SUBWAY - Random Thoughts Topic

[Kamen Rider]

Basically the problem is, while dreaming and asking “what if” are perfectly fine… people tend to act like all these dreams and what if’s are practical and then get offended when we even so much as poke one hole in their logic.

like me having to explain multiple times why they can’t just move the B to be based at Concourse yard.
 

There are almost always details that are ether ignored or forgotten or just not understood.
Another example, expanding the trains on the J, L and M. A certain someone always insists we just need to extend the platforms, ignoring that things like yard storage tracks and the barn at East New York Yard are the actual restrictions on how long those trains are.

[Around the Horn]

I'm not sure if this is intentional but I've been noticing lately that the is almost entirely R68/As and the mostly R46s. I personally haven't gotten an R46 in a week (not that I'm complaining).

[Calvin]

5 minutes ago, Around the Horn said:

I'm not sure if this is intentional but I've been noticing lately that the is almost entirely R68/As and the mostly R46s. I personally haven't gotten an R46 in a week (not that I'm complaining).

The  didn't have that many R68/As like they used to. However, they only used at least 3 trains out of the 21, 18 are the usual R46. On other days, I can see at least 5-6 max. 

Edited February 28, 2023 by Calvin

[ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ]

2 hours ago, Kamen Rider said:

Basically the problem is, while dreaming and asking “what if” are perfectly fine… people tend to act like all these dreams and what if’s are practical and then get offended when we even so much as poke one hole in their logic.

like me having to explain multiple times why they can’t just move the B to be based at Concourse yard.
 

There are almost always details that are ether ignored or forgotten or just not understood.
Another example, expanding the trains on the J, L and M. A certain someone always insists we just need to extend the platforms, ignoring that things like yard storage tracks and the barn at East New York Yard are the actual restrictions on how long those trains are.

Yeah, I tend to agree. The NY subway system is so large and complex, that even people who are generally very familiar with it don't know everything and can make mistakes; just because you're generally knowledgeable doesn't give you the right to be a know-it-all. I feel like we should try to be as constructive as possible; I for instance am always really bad with junctions and figuring out how they work and which routing combinations are possible, which can be frustrating lol. I also tend to be less familiar with the specifics of each yard.

Oh also I wanted to follow up and ask you why you think sending both the  and  up SAS post phase II would be problematic? You said from your experience as a conductor it'd be bad, but is there like a specific yard, junction, or ridership problem I'm missing/not aware of?

 

[ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ]

6 minutes ago, Around the Horn said:

I'm not sure if this is intentional but I've been noticing lately that the is almost entirely R68/As and the mostly R46s. I personally haven't gotten an R46 in a week (not that I'm complaining).

Yep I've been seeing the same thing (moreso on the  end so I assume the R68s went to the ). Honestly to most customers, they see an R46 and an R68 the same, and also probably see all the B-Division NTTs are virtually identical, so prolly no-one outside of transit nerds care or notice.

[Lawrence St]

It seems people coming from PABT wanting to go to Grand Central opt to take the  since that’s the first train they see.

[darkstar8983]

Question - why when there was the Broadway fastback, the  and  were rerouted via 6 Av to provide alternate service (in the 's case for the last two hours or so of service for the day), but yet during the Queens Blvd GO, they couldn't reroute the   to/from 96 St or Queensboro Plaza to preserve a Manhattan-to  train direct connection like the  had? There was definitely capacity on Broadway to accommodate the  rerouted to 96 St or to Queens via the  route to provide a direct transfer to the , especially since in Manhattan, the  and ended around 9-9:15PM, and the transfers between the 6 Av and 8 Av Lines to the  are not the easiest in the system. 

[Kamen Rider]

…because the 7 was still running… why are we having to run extra service for a service that is still ready and raring to go?

[ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ]

For how overbuilt the IND otherwise is, why did they go in with the philosophy of keeping the locals exclusive to the outer-boroughs? 4-track trunk lines like Queens Blvd, Fulton, and Culver only got 1 direct tunnel into Manhattan via the express tracks (though we've since added 63rd street tunnel). Did no one think capacity would ever be an issue or that the express Manhattan services wouldn't be disproportionately favored? Tbf, Fulton and Culver generally function fine (the express Culver tracks aren't seriously used), mainly QBLVD where it was a huge mistake.

Also Concourse is interesting cause it's the only part of the original IND that has a true 3-track peak express set-up. Anyone know why this is?

[engineerboy6561]

3 hours ago, ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ said:

For how overbuilt the IND otherwise is, why did they go in with the philosophy of keeping the locals exclusive to the outer-boroughs? 4-track trunk lines like Queens Blvd, Fulton, and Culver only got 1 direct tunnel into Manhattan via the express tracks (though we've since added 63rd street tunnel). Did no one think capacity would ever be an issue or that the express Manhattan services wouldn't be disproportionately favored? Tbf, Fulton and Culver generally function fine (the express Culver tracks aren't seriously used), mainly QBLVD where it was a huge mistake.

Also Concourse is interesting cause it's the only part of the original IND that has a true 3-track peak express set-up. Anyone know why this is?

I'm not sure, especially because the relative widths of the platforms at some of the express stations (145 St, Tremont Av IIRC, and Fordham Rd) suggest that the original plan was to run four tracks; if I had to guess there wasn't money for four tracks across the entire first system, and because the Concourse line directly parallels Jerome the whole way from Bedford Park Blvd down to 161 St it was probably the place they figured that dropping the bidirectional express would do the least harm.

 

On 2/27/2023 at 8:11 PM, Kamen Rider said:

Basically the problem is, while dreaming and asking “what if” are perfectly fine… people tend to act like all these dreams and what if’s are practical and then get offended when we even so much as poke one hole in their logic.

like me having to explain multiple times why they can’t just move the B to be based at Concourse yard.
 

There are almost always details that are ether ignored or forgotten or just not understood.
Another example, expanding the trains on the J, L and M. A certain someone always insists we just need to extend the platforms, ignoring that things like yard storage tracks and the barn at East New York Yard are the actual restrictions on how long those trains are.

It would be really interesting to get a solid list of pinch points like that in one place, especially if we could get a meaningful sense of what it would take to do something about them. For instance, looking at ENY yard on satellite view tells me that if you wanted to run 600' trains out of there you'd basically need to buy up the two or three blocks next to the yard (the area bounded by the tracks, Conway St, and Bushwick Av, plus the storage place there, and then build a new 600' car barn extending from where Stewart St is now through where the storage place is. If you did that you could probably extend about 10 or 15 of the storage tracks at ENY up to Conway St, and then bring the track that currently connects eastbound trains to the yard up and over the portal. You could do it, but it would basically entail completely rebuilding ENY to do it, and I'm not sure where you'd put all the trains that currently live there while you did that.

Also Rogers Junction is a shitshow, and ideally would be rebuilt to the same design as the IND junctions just below Columbus Circle as a congestion management thing, but that would be interesting and quite possibly require the rebuilding of President St as well (President St looks like it ends around 300' south of where the platforms at Nostrand Av sit, and just west of Nostrand Av the northbound has to swing under the northbound to pop up in the correct spot by Franklin Av, and the distance between Franklin Av and Nostrand Av  is only about 1500 feet. If we assume that the clearance for individual tracks to pass underneath each other is about 15', then I can take a rough whack at laying this out:

Just east of Franklin Av, the two Nostrand Av tracks branch off and descend 15 feet over about 450 feet (so a 3.3% grade), as does the westbound track. The Nostrand Av and westbound tracks then level off and continue for about 450 feet, while the westbound track descends another 15 feet; at that point the Nostrand Av and westbound tracks swing south; the westbound track connects to the lower level of Nostrand Av, while the Nostrand Av tracks connect to President St; the westbound track slowly rises back up over the following 900' and joins the old tunnel lower level just past the end of Nostrand Av station.

The downside is that making this happen would require the rebuilding of Franklin Av, Nostrand Av, and President St, which would likely take years because of the sheer amount of track that would be getting ripped up and relaid. Furthermore, while work on the junction is happening nothing can run through it; during that time you'd basically need to turn the at Bowling Green, turn the at either Franklin Av with a new crossover or Atlantic/Barclays using the central crossover there, and then turn the and upper section of the at Franklin Av using the crossover just to the north of there. The southern section of the would basically only run from New Lots to Utica Av at a fairly low frequency, and both Nostrand Av and Eastern Parkway between Utica Av and Franklin Av would need to be bustituted; in theory you could run a shuttle from President St to Flatbush Av, but unless you added a brand new track connection from President St to either level of the Eastern Parkway line east of Nostrand those trains would be trapped there without any way to maintain them (and if, as I suspect, making this work would require rebuilding President St then you can't do that either).

You'd wind up doing the work in phases:

Phase I would be a few months to a year of preparatory trackwork; we'd need to add switches so that the center track stub on the coming out of Utica connected to both local tracks west of Sutter Av (which wouldn't be too bad and could probably be done at night with shuttle buses replacing the between Utica and New Lots), add a crossover just west of Franklin Av to allow trains to turn there (which you could probably also do late nights), and add bidirectional signaling on all four tracks between Eastern Parkway and Franklin Av so Franklin Av can be used as a terminus).

Phase II would be  3-5 years of absolute misery; and trains would turn at Franklin Av, trains would turn at Bowling Green all day, and trains would run in two sections (between 148 St and 42 St sharing trains from the , and between New Lots Av and Utica Av at a 10-minute headway using trains out of Livonia Yard). Shuttle buses would have to replace trains between Utica and Franklin Av, as well as between Flatbush Av and Franklin Av, so Nostrand Av would just completely lose subway service.

Phase III could probably be done in a year or so and would offer partial relief but still be not great; express trains could run through Franklin Av while platforms are widened, elevators, added, etc. but local trains still wouldn't be able to. The would run to Eastern Parkway, empty out there, and reverse at the crossover without entering Franklin Av, and the would still run to 42 St. However, the would run to New Lots all times, skipping Franklin, Nostrand and Kingston Aves and the would run to Flatbush all times), so at least there would be some through service on the network.

Edited March 1, 2023 by engineerboy6561

[ABOGbrooklyn]

What did Atlantic Ave stations entrances look like pre Atlantic Mall? Where were they located? For the 2345 and B&Q lines.

[Lex]

7 hours ago, engineerboy6561 said:

long post is long

I'd like to point out the reason for Eastern Parkway's setup under its namesake.

The actual width of Eastern Parkway isn't the reason for the tracks sitting on the south side, but the trees dotting the northern median strip. In other words, functionality was inherently thrown out the window in favor of street-level (stroad-level?) aesthetics. In addition to being a needless roadblock for branch design (to the point of being a significant factor in my opposition to feeding Utica Avenue into Eastern Parkway), it actually makes reaching points north of Eastern Parkway and the local stations east of Franklin Avenue needlessly daunting. Thankfully, potentially flattening Eastern Parkway can address this, though construction would still require some level of disruption.

[engineerboy6561]

1 hour ago, Lex said:

I'd like to point out the reason for Eastern Parkway's setup under its namesake.

The actual width of Eastern Parkway isn't the reason for the tracks sitting on the south side, but the trees dotting the northern median strip. In other words, functionality was inherently thrown out the window in favor of street-level (stroad-level?) aesthetics. In addition to being a needless roadblock for branch design (to the point of being a significant factor in my opposition to feeding Utica Avenue into Eastern Parkway), it actually makes reaching points north of Eastern Parkway and the local stations east of Franklin Avenue needlessly daunting. Thankfully, potentially flattening Eastern Parkway can address this, though construction would still require some level of disruption.

Honestly I'd agree that it would be better to just rebuild Rogers as part of a flattening of Eastern Parkway west of Utica Av. I'm tempted to suggest that we leave Utica Av as a two-level station, add tail tracks to the lower level, set the lower level up with tail tracks, and add an additional interlocking to allow trains to either terminate on the lower level island platform or switch to and from the local tracks just west of the station. I personally would have Utica Av run off a rebuilt Jamaica trunk; the downside is that making that work would likely require six tracks between Essex St and Myrtle Av to handle combined loading (15tph to Metropolitan Av, 30 express tph to Jamaica and beyond, 15 local tph to Jamaica, 15 or 30 tph to Utica Av. The original Second System proposal had a crosstown line running along Worth St that would have taken 8 Av local trains and brought them over to join the South 4th St trunk; if you brought that back you could in theory send the down Utica Av to Kings Plaza. The downside is that the only way to do that is to rebuild Jamaica, and then build a Worth St line.

Edited March 1, 2023 by engineerboy6561

[Trainmaster5]

3 hours ago, engineerboy6561 said:

Honestly I'd agree that it would be better to just rebuild Rogers as part of a flattening of Eastern Parkway west of Utica Av. I'm tempted to suggest that we leave Utica Av as a two-level station, add tail tracks to the lower level, set the lower level up with tail tracks, and add an additional interlocking to allow trains to either terminate on the lower level island platform or switch to and from the local tracks just west of the station. I personally would have Utica Av run off a rebuilt Jamaica trunk; the downside is that making that work would likely require six tracks between Essex St and Myrtle Av to handle combined loading (15tph to Metropolitan Av, 30 express tph to Jamaica and beyond, 15 local tph to Jamaica, 15 or 30 tph to Utica Av. The original Second System proposal had a crosstown line running along Worth St that would have taken 8 Av local trains and brought them over to join the South 4th St trunk; if you brought that back you could in theory send the down Utica Av to Kings Plaza. The downside is that the only way to do that is to rebuild Jamaica, and then build a Worth St line.

You and Lex are both missing the bigger issue, IMO. Eastern Parkway is the major east-west thoroughfare in that part of Brooklyn. The section from Grand Army Plaza to the original end at Pitkin Avenue wasn’t built with a subway line in mind. Think Prospect Park and Ocean Parkway and you’ll understand where I’m coming from. Those of us who were raised and educated in the area were also taught about the geology of the Parkway, especially the area where the subway was constructed. I foresee open warfare between the reconstruction plans and the residents and the drivers who travel along the Parkway. The only other east-west routes are Empire Boulevard to the south and Atlantic Avenue to the north which is always congested with commercial traffic. I’m not forgetting about the bus traffic on the B44, B48, and B49 which also run across the Parkway. I’d love to see how things unfold between the competing sides. Carry on.

[engineerboy6561]

1 hour ago, Trainmaster5 said:

You and Lex are both missing the bigger issue, IMO. Eastern Parkway is the major east-west thoroughfare in that part of Brooklyn. The section from Grand Army Plaza to the original end at Pitkin Avenue wasn’t built with a subway line in mind. Think Prospect Park and Ocean Parkway and you’ll understand where I’m coming from. Those of us who were raised and educated in the area were also taught about the geology of the Parkway, especially the area where the subway was constructed. I foresee open warfare between the reconstruction plans and the residents and the drivers who travel along the Parkway. The only other east-west routes are Empire Boulevard to the south and Atlantic Avenue to the north which is always congested with commercial traffic. I’m not forgetting about the bus traffic on the B44, B48, and B49 which also run across the Parkway. I’d love to see how things unfold between the competing sides. Carry on.

So basically Eastern Parkway is a big enough thoroughfare for traffic going across Brooklyn in that area that trying to rip it up and rebuild the subway underneath it would provoke World War III with everyone who drives on Eastern (which sounds like a fair number of people, given that both Empire Blvd and Atlantic Ave are already full, and Empire Blvd just dumps out onto Flatbush Av at Prospect Park); just out of curiosity, what's the geological issue with the Parkway? I know that farther south in Brooklyn the soil gets sufficiently difficult to tunnel through that planned lines along Nostrand and Utica would need to surface somewhere around Avenue S or so.

[N6 Limited]

2 hours ago, Trainmaster5 said:

You and Lex are both missing the bigger issue, IMO. Eastern Parkway is the major east-west thoroughfare in that part of Brooklyn. The section from Grand Army Plaza to the original end at Pitkin Avenue wasn’t built with a subway line in mind.

Speaking of which, why did the IRT turn off onto E98th st, and not down Pitkin Ave as seen on original extension plans?

[4 via Mosholu]

1 hour ago, ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ said:

Also Concourse is interesting cause it's the only part of the original IND that has a true 3-track peak express set-up. Anyone know why this is?

The Grand Concourse was originally going to be built with a fourth track like Central Park West, because the Independent Railroad wanted to replace the Mosholu elevated and redirect those that would have taken the train to the train, but during the construction stages, it was switched to three tracks only. There are two pieces of evidence that indicated to the fourth track and that is a pocket track north of 167 Street on the Manhattan bound platform and the extra wide uptown platform at Harlem-145 Street. I don't think anyone expected the Mosholu elevated under River and Fifth (Jerome) Avenues to last as long as it did because it was likely meant to be destroyed. There was even a point during the Corporate era where because of how bad the train was during that early period, they wanted to cut the Mosholu Local and make it run up to 161 Street-Yankee Stadium. But that never happened at all.

 

[ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ]

37 minutes ago, 4 via Mosholu said:

The Grand Concourse was originally going to be built with a fourth track like Central Park West, because the Independent Railroad wanted to replace the Mosholu elevated and redirect those that would have taken the train to the train, but during the construction stages, it was switched to three tracks only. There are two pieces of evidence that indicated to the fourth track and that is a pocket track north of 167 Street on the Manhattan bound platform and the extra wide uptown platform at Harlem-145 Street. I don't think anyone expected the Mosholu elevated under River and Fifth (Jerome) Avenues to last as long as it did because it was likely meant to be destroyed. There was even a point during the Corporate era where because of how bad the train was during that early period, they wanted to cut the Mosholu Local and make it run up to 161 Street-Yankee Stadium. But that never happened at all.

 

Interesting; honestly I'm glad both lines exist because if one wasn't there, the other would have severe crowding problems (the  already does as is). I wonder if this also explains why the northern half of the southbound platform at Fordham Road is so damn wide; they started building the northern half when the intention was 4 tracks but that fell out of favor by the time they reached the southern half. Maybe there's another reason that explains this though.

[Trainmaster5]

1 hour ago, engineerboy6561 said:

So basically Eastern Parkway is a big enough thoroughfare for traffic going across Brooklyn in that area that trying to rip it up and rebuild the subway underneath it would provoke World War III with everyone who drives on Eastern (which sounds like a fair number of people, given that both Empire Blvd and Atlantic Ave are already full, and Empire Blvd just dumps out onto Flatbush Av at Prospect Park); just out of curiosity, what's the geological issue with the Parkway? I know that farther south in Brooklyn the soil gets sufficiently difficult to tunnel through that planned lines along Nostrand and Utica would need to surface somewhere around Avenue S or so.

Excuse me if I'm forgetful with the name (s) of the rock underpinning the south side of the Parkway ( Junior High  was over 60 years ago ) but the sediment that remained was due to the fusion of the remnants of the Ice Age we were taught. If you know the topography of the area the line rises from the southern end (Empire Blvd) up to the Parkway and then it recedes as you head farther north toward Atlantic Avenue. That's why the Franklin Shuttle runs below the IRT and Eastern Parkway. It's why Mount Prospect stands out behind the Museum and into the Botanical Gardens. Head eastward along the Parkway past Utica toward Lincoln Terrace Park where the Livonia Avenue line rises to become an El and you can get an idea of the below ground situation. As an aside to the poster who asked about the IRT and Pitkin Avenue due east along that avenue were 2 major obstacles, namely the LIRR Bay Ridge Branch and the BMT Fulton Street El. Note in my first post I mentioned the " original " Eastern Parkway on the eastern end. Thats because it ended at the slope to Pitkin. Everything past that point to Bushwick Avenue is/was Eastern Parkway Extension.  I went to grade school in the area in those ancient days and our teachers stressed certain things. Even my old school instructors in school car stressed certain points like that and the fact that DeKalb Avenue station in downtown Brooklyn is NOT  located on Flatbush Avenue and neither was the abandoned Myrtle Avenue station. The street from the Manhattan Bridge to Fulton St is Flatbush Avenue Extension. I know I went off topic there but I was trying to point out how much we were taught back then. The big piece of the puzzle IMO is $$$ and politics. Carry on.

[Lex]

1 hour ago, Trainmaster5 said:

Excuse me if I'm forgetful with the name (s) of the rock underpinning the south side of the Parkway ( Junior High  was over 60 years ago ) but the sediment that remained was due to the fusion of the remnants of the Ice Age we were taught. If you know the topography of the area the line rises from the southern end (Empire Blvd) up to the Parkway and then it recedes as you head farther north toward Atlantic Avenue. That's why the Franklin Shuttle runs below the IRT and Eastern Parkway. It's why Mount Prospect stands out behind the Museum and into the Botanical Gardens. Head eastward along the Parkway past Utica toward Lincoln Terrace Park where the Livonia Avenue line rises to become an El and you can get an idea of the below ground situation. As an aside to the poster who asked about the IRT and Pitkin Avenue due east along that avenue were 2 major obstacles, namely the LIRR Bay Ridge Branch and the BMT Fulton Street El. Note in my first post I mentioned the " original " Eastern Parkway on the eastern end. Thats because it ended at the slope to Pitkin. Everything past that point to Bushwick Avenue is/was Eastern Parkway Extension.  I went to grade school in the area in those ancient days and our teachers stressed certain things. Even my old school instructors in school car stressed certain points like that and the fact that DeKalb Avenue station in downtown Brooklyn is NOT  located on Flatbush Avenue and neither was the abandoned Myrtle Avenue station. The street from the Manhattan Bridge to Fulton St is Flatbush Avenue Extension. I know I went off topic there but I was trying to point out how much we were taught back then. The big piece of the puzzle IMO is $$$ and politics. Carry on.

That's not right. You have to go up in order to reach the shuttle at all from the IRT, only heading down any stairs if you're trying to reach Brighton. Perhaps things are a little different in relation to the line further east, but that doesn't change anything.

As for flattening the IRT ROW, I'm not seeing how the topography is an issue that would severely complicate construction. Eastern Parkway itself doesn't have a significant grade shift between the northern and southern sides, unlike everything past it on either side.

[T to Dyre Avenue]

17 hours ago, engineerboy6561 said:

Also Rogers Junction is a shitshow, and ideally would be rebuilt to the same design as the IND junctions just below Columbus Circle as a congestion management thing, but that would be interesting and quite possibly require the rebuilding of President St as well (President St looks like it ends around 300' south of where the platforms at Nostrand Av sit, and just west of Nostrand Av the northbound has to swing under the northbound to pop up in the correct spot by Franklin Av, and the distance between Franklin Av and Nostrand Av  is only about 1500 feet. If we assume that the clearance for individual tracks to pass underneath each other is about 15', then I can take a rough whack at laying this out:

Just east of Franklin Av, the two Nostrand Av tracks branch off and descend 15 feet over about 450 feet (so a 3.3% grade), as does the westbound track. The Nostrand Av and westbound tracks then level off and continue for about 450 feet, while the westbound track descends another 15 feet; at that point the Nostrand Av and westbound tracks swing south; the westbound track connects to the lower level of Nostrand Av, while the Nostrand Av tracks connect to President St; the westbound track slowly rises back up over the following 900' and joins the old tunnel lower level just past the end of Nostrand Av station.

The downside is that making this happen would require the rebuilding of Franklin Av, Nostrand Av, and President St, which would likely take years because of the sheer amount of track that would be getting ripped up and relaid. Furthermore, while work on the junction is happening nothing can run through it; during that time you'd basically need to turn the at Bowling Green, turn the at either Franklin Av with a new crossover or Atlantic/Barclays using the central crossover there, and then turn the and upper section of the at Franklin Av using the crossover just to the north of there. The southern section of the would basically only run from New Lots to Utica Av at a fairly low frequency, and both Nostrand Av and Eastern Parkway between Utica Av and Franklin Av would need to be bustituted; in theory you could run a shuttle from President St to Flatbush Av, but unless you added a brand new track connection from President St to either level of the Eastern Parkway line east of Nostrand those trains would be trapped there without any way to maintain them (and if, as I suspect, making this work would require rebuilding President St then you can't do that either).

 

Columbus Circle at least has the advantage of all four tracks staying on the same level once the  diverge for 53rd St then 6th Ave, unlike Eastern Pkwy where the tracks go to a stacked layout almost immediately after Franklin Ave. That’s the challenge with rebuilding Rogers Jct into a Columbus Circle-style design. I wonder if it’s really worth it to spend billions of dollars and tear up Eastern Pkwy for years just so Nostrand riders can continue to have a one-seat ride to the Lexington Ave Line. Like, is it really the end of the world to have to transfer cross-platform at Franklin for an express? Especially if the trains run more frequently than they do now? That’s why I kind of like this study done a couple years back in July 2020 by STV - https://ia601408.us.archive.org/15/items/irt-capacity-study-final-reportt-redacted/IRT Capacity Study Final Reportt_Redacted_.pdf

Skip to section E to get the idea. Warning:    It’s a huge document (917 pages!).

[Trainmaster5]

45 minutes ago, Lex said:

That's not right. You have to go up in order to reach the shuttle at all from the IRT, only heading down any stairs if you're trying to reach Brighton. Perhaps things are a little different in relation to the line further east, but that doesn't change anything.

As for flattening the IRT ROW, I'm not seeing how the topography is an issue that would severely complicate construction. Eastern Parkway itself doesn't have a significant grade shift between the northern and southern sides, unlike everything past it on either side.

You’re right about going up for the shuttle as the subway came along after the shuttle. The point was trying to convey is the difference between the grades on the underside of the Parkway itself..From Franklin to the east there’s a noticeable rise as you get to Bedford Avenue which starts to drop down from Rogers Avenue as you approach Nostrand Avenue. The significant difference we were taught in school was the Franklin-Bedford-Rogers-Nostrand stretch under the Parkway itself. That’s what our geology/ Earth Science was focused on. I’ve walked the stretch underground from Franklin Avenue to Nostrand, especially the southern side as a miscellaneous work train operator installing signal cables from the old tower at the junction to the present location at the Utica Avenue station. My  road job during cold weather plans was the Nostrand 1  layup located on the n/b express track adjacent to the Nostrand Avenue  station where the Flatbush line joins Eastern Parkway. Right at the switch. What I’m trying to convey is that underground it’s a completely different thing that even though we once had rail fan windows most people had no idea what they were passing through. Signal Maintainers quarters, storage rooms, staircases between the n/b and s/b trackage and the like. That’s why I think the time and expense of construction will be a hindrance to any project in that area. I’m not saying that it can’t be done but there will probably be some fierce opposition. My take. Carry on

[Lawrence St]

Does anyone know why the  and  are chained in a weird way where the  is technically southbound and the  is northbound?

[Mpn4179]

20 minutes ago, Lawrence St said:

Does anyone know why the  and  are chained in a weird way where the  is technically southbound and the  is northbound?

It has to do with the terminals. When the  used to go to Chambers St/Broad St/9 Av or Bay Pkwy, those terminals were southbound and Metropolitan Avenue is Northbound. When the  was rerouted to Forest Hills-71 Av, that terminal became Norhbound, while Metropolitan Av became southbound.

With the , Jamaica Center is northbound and Broad Street is southbound.

Edited March 2, 2023 by Mpn4179

[engineerboy6561]

9 hours ago, T to Dyre Avenue said:

Columbus Circle at least has the advantage of all four tracks staying on the same level once the  diverge for 53rd St then 6th Ave, unlike Eastern Pkwy where the tracks go to a stacked layout almost immediately after Franklin Ave. That’s the challenge with rebuilding Rogers Jct into a Columbus Circle-style design. I wonder if it’s really worth it to spend billions of dollars and tear up Eastern Pkwy for years just so Nostrand riders can continue to have a one-seat ride to the Lexington Ave Line. Like, is it really the end of the world to have to transfer cross-platform at Franklin for an express? Especially if the trains run more frequently than they do now? That’s why I kind of like this study done a couple years back in July 2020 by STV - https://ia601408.us.archive.org/15/items/irt-capacity-study-final-reportt-redacted/IRT Capacity Study Final Reportt_Redacted_.pdf

Skip to section E to get the idea. Warning:    It’s a huge document (917 pages!).

Just read through Section E and that's an interesting idea; it's also frustrating that the IRT has a bunch of spots that weren't really well designed to maximize throughput, but I guess that's what happens when you're building a subway system for the first time.