SUBWAY - Random Thoughts Topic

[Collin]

I was thinking about the express tracks in the system that are not used in regular service.  I wonder how often are some of them actually used, both in revenue service for G.O.'s or singular train reroutes, or for out of service trains to/from the yard, or for work trains.  Which are the most and least used?  Below is my complete list.  I left out some small portions like on the  past Grant where the configuration of the crossovers mean the express track isn't useable for revenue service.

between 96th Street and 137th Street, and between Dyckman Street and 242nd Street

between Gun Hill Road and 241st Street (East 180th to Gun Hill is used by some 5 trains on the regular schedule now)

between 149th Street and 170th Street, and between Burnside Avenue and Woodlawn.

between East 180th Street and Dyre Avenue

between Parkchester and Pelham Bay Park

between 36th Street and Coney Island

between Church Avenue and Avenue X

between Myrtle Avenue and Broadway Junction

between Astoria Ditmars Boulevard and Queensboro Plaza, and between 59th Street and Coney Island

 

I'd say the Astoria Express and Dyre Express are used the least since they can't be used to take out of service trains to the yard.  Meanwhile, the West End and Sea Beach express tracks I think are used every day for  put ins.  I also don't see how the  express track between Myrtle Avenue and Broadway Junction is used often.

[danielhg121]

20 minutes ago, Collin said:

I was thinking about the express tracks in the system that are not used in regular service.  I wonder how often are some of them actually used, both in revenue service for G.O.'s or singular train reroutes, or for out of service trains to/from the yard, or for work trains.  Which are the most and least used?  Below is my complete list.  I left out some small portions like on the  past Grant where the configuration of the crossovers mean the express track isn't useable for revenue service.

between 96th Street and 137th Street, and between Dyckman Street and 242nd Street

between Gun Hill Road and 241st Street (East 180th to Gun Hill is used by some 5 trains on the regular schedule now)

between 149th Street and 170th Street, and between Burnside Avenue and Woodlawn.

between East 180th Street and Dyre Avenue

between Parkchester and Pelham Bay Park

between 36th Street and Coney Island

between Church Avenue and Avenue X

between Myrtle Avenue and Broadway Junction

between Astoria Ditmars Boulevard and Queensboro Plaza, and between 59th Street and Coney Island

 

I'd say the Astoria Express and Dyre Express are used the least since they can't be used to take out of service trains to the yard.  Meanwhile, the West End and Sea Beach express tracks I think are used every day for  put ins.  I also don't see how the  express track between Myrtle Avenue and Broadway Junction is used often.

Actually the Astoria express tracks have a lot of layups.

[Daniel The Cool]

48 minutes ago, Collin said:

I was thinking about the express tracks in the system that are not used in regular service.  I wonder how often are some of them actually used, both in revenue service for G.O.'s or singular train reroutes, or for out of service trains to/from the yard, or for work trains.  Which are the most and least used?  Below is my complete list.  I left out some small portions like on the  past Grant where the configuration of the crossovers mean the express track isn't useable for revenue service.

between 96th Street and 137th Street, and between Dyckman Street and 242nd Street

between Gun Hill Road and 241st Street (East 180th to Gun Hill is used by some 5 trains on the regular schedule now)

between 149th Street and 170th Street, and between Burnside Avenue and Woodlawn.

between East 180th Street and Dyre Avenue

between Parkchester and Pelham Bay Park

between 36th Street and Coney Island

between Church Avenue and Avenue X

between Myrtle Avenue and Broadway Junction

between Astoria Ditmars Boulevard and Queensboro Plaza, and between 59th Street and Coney Island

 

I'd say the Astoria Express and Dyre Express are used the least since they can't be used to take out of service trains to the yard.  Meanwhile, the West End and Sea Beach express tracks I think are used every day for  put ins.  I also don't see how the  express track between Myrtle Avenue and Broadway Junction is used often.

You're wrong on Astoria. The Middle tracks has been used a bunch of times especially on a normal weekday when they would send a late  and/or  Train Express for being late. It's also used for Overnights/Weekend layups.

 

[Collin]

Ok so I'm wrong about Astoria, but which express tracks are in fact rarely used?

[CenSin]

2 minutes ago, Collin said:

Ok so I'm wrong about Astoria, but which express tracks are in fact rarely used?

Express track that is functional or any express track? The Sea Beach Line, before the abandonment of the southbound express track, had very rare usage of the southbound express track. I was on it a few times and speeds were abysmal. I suppose the poor condition of the track precluded frequent usage. Nowadays, trains can’t use it at all.

[Collin]

I'm referring to tracks that are functional and available for use, but are rarely used in practice.  I've ridden the current express track on Sea Beach.  I took advantage of the station renovation project to get a much faster ride from Coney Island.  During that project, they put temporary platforms over the old southbound express track at select stations.

[NewFlyer 230]

10 hours ago, Collin said:

I'm referring to tracks that are functional and available for use, but are rarely used in practice.  I've ridden the current express track on Sea Beach.  I took advantage of the station renovation project to get a much faster ride from Coney Island.  During that project, they put temporary platforms over the old southbound express track at select stations.

There are not that many places where there is a express available but it’s not used.

Some locations that come in mind is the  above 96th street, the  along the Sea Beach Line, the  south of Church Ave, the  along the West End, the  between Myrtle Ave and Broadway Junction and the  along Liberty Ave and between Rockaway Blvd and Howard Beach-JFK. However the express tracks on the  in Queens don’t allow for an express actual express service, just storage, testing, turning Rockaway  trains around and yard leads. 

As for the other locations I know they are used during G.O’s, storage, or in the case of Sea Beach, testing. 

[LGA Link N Train]

11 hours ago, Daniel The Cool said:

You're wrong on Astoria. The Middle tracks has been used a bunch of times especially on a normal weekday when they would send a late  and/or  Train Express for being late. It's also used for Overnights/Weekend layups.

I notice that too every time I travel in Astoria/LIC. I've been on a few express trains on Astoria (some time before the fleet swap began). Never understood why the has done those oddball express runs with the and .

[T to Dyre Avenue]

If a train is late, then it makes sense to send an  or  up the middle. But probably the most oddball decision they made was to resume the  peak express in Astoria after the six weeks following 9/11 when the  and  were suspended and the  ran solo in Queens. It was odd enough that it ran peak express when it debuted earlier in 2001. But bringing the peak express back when the  came back was even odder, I think. Eventually it was canned completely, and rightfully so.

[darkstar8983]

2 hours ago, T to Dyre Avenue said:

If a train is late, then it makes sense to send an  or  up the middle. But probably the most oddball decision they made was to resume the  peak express in Astoria after the six weeks following 9/11 when the  and  were suspended and the  ran solo in Queens. It was odd enough that it ran peak express when it debuted earlier in 2001. But bringing the peak express back when the  came back was even odder, I think. Eventually it was canned completely, and rightfully so.

There were two reasons behind restoring the Astoria Express service (and running it in the first place in 2001).

 

1. Transit didn’t know if Ditmars Blvd was going to be able to handle turning both the  and  considering that from 1988-2001, Ditmars only had 11TPH to turn for the , but now it had to turn 15TPH ( 7  And 8  ).

2. Ridership in Astoria was expected to be evenly divided between the  and , with Astoria Blvd and Ditmars Blvd customers opting for the  and Customers at 30 Av, Broadway, 36 Av, and 39 Av taking the .
 

Ridership ended up at its extreme being divided with 33% on the  and 67% on the . Combining this with the habitual lateness of both routes left the  overcrowded during rush hours and the  underutilized 

[Collin]

I think when considering adding an alternate train peak direction express, several factors need to be looked at.

• Is there high enough frequency or can more service be added?  Local stations will lose half their service compared to having all trains run local.  It's one thing to go from a 2 to a 4 minute interval.  Going from 6 to 12 minutes is a different story.  Sometimes, short turns can be used to offset this.
• How well are the stations configured?  Some lines have well placed express stations while other have poorly placed ones, too few, or none at all.  A lack of well placed express stations makes express service less valuable, since it benefits fewer riders.
• What is the ridership balance between local and express stations?  On some lines, the express configured stations have much higher ridership, but it's not the case everywhere.
• How much faster is express service compared to local service?  The more time that's saved, the more it makes sense to have express service.

That being said, I think that given the current service pattern and schedule, the areas where peak direction express service makes sense already have it.  In some areas, like Jerome Ave, it would make sense if the stations were configured better.  If Yankee Stadium and Fordham Road were both express stations, then I'm sure the line would have express service.  Locals would terminate at Fordham Road while express trains would run as locals north of there.  In other areas, express service makes sense given the station configuration and time saved, but there isn't enough service.  Culver should have much more express service than 2 trains per day, but doesn't have enough service to make that possible.

[trainfan22]

For the first time since mid March, I rode the subway today. Not to railfan, but to go the park.

 

It was surreal, ridership is LOW. Took the to the and both trains no more than 5 ppl in the entire car the entire trip. This time of day usually a whole bunch of people get off at Broadway Junction, today, only a handful of people. Broadway Junction N/B A/C platform, ghost town, usually fairly busy this time of day.

 

14th/8th Ave stop was practically empty, it was so quiet in the station I could hear my sneakers pressing against the floor, that station is usually a madhouse this time of day.

 

Nice to see ppl are following the MTA orders of staying off the system unless you're an essential worker. I kinda felt guilty for riding today but the weather is so nice today and I couldn't resist the urge to enjoy it.

 

[CenSin]

6 hours ago, NewFlyer 230 said:

 along the Sea Beach Line, the  south of Church Ave, the  along the West End

Actually, all of those are used pretty regularly. The used Sea Beach to access the yard. The regularly skips stations along the express track to make up for lost time. The / does so along West End for occasional G O.s. I do not use the , but I reckon frequent service disruptions require trains to use the express track to bypass the problems.

[Calvin]

From yesterday, the  has went back to using regular 4-car trains. The past few weeks, on weekdays, it was full length 160s and 68/As. 

[NewFlyer 230]

2 hours ago, Calvin said:

From yesterday, the  has went back to using regular 4-car trains. The past few weeks, on weekdays, it was full length 160s and 68/As. 

I think the  stopped using full length trains for a while. I used the  this past Monday and all trains were 4 car R68/A’s. I was looking forward to riding on a full length  but ended up being disappointed lol. 

[T to Dyre Avenue]

7 hours ago, darkstar8983 said:

There were two reasons behind restoring the Astoria Express service (and running it in the first place in 2001).

 

1. Transit didn’t know if Ditmars Blvd was going to be able to handle turning both the  and  considering that from 1988-2001, Ditmars only had 11TPH to turn for the , but now it had to turn 15TPH ( 7  And 8  ).

2. Ridership in Astoria was expected to be evenly divided between the  and , with Astoria Blvd and Ditmars Blvd customers opting for the  and Customers at 30 Av, Broadway, 36 Av, and 39 Av taking the .
 

Ridership ended up at its extreme being divided with 33% on the  and 67% on the . Combining this with the habitual lateness of both routes left the  overcrowded during rush hours and the  underutilized 

I didn’t know the  ran only 11 tph from 1988-2001. However, there was a previous time when they turned two services at Ditmars. They did it with the Broadway B and the  (  before May 1987) at Ditmars at rush hours during the first shutdown of the Manhattan Bridge  tracks. Maybe the combined B/N service was less than 15 tph. They only did it during rush hours (B turned at QBP during middays; 57/7 during evenings and weekends). They didn’t do an Astoria express then. Maybe ridership was lower back then. 

[Lawrence St]

9 hours ago, CenSin said:

Actually, all of those are used pretty regularly. The used Sea Beach to access the yard. The regularly skips stations along the express track to make up for lost time. The / does so along West End for occasional G O.s. I do not use the , but I reckon frequent service disruptions require trains to use the express track to bypass the problems.

For the , they rarely use the express track to make up for lost time and just use the local track. But the section from 207th St to 238th St are used often for relay and yard moves.

I've never seen the express section between 96th St and 137th St be used, except to lay up trains when they're ending at 96th St.

[Abba]

The  is running normal headways now. 

[subway4832]

13 hours ago, Lawrence St said:

For the , they rarely use the express track to make up for lost time and just use the local track. But the section from 207th St to 238th St are used often for relay and yard moves.

I've never seen the express section between 96th St and 137th St be used, except to lay up trains when they're ending at 96th St.

The middle track is usually used overnights to layup extra  trains. 

[trainfan22]

 

 

This post has me cracking up LMAO. Dude called overzealous fanners a simp for constantly bothering the NYCT Twitter account about an R32 final trip. 

 

Being the person behind the NYCT Twitter account gotta be one of worst jobs to have.. regular passengers constantly cursing you out when there's a service disruption, railfans asking railfan related question, like where a certain car model is at on a particular route, R32 final run, etc. 

 

Someone should ask NYCT Twitter if 76th Street really exists, I'm curious as to what their answer would be lol

[RedLine]

Imagine being so much of a nutjob that you hypocritically call other nutjobs out.

Edited May 3, 2020 by RedLine

[danielhg121]

50 minutes ago, trainfan22 said:

Someone should ask NYCT Twitter if 76th Street really exists, I'm curious as to what their answer would be lol

I think it would depend on how you proposed it.

If you were asking a genuine question about where it is, they might tell you it prob doesn't exist and suggest an alternative. However, if you tweeted a meme at them about the 76th Street station whereabouts, you'll prob get a response saying not to press any further or there may be consequences LOL.

[Jacob]

On 5/2/2020 at 6:30 PM, Calvin said:

From yesterday, the  has went back to using regular 4-car trains. The past few weeks, on weekdays, it was full length 160s and 68/As. 

They did that to increase car space for social distancing.

[Deucey]

On 4/29/2020 at 4:54 PM, Collin said:

Another thing I think might make the  more reliable is if it were cut back to Whitehall while the  took over Bay Ridge.  With a shorter route, there's less that can go wrong.  I could see this happening as part of a Broadway de-interlining plan that would send the  to 96th Street at all times.  The problem with that idea is I don't know how many trains Whitehall can reasonably turn, though some trains could just be extended to Bay Ridge or somewhere else in Brooklyn.

Or  Bronx to Bay Ridge

 between 96th/UES to Coney Island via West End

 - Whitehall to 71st/Continental or Parsons 

[T to Dyre Avenue]

With a merge between the  and the  at DeKalb and a merge between the  and  between DeKalb and Pacific (Atlantic-Barclays)?