way to just keep the trains moving albeit slowing them down) and our cab signal will drop and thus we'll have to get our train down to speed so that it won't initiate a penalty brake. Now if there is roadwork going on, we usually know about it from the paperwork we're supposed to pick up from our bulletins. For the most part, they'll also incorporate the speed restrictions into the PTC system but they may forget and it'll be entirely the engineer & conductors fault if they're caught speeding into a work zone. I believe CBTC is really better suited for high-frequency, close distance train operations because they have transponders literally everywhere so they can run trains really really close. PTC for the most part works quite well for Metro-North and I guess you can even say it's our version of CBTC as it has a moving-block system. ATC is more of a failsafe system that's incorporated into PTC where if the engineer fails to reduce the speed to the defined limit, there will be a penalty brake application. I know this seems very jumbled as I've just word rambled but I'll try to clarify some points.

I would not be surprised if the MTA did some private charter shuttle on the side. Maybe it’s for a sporting event for Columbia and they didn’t have enough buses but I find that a little hard to believe since most of Columbia’s shuttles are weekdays only. The other day I was waiting for the Q66 and a bus from Casey Stengel drives by with the sign “Vietnam Veterans Memorial Shuttle” and it had a sign in the window saying “Shuttle Bus” no idea where it was headed but I saw it start up on Roosevelt and head east and 3-4 mins come back west. The Columbia shuttle could be used maybe for open houses to supplement extra service for the influx of visitors. I know the MTA also operates the Dragon Boat Festival shuttle buses from Mets-Willets Point to the festival grounds.

I believe it's up there now. They're hurting for a lot of positions but especially engineers right now.

It's pretty much a waiting game at this point. Did you apply for Locomotive Engineer as well?

Did you try tailoring your resume to fit the job description? I'm pretty sure the resumes are put through a software that looks for keywords such as customer service and cash-handling experience. Once it gets good match, I think HR manually reviews them and sends out a study packet for you to take an exam.

I'm pretty sure they supply the gear for the most part as they will measure you for your uniform except work boots. I'd ask @NycHopeful718 or @Lawrence St if they have anything they'd recommend.

Which railroad if you don't mind me asking?

Metro-North is taking applications right now if you’re interested.

For vacation, if I heard correctly, I believe it's 2 weeks for the first 5 years and then they add another week every 5 years for a maximum of 5 weeks of vacation time so it's about the same as you guys. We fall under railroad retirement which is sorta hard to explain so I'll link the presentation: http://arsa.mnrr.org/doc/MTA_definedPensionPlan.pdf Begins at slide 12.

Kawasaki must be absolutely swamped with the R211A/T/S. I would like them to choose someone else for the M9A's but there's such limited options to choose from and going with somebody from the outside may be even worse as they'll have to play catch-up. Hopefully, Kawasaki gets into the swing of things.

Mind quoting the article? Some of us can’t get past the paywall. maybe the increase in M9A’s is due to Metro-North tacking onto the order. I heard they weren’t going to participate, then they were going to but based on the 20-year needs assessment, I’m pretty sure they will.