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42nd street shuttle fastrack good idea or not?


alekr

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1) That's one of my main points, you don't have to have complicated, time and energy consuming moves. Keep in mind electric energy is precious, a big chunk of it is from petro and coal burning plants.

 

 

I'm not sure what point you're making.

 

2) There is a physical way, switch the northbound train to the express, then the s/b express, then s/b local to get to the (S), even if a reverse need to be executed.

 

 

And tie up service on all four tracks for 20 minutes. What's the point?

 

3) Do you know what we're talking about here? The folks here are trying to remove the Times Square spur track which connects to T4, not the GCT link at T1 and really it's north of Times Square, not south.

 

 

I'm talking about the spur track south of Times Square, the one between the express tracks, which can be accessed from either direction without a reverse move.

 

Track 4 on the shuttle is used for the shuttle train only, and its connection to the mainline is used only to bring trains onto and off of the shuttle. If at some point track 4 is no longer needed for service, then it will be removed from service and the switch will be removed. Tracks and switches cost money to maintain, and there's no reason to maintain a track and a switch that have no use.

 

R142s are eventually going to end up there. They have the program I believe. But don't count on it anytime soon.

 

 

R142s have the program for all IRT lines.

 

If the shuttle is ever reconfigured to run with 5-car trains, then R142s could end up there, although I doubt they will any time soon. But as long as it runs 3-car and 4-car trains, the R142s will not run there.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I'm not sure what point you're making.

 

 

 

And tie up service on all four tracks for 20 minutes. What's the point?

 

 

 

I'm talking about the spur track south of Times Square, the one between the express tracks, which can be accessed from either direction without a reverse move.

 

Track 4 on the shuttle is used for the shuttle train only, and its connection to the mainline is used only to bring trains onto and off of the shuttle. If at some point track 4 is no longer needed for service, then it will be removed from service and the switch will be removed. Tracks and switches cost money to maintain, and there's no reason to maintain a track and a switch that have no use.

 

 

1) The point is to conserve energy, and electricity by keeping this connection in place (since trains don't have to travel long distances and do several switch moves during non-revenue moves or such.

 

2) This is for a not normal day contingency plan that could not tie a corridor up more, that's why we should keep this Midtown connection between the IRT Lex and 7th Ave. Line in place.

 

3) I am talking about the Lexington Ave. Line, NOT the 7th Ave. Line, and the track and switch is useful for MOW, Emergency and Museum Train use so it's best not to remove it and regret later.

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Track 4 on the shuttle is used for the shuttle train only, and its connection to the mainline is used only to bring trains onto and off of the shuttle. If at some point track 4 is no longer needed for service, then it will be removed from service and the switch will be removed. Tracks and switches cost money to maintain, and there's no reason to maintain a track and a switch that have no use.

 

The MTA already has a bunch of switches, to unused express tracks, etc.

 

R142s have the program for all IRT lines

 

Why does this matter. We know.

 

If the shuttle is ever reconfigured to run with 5-car trains, then R142s could end up there, although I doubt they will any time soon. But as long as it runs 3-car and 4-car trains, the R142s will not run there.

 

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2) This is for a not normal day contingency plan that could not tie a corridor up more, that's why we should keep this Midtown connection between the IRT Lex and 7th Ave. Line in place.

 

 

there is no connection between 7th and lex in midtown. T4 is isolated from 3 and 1 and inserting such a connection would require a massive rebuild of the tunnel, and a crosstown move would be a complicated back and forth routine. any train using such a connection would need to fit into track 3's platform at GCT and not fowl the switch to track one.

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If the TS end is ever rebuilt to hold a 5 car train, you don't need to waste running an R142 there (unless they were to use ato or cbtc on it). R62/62As would be fine.

 

The 142s can run in 3 or 4 car sets as they are semi-permanently coupled and can be taken apart of necessary

 

Problem is if you do that, you have extra B-cars lying around doing nothing

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1) The point is to conserve energy, and electricity by keeping this connection in place (since trains don't have to travel long distances and do several switch moves during non-revenue moves or such.

 

2) This is for a not normal day contingency plan that could not tie a corridor up more, that's why we should keep this Midtown connection between the IRT Lex and 7th Ave. Line in place.

 

3) I am talking about the Lexington Ave. Line, NOT the 7th Ave. Line, and the track and switch is useful for MOW, Emergency and Museum Train use so it's best not to remove it and regret later.

 

 

1) The only purpose that these switches serve is to allow trains onto and off of the shuttle tracks. They are not and cannot be used for anything else. If track 4 is abandoned, the switch leading to track 4 will also be abandoned, as it will no longer serve any purpose at all.

 

2) What exactly is this "contingency plan" that you had in mind?

 

3) The switch at the Lex end isn't going anywhere - it's the only way the trains on tracks 1 and 3 can get off the shuttle, and nobody's proposed abandoning those tracks.

 

The MTA already has a bunch of switches, to unused express tracks, etc.

 

 

All of those supposedly unused express tracks are in fact used quite frequently.

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The 142s can run in 3 or 4 car sets as they are semi-permanently coupled and can be taken apart of necessary

 

Problem is if you do that, you have extra B-cars lying around doing nothing

 

Well of course, but since the R62As are still around, there's no need to uncouple a few R142 cars to run on the shuttle. Ideally they should renovate the TS end to hold 5 car trains sometime before the last R62A retires in 15-20 years. GCT can hold 5 or more cars iirc.

 

@keystone: calm down. Again, I do not think anyone is saying to sever the track connections to either side on track 1 and 4. The only thing I think can be assumed is that if tracks 1 and 3 were to hold 5 car trains, then you don't need track 4 for Passenger service. I have said a few times in the past that ideally track 4 could be used as some storage/layup track. It would be handy in the cases of bad weather if the MTA needs to store some more cars underground.

But that said, I can also see the flip side of abandoning track 4 entirely to remove that switch and allow the ML local to run past that segment without having to go 'slowly'. Would it be a waste if they were to abandon it? Yes, but it's not an 'end of the world' sort of thing. Trains still have to get to the shuttle, and track 1 will always be there.

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As usual, rational thinking is being covered in foam. There's no reason to keep the switch to tk 4 if that track isn't going to be used for anything, but OMFG we'll lose a piece of the original 1904 IRT!!!!!!

 

 

Are we gonna leave the R62 stuck on there? :lol:

 

Really, It's just one switch.

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Some days I think the only thing that's gonna stop them from getting worked up about stuff is a foaming swear jar with a very high pentaly. There are good reasons to keep 4 and good reasons to retire it. Discussing and debating a topic is one thing. But there is no use getting all excetied over something, which we seem to keep forgetting we have no control over.

 

if the MTA diecides to close T4 then we have to live with that decision. If they decided to leave the shuttle as is, then we have to live with that decision. If they decided to get rid of T3 instead.... you see where I'm going with this..?

 

we don't have to like it, we don't have to be happy about it. but we have to live with it.

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In answer to the OP's question, in going with my layman's knowledge of this, a 42nd Street fastrack may only be necessary if there are urgent repairs needed to be done within a certain time frame or by a certain deadline. Otherwise I don't see the point of it either.

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I have said a few times in the past that ideally track 4 could be used as some storage/layup track. It would be handy in the cases of bad weather if the MTA needs to store some more cars underground.

 

 

There's plenty of excess space on the express tracks that could be used for underground storage if necessary, and putting trains onto it doesn't require holding up northbound 1 trains for a time-consuming reverse move.

 

But that said, I can also see the flip side of abandoning track 4 entirely to remove that switch and allow the ML local to run past that segment without having to go 'slowly'.

 

 

Switches are failure-prone and are expensive to maintain. The primary reason to remove a switch that is never used is to avoid the ongoing maintenance cost.

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The track map on nycsubway shows t1&3 are connected to Lexington. Track 4 is just to 7th av, so it won't impact anything. Based on what someone said about the last recent proposal for the TS renovation: it was going to be the trains terminating before the curve and the platforms being built further back. ie: they are avoiding the curve entirely.

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If T4 is so useless and acting like a spur for the 7th Ave. IRT, then I think it should probably be removed and have T1 and T3 perhaps straightened out and the gap removed in Times Square. I thought it has a connection to T1/T3, but I guess not...

 

 

Track 4 is necessary now to provide enough capacity, since the other two tracks are only long enough to hold three and four cars, respectively, at the Times Square station.

 

But if Times Square is rebuilt off the curve with a five-car platform, say goodbye to track 4.

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@keystone: calm down.

 

 

I am calm all along;;;

 

Track 4 is necessary now to provide enough capacity, since the other two tracks are only long enough to hold three and four cars, respectively, at the Times Square station.

 

But if Times Square is rebuilt off the curve with a five-car platform, say goodbye to track 4.

 

 

Wait... Are we promoting the removal of T4 and the connection to 7th Ave. IRT or not? I am kinda confused...

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