MHV9218

Closing the gate is asking for it lmao... leaving it right open in front of people's eyes! My charity is swiping people when I leave if I have an unlimited. Rarely do, though.

Gonna be a weird day when the MTA doesn't have any Detroit Diesels running anymore...

Both still in service, actually. CP still has those 15 DL3s even as the D4500s are getting knocked off one-by-one.

Well, nobody's really ordering LFSes, for whatever reason. There are only a handful of operators whereas XE40s are all over the place. I don't really know why but it seems like Nova is behind on the electric technology by a fair amount. TTC was only going to do one or the other, no reason to disrupt the fleet with a non-Canadian brand like Proterra or Chinese BYD. New Flyer has been better out of the gate but they haven't really achieved long-distance range solution for XE40s, from what I understand. The XE60s are much better on range. Next step is New Flyer putting the electric tech into MCIs, and I believe Van Hool is licensing Proterra's battery equipment for its fleet.

Don't worry, the hybrids get mileage almost as bad as the diesels in regular use. Now, once Proterra figures out how to run a bus that works under 45º outside and New Flyer gets its act together for range, we're moving on electrics...

Did any of those run? I assume no, probably crew transfer buses or something? I haven't seen an express in local service anywhere besides SI since Quill ran the X90 express fleet on the local lines - O5s and RTSes with the platform seats. Used to feel like you won the lottery getting one of those.

One of the most confusing piece of city geography in any movie is in The Pawnbroker, the 1964 Sidney Lumet movie, where the main character visits in an apartment in one of the new towers and looks out from a terrace over the rail yards. It took me a few minutes of trying to figure out where in Manhattan had a white-brick, midcentury apartment tower looking directly over train yards. Turns out it's probably one of the new towers that replaced San Juan Hill roughly around the urban renewal days, and it's looking out to the water over the trainyards. View that's totally gone in every way today.

Yeah, chains on plowed roads used to drive me insane on more than a ten-minute ride. Felt like my spine was going to shatter. Noisy, bumpy, and limited to 15-20mph, I forget the exact guideline. Idk how the ops do it, I'd be going crazy hearing that metallic thump all day.

I think they look bad because the paint jobs are old and falling apart, not because the scheme is bad. I totally prefer the old scheme, though the best ever was probably what 4618 and a couple others had as delivered. A few of them were repainted in the first repaint cycle, but yeah, none of them got their second repaints with overhauls. Almost all other NGs have been repainted twice at this point, those buses haven't even been painted once!

Well, today I learned there was a 99th Street Yard. Looks like the leads were all elevated and they descended into the barn. Makes sense there might have been a crossing, but you're right, I can't even begin to picture where that was or what buildings it used. Comparing that to a modern picture, it looks like the building on the left is today's 100th Street bus depot! You can see the decorative brick on the building across the street – this is looking straight south and the huge hill down to 103rd is just beyond where the lights start dipping. My guess is the tracks dipped off 3rd Ave. to street level and crossed into the barn that occupied the 100th Street depot space. Funny to think there's been a TA depot there for that long. From Google: https://goo.gl/maps/UHgbysZNYjFtkhZj6

Careful, another story about this and Clayton'll try get these scrapped like the RTSes...

Have they replaced the rollsigns?

Quill loans are returning to SI. Last pullouts were earlier today, maybe one or two buses still out there. I saw 7045 working the M20 as late as 7ish, last few stragglers might be pulling in now. However artics are still grounded. So Quill is really, really short. Hope nobody's relying on an MQ route this evening. In-borough loaners (MV to OH, etc.) remain in effect.

Snow is still coming down pretty hard out there. Hale got a little confident and took the chains off some of their buses. Wouldn't want to be one driving those right now...

Detail I noticed going through some old photos (@Union Tpke, you might be interested): - lower-level W4 received new Vignelli black-on-white Unimark signs as earlier as spring 1968, possibly 1967 (in time for the Chrystie changes and Grand's opening); - upper-level W4 received those signs by spring 1969 - rest of the 8th Ave probably around this time, but not all the way up; - 125-145th never received these signs, only 'halfway' signs with white modules for bullets and white-on-black otherwise by the mid-1970s. No new pillar signs on 8th Avenue until ~1981, when black-on-white enamel signs were installed (like 72nd and 135th had until recently). Exception for Chambers. And it turns out that 71st-Continental actually received Unimark Vignelli signs in 1968-1969. I had no idea any Queens stations received these signs. Looks to be a sign for the EE and GG together. Credit to the late Joe Testagrose:

There's some talk of the XE60s being significantly better with snow traction because they have a two-axle drive system. Rather than the standard articulated tractor-trailer setup there are motors in two sets of wheels, making it a tractor-tractor/trailer situation. At the least it should reduce jackknifing.

That's not totally true though. There are, conceivably, a few riders who want to go from 241 St. to Flatbush, or Canarsie to 8th Avenue, and you see a decent number of full-route straphangers on every line. Obviously it's a minority of people, but my point is that they do exist. It's a service provided by the MTA on their behalf, even if they aren't the main patrons of the line. You wouldn't want to lose that if your goal is a system that provides real accessibility around the city. But the on the other hand is pointless by design - there is no practical reason anybody would ride it end-to-end, and it would be quicker to take basically any other form of transportation.

Well, just partying is maybe an exaggeration, but you have a lot of young people who live on the UES who spend their nights/weekends in Williamsburg, and vice versa. Also people who work in Williamsburg and work in Midtown. It's a decent market. My only point is that it's a market that exists, whereas there is no demographic that takes the full on the horseshoe loop into Queens and back. Well, maybe that's the play. to 96th and to Continental to cover the . I never understood cutting off the anyway, Court Square is a lousy last stop. I guess now we're talking a real increase but to me it makes sense in the future. Definitely to 96th weekends as a compromise, it's possible the demographic I'm talking about is more of a weekends thing than weekdays.

Yeah, that all makes sense to me. Would the have to be reduced? I'm not aware of the 96th capacity TPH offhand...would it work? Disagree on this. Bringing up the Bay Ridge to Forest Hills is an apples to oranges comparison - you're talking a 95 minute experience versus a 35 minute one. Think about the demographic on Yorkville/far-East UES: a lot of affluent millennial types, twenty- and thirty-somethings who like to party etc. Then think about who's in Williamsburg and Bushwick, and who views those neighborhoods as a destination. Tons of millennials in Yorkville who go out to Williamsburg/Bushwick to drink/go out every Thursday-Sunday. Bedford Ave in Williamsburg has almost the exact same demographic as a lot of Yorkville. Currently many of those people Uber, but the routing covers that. I can speak from personally observation that the evening M-to-96 trains were often packed with this. Same thing, by the way, with the UES to LES crowd (not served by the Q at Canal anywhere near as much as the M at Delancey).

Neither here nor there, but I still think the to 96th makes the most sense and wish the MTA would run it. 1) QBL already has decent service, 2) we want to build reliance on SAS generally to help calm Lex and get it up to service guidelines, 3) you actually have a lot of people who want to travel between Williamsburg and the UES, whereas almost nobody relies on the for its full horseshoe route from Queens to Queens in its current state.

BusTime is basically kaput right now but I'm still seeing buses running out there.

Still a nontrivial number of XD60s out on the 15-SBS. They should figure that out pretty soon, it's picking up out there. OH has gotten almost all of their artics off the road, just a few 60 footers still out and running short-turns to pull into the depot. Quill has basically everything grounded.

Not to mention, a lot of America's in for a rude awakening if they ever realize a 'welfare queen' isn't a black woman in New York, but in truth more like a white woman in Kentucky...

Not aware of this being an ESI job or full renovation. My understanding, this was purely about making it ADA accessible. Elevators + ramps and new concrete / cleaned tiling around the affected portions of the platform. Not a full renovation involving parts of the station separate from the ADA fix-up. Basically, this was about accessibility only, not cleaning up the station. That's also why service continued through unlike a typical ESI or renovation project as we've seen on the Lex and the 4th Ave.

TU sending out the 40s now on the 101-103 and 15. Everything out of Quill and Manhattanville is chained, possible exception the XE60s which I haven't seen. Some of the TU artics are still out there without chains.