Department of Subways - Proposals/Ideas

[engineerboy6561]

5 hours ago, mrsman said:

To me it would seem better to allow more trains down past Euclid.  Maybe not feasible to allow all C trains to go to Lefferts, but more trains would ease some of the crowding on this section (for the Rockaway trains).

That would make sense; the question at that point would have to do with how many trains Euclid can turn and how much of a reliability hit the merged segment between Euclid and Rockaway Blvd would cause. There's already the shared run through the Cranberry St tubes that would limit Fulton to 25-30tph, so the additional shared segment might not mess things up too much; that said, scheduling it sounds like a massive pain in the ass and I'd really like to see some sort of connection between the Chambers St/WTC  platform and Court St to kill the merge there.

In an ideal world we'd just finish the Pitkin Av line out to Cross Bay Blvd (including building the mythical 76 St station) with four tracks and an express stop at Cross Bay, then tie the  into the Rockaway line just below 133 Av. Have the  take over Lefferts service, then  to the Rockaways with the merge at Euclid Av; late nights when the  ran local the  could just run from Lefferts to Euclid and reverse on the express tracks.

Edited May 5, 2020 by engineerboy6561

[Lex]

4 hours ago, engineerboy6561 said:

That would make sense; the question at that point would have to do with how many trains Euclid can turn and how much of a reliability hit the merged segment between Euclid and Rockaway Blvd would cause. There's already the shared run through the Cranberry St tubes that would limit Fulton to 25-30tph, so the additional shared segment might not mess things up too much; that said, scheduling it sounds like a massive pain in the ass and I'd really like to see some sort of connection between the Chambers St/WTC  platform and Court St to kill the merge there.

Well, that won't happen, but the Worth Street provision could certainly be used (if planned correctly).

[engineerboy6561]

1 hour ago, Lex said:

Well, that won't happen, but the Worth Street provision could certainly be used (if planned correctly).

Agreed; if you ran a new tunnel branching off the Worth St bellmouths diagonally you could connect to the City Hall lower level, then Fulton St, Hanover Sq, and Court St on the Brooklyn side. Also doing it that way clears the way for the  to run to Euclid as a secondary local service.

Edited May 5, 2020 by engineerboy6561

[Lex]

33 minutes ago, engineerboy6561 said:

Agreed; if you ran a new tunnel branching off the Worth St bellmouths diagonally you could connect to the City Hall lower level, then Fulton St, Hanover Sq, and Court St on the Brooklyn side. Also doing it that way clears the way for the  to run to Euclid as a secondary local service.

You caught on quickly.

[Theli11]

35 minutes ago, engineerboy6561 said:

Agreed; if you ran a new tunnel branching off the Worth St bellmouths diagonally you could connect to the City Hall lower level, then Fulton St, Hanover Sq, and Court St on the Brooklyn side. Also doing it that way clears the way for the  to run to Euclid as a secondary local service.

Assuming that we use the  on the express tracks to Lefferts Blvd? 

[engineerboy6561]

24 minutes ago, Theli11 said:

Assuming that we use the  on the express tracks to Lefferts Blvd? 

That would be one option; the way I would do it would be to send the  through the new tunnel as the 8 Av/Fulton local, and then build a Pitkin Av/133 Av connector to connect the  to the Rockaways directly, leave the  to take over the Liberty Av el as a local, and turn the  at a new Cross Bay Blvd station (you can get away with this because the interlocking at Euclid Av is designed so that trains can go directly from the el to either the express or the local tracks). Here's a rough map of how I'd do it:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/drive?state={"ids"%3A["1tHM4omxrUX_UnUfQ8r_TubpK8kLEInji"]%2C"action"%3A"open"%2C"userId"%3A"114356854643211448619"}&usp=sharing

By having the  and  share local duties you can push Fulton local up to 25-30tph peak, while leaving the  almost completely deinterlined; at that point it would only share tracks with the  from 59-145 Sts, and if the  stays capped at 10tph because of DeKalb Av nonsense you could push the  to 20tph peak (10 to Far Rock, 10 to Rock Park). 

Edited May 6, 2020 by engineerboy6561

[LGA Link N Train]

1 minute ago, engineerboy6561 said:

Map here

The map is not loading for me.

[engineerboy6561]

14 minutes ago, LaGuardia Link N Tra said:

The map is not loading for me.

Try it now? I just edited it.

In words, the basic idea is to add two new track segments:

1) A two-track tunnel via the Worth St bellmouths; this would swing down and connect with City Hall  lower level, before continuing mid-block between Broadway and Nassau Sts with a stop at Fulton St  , and swinging across to Hanover Sq (above planned  platform). A track connection would then tie the lower 2 Av line to the new tunnel that would connect to Court St IND and then to the Hoyt-Schermerhorn local tracks.  trains would stop at City Hall lower level, Fulton St, Hanover Sq upper level, Court St, all current local stops to Euclid, then all stops to Ozone Pk/Lefferts Bl.

2) A four-track segment continuing on from Euclid Av under Pitkin Av to 133 Av, then under 133 Av past Cross Bay Blvd and connected to the Rockaway line. Stops would be Euclid Av , 76 St , 84 St , and Cross Bay Blvd . Past Cross Bay Blvd a pair of tracks would drop down and swing over to connect to the Rockaway branch local tracks, while the remaining four tracks would be configured to allow  trains to relay the way  trains currently do at 71 Av/Forest Hills.

Doing it that way completely deinterlines the  from the  and frees the  up to run 15tph should we so choose, and the four-track continuation would also leave an option open for extending the line out to Springfield Gardens or St. Albans if we wanted to.

Edited May 6, 2020 by engineerboy6561

[Lex]

30 minutes ago, engineerboy6561 said:

Try it now? I just edited it.

In words, the basic idea is to add two new track segments:

1) A two-track tunnel via the Worth St bellmouths; this would swing down and connect with City Hall  lower level, before continuing mid-block between Broadway and Nassau Sts with a stop at Fulton St  , and swinging across to Hanover Sq (above planned  platform). A track connection would then tie the lower 2 Av line to the new tunnel that would connect to Court St IND and then to the Hoyt-Schermerhorn local tracks.  trains would stop at City Hall lower level, Fulton St, Hanover Sq upper level, Court St, all current local stops to Euclid, then all stops to Ozone Pk/Lefferts Bl.

2) A four-track segment continuing on from Euclid Av under Pitkin Av to 133 Av, then under 133 Av past Cross Bay Blvd and connected to the Rockaway line. Stops would be Euclid Av , 76 St , 84 St , and Cross Bay Blvd . Past Cross Bay Blvd a pair of tracks would drop down and swing over to connect to the Rockaway branch local tracks, while the remaining four tracks would be configured to allow  trains to relay the way  trains currently do at 71 Av/Forest Hills.

Doing it that way completely deinterlines the  from the  and frees the  up to run 15tph should we so choose, and the four-track continuation would also leave an option open for extending the line out to Springfield Gardens or St. Albans if we wanted to.

It's a little different from how I'd do it, but I actually don't hate it.

I'm not too sure if I like that Queens leg, though. It seems to meander a bit and rely on more residential areas that may not really exist (76th Street). In addition, I think Springfield Gardens and St. Albans would benefit more from LIRR and bus improvements than trying to have the subway somehow end up there (though I won't knock you for considering service there in the first place).

[engineerboy6561]

52 minutes ago, Lex said:

It's a little different from how I'd do it, but I actually don't hate it.

I'm not too sure if I like that Queens leg, though. It seems to meander a bit and rely on more residential areas that may not really exist (76th Street). In addition, I think Springfield Gardens and St. Albans would benefit more from LIRR and bus improvements than trying to have the subway somehow end up there (though I won't knock you for considering service there in the first place).

Gotcha; the Queens leg was there mostly because it satisfied a couple of constraints; it let me keep the  and the  completely separate (which is a key part of pushing  frequencies up enough to be respectable) and it avoided cutting service to any current stations. The alternatives to that leg would be to have a merge from Euclid to Rockaway Blvd (which at least partially defeats the point of separating the  and ), or having the new tunnel segment follow Conduit Av directly and drop service to Aqueduct Casino/Racetrack. 

As far as subway service to far SE Queens goes I disagree with you somewhat because of the fare structure on the LIRR; a lot of the areas around Linden and Merrick Blvds have household incomes under $65K/year, so getting subway access there would likely be a decent load off of a fair number of people's paychecks; a Zone 3 monthly is $234/mo, plus the $120 unlimited MetroCard. If you assume two working parents that's $708/mo (or about $8500/year) in commuting costs if you choose to go LIRR; an express subway into Manhattan from farther southeast than Jamaica would likely do those people much better.

I agree that the Fulton line likely isn't the best way into southeastern Queens, and my megapost (with corresponding map here) a few pages back mostly focuses on using a modified QBL and a completely rebuilt four-track Jamaica line to get 70tph (30 local, 45 express) into downtown and midtown from Jamaica, with 30 of those tph continuing on to SE Queens; I just like leaving options on the table when it comes to laying out trackage.

Edited May 6, 2020 by engineerboy6561

[Lex]

43 minutes ago, engineerboy6561 said:

As far as subway service to far SE Queens goes I disagree with you somewhat because of the fare structure on the LIRR; a lot of the areas around Linden and Merrick Blvds have household incomes under $65K/year, so getting subway access there would likely be a decent load off of a fair number of people's paychecks; a Zone 3 monthly is $234/mo, plus the $120 unlimited MetroCard. If you assume two working parents that's $708/mo (or about $8500/year) in commuting costs if you choose to go LIRR; an express subway into Manhattan from farther southeast than Jamaica would likely do those people much better.

As things currently stand, I wholeheartedly agree that the railroad (and express buses) would be far too costly and not really worth it. What I'd advocate for is making premium services (express buses and railroads) cost no more than double the local bus/subway fare within NYC, having free/discounted fares between the local bus/subway and express bus/railroad (yes, Metro-North will also get in on this), adding more railroad stations and building new tracks (for new connections), fare capping, and rerouting/creating local routes to fill in the gaps.

The fares for the express buses, Metro-North (as far as Tarrytown/White Plains/Port Chester), and LIRR (all short branches, Main Line to Mineola, Montauk Branch to Baldwin) will all match in order to be more affordable and foster reverse commutes.

[engineerboy6561]

7 hours ago, Lex said:

As things currently stand, I wholeheartedly agree that the railroad (and express buses) would be far too costly and not really worth it. What I'd advocate for is making premium services (express buses and railroads) cost no more than double the local bus/subway fare within NYC, having free/discounted fares between the local bus/subway and express bus/railroad (yes, Metro-North will also get in on this), adding more railroad stations and building new tracks (for new connections), fare capping, and rerouting/creating local routes to fill in the gaps.

The fares for the express buses, Metro-North (as far as Tarrytown/White Plains/Port Chester), and LIRR (all short branches, Main Line to Mineola, Montauk Branch to Baldwin) will all match in order to be more affordable and foster reverse commutes.

That would be awesome  I'd still be in favor of getting more tph farther into Eastern Queens on the subway (and I still think that the Jamaica line needs a full four-track rebuild, both to get more trains into Manhattan that are time-competitive with the  and because of the weight that would take off the  ), but a more affordable LIRR would help.

[Collin]

I've long thought that the Jamaica Line is in need of a serious upgrade.  It's one of the oldest lines in the system and not only is it slow, but it has a lot of choke points making it less efficient.  I've come up with a series of alternatives to upgrade the line.

 

Alternative 1:  Keep the full current route, consolidate stops, improve terminals and junctions.

Under this alternative, the full route of the line would remain the same.  Some stations would be consolidated.  Cleveland Street and Norwood Avenue would be consolidated to a new station at Shepherd Avenue.  Hewes Street and Lorimer Street would be consolidated to a new station at Union Avenue with a direct connection to the .

The Myrtle Avenue Junction would be rebuilt as a flying junction.  Trains going to the Myrtle Avenue Line would ramp up to the outside of the local tracks just after Flushing Avenue, go south on Lewis Avenue, and make a gradual turn onto Myrtle Avenue.  The upper level would be returned to service.  This would require demolishing some nearby buildings, but would reduce merge conflicts and allow for faster service since the curves would be much more gradual.

Jamaica Center would be upgraded as a terminal so that it could handle more than 12 tph.

The current service pattern would be maintained, but possible increased frequencies.

 

Alternative 2:  Partial replacement and reroute:

Under this alternative, the section of the line between Broadway Junction and Cypress Hills would be replaced with a new subway under Jamaica Avenue, eliminating the two sharp curves.  The new segment would be 2 tracks with provisions for a 3rd.  New stations would be built at Van Siclen Avenue, Cleveland Street (between Cleveland and Elton Streets), and Norwood Avenue (between Norwood Avenue and Logan Street), all configured local.  If an express track were to be added, Woodhaven Boulevard would be reconfigured to an express station.  A track connection would also be provided to the IND Fulton Street Line

The station consolidation of Hewes Street and Lorimer Street, Myrtle Avenue junction rebuild, and Jamaica Center terminal upgrade would also happen under this plan.

The service pattern with 2 tracks would remain the same, but with increased frequencies.

Service pattern with 3 tracks and Fulton connection:

:  Express service during rush hour, local other times.  8 tph

:  Local service from Broadway Junction.  8 tph.

:  Current service pattern.  12 tph

:  Fulton express to Broadway Junction, then Jamaica local, all times except late nights.  12 tph

:  Connected to Fulton local to replace .  12 tph.

 

Alternative 3:  Full Replacement

The entire line would be replaced with a subway.  4 tracks to Jamaica Center, and possible extension beyond.  The local tracks would continue to use the Williamsburg Bridge to Nassau Street, while the express tracks would be routed via a new tunnel to Second Avenue Lower East Side.  2nd Avenue services would replace the  over the Manhattan Bridge.

Service pattern:

:  Local to Broadway Junction.  20 tph

:  Express to Myrtle Avenue, then Myrtle Avenue Line.  12 tph

:  Express to Jamaica Center, possible further extension.  15 tph.

:  Fulton express to Broadway Junction, local to Jamaica Center.  12 tph.

:  Connected to Fulton local to replace .  12 tph.

[BreeddekalbL]

Since we are all concerned about capacity past Euclid what are the current numbers allowing for both trains past Euclid 

[Collin]

I believe it's 14-15 tph for all trains combined.  Highest frequency I can find on the  is 6 tph.  With 8th Avenue CBTC, I would think there could be 18 tph  and 12 tph .

[T to Dyre Avenue]

Assuming there’s as little merging between the  and  as possible. The current merging at Canal and Hoyt/Schermerhorn between  express and  local doesn’t lend itself very easily to 30 tph. CBTC isn’t going to be the cure-all for that. 

[bobtehpanda]

On 5/6/2020 at 4:17 PM, Collin said:

I've long thought that the Jamaica Line is in need of a serious upgrade.  It's one of the oldest lines in the system and not only is it slow, but it has a lot of choke points making it less efficient.  I've come up with a series of alternatives to upgrade the line.

 

Alternative 1:  Keep the full current route, consolidate stops, improve terminals and junctions.

Under this alternative, the full route of the line would remain the same.  Some stations would be consolidated.  Cleveland Street and Norwood Avenue would be consolidated to a new station at Shepherd Avenue.  Hewes Street and Lorimer Street would be consolidated to a new station at Union Avenue with a direct connection to the .

The Myrtle Avenue Junction would be rebuilt as a flying junction.  Trains going to the Myrtle Avenue Line would ramp up to the outside of the local tracks just after Flushing Avenue, go south on Lewis Avenue, and make a gradual turn onto Myrtle Avenue.  The upper level would be returned to service.  This would require demolishing some nearby buildings, but would reduce merge conflicts and allow for faster service since the curves would be much more gradual.

Jamaica Center would be upgraded as a terminal so that it could handle more than 12 tph.

The current service pattern would be maintained, but possible increased frequencies.

Alternative 2:  Partial replacement and reroute:

Under this alternative, the section of the line between Broadway Junction and Cypress Hills would be replaced with a new subway under Jamaica Avenue, eliminating the two sharp curves.  The new segment would be 2 tracks with provisions for a 3rd.  New stations would be built at Van Siclen Avenue, Cleveland Street (between Cleveland and Elton Streets), and Norwood Avenue (between Norwood Avenue and Logan Street), all configured local.  If an express track were to be added, Woodhaven Boulevard would be reconfigured to an express station.  A track connection would also be provided to the IND Fulton Street Line

The station consolidation of Hewes Street and Lorimer Street, Myrtle Avenue junction rebuild, and Jamaica Center terminal upgrade would also happen under this plan.

The service pattern with 2 tracks would remain the same, but with increased frequencies.

 

Alternative 3:  Full Replacement

The entire line would be replaced with a subway.  4 tracks to Jamaica Center, and possible extension beyond.  The local tracks would continue to use the Williamsburg Bridge to Nassau Street, while the express tracks would be routed via a new tunnel to Second Avenue Lower East Side.  2nd Avenue services would replace the  over the Manhattan Bridge.

Thoughts:

Alt 1: 

Probably the most realistic. 

Alt 2:

Where would you take such a line underground? And why would you go underground to go back up again a short distance away? You could build an el on Jamaica. If a three-track el is too big you could even build an express-track-only el and keep the existing alignment for local trains.

Alt 3:

Building a 4-track subway in 2020 is simply not happening. No city anywhere in the world has built a new 4-track subway from scratch in the last 50 years, and this is even before you consider NY's insane construction costs.

It's worth noting that Chicago evaluated similar options for its Red Line Modernization, and ended up going with improving the el and building flyovers.

 

[Jova42R]

WEST BRONX LIGHT RAIL

The Rationale

The West Bronx is rather underserved, with the  being the only subway line, all the way on Jerome Av. Therefore, the , the main bus line through the area is usually packed with people. In addition, there is the old ROW of the Croton Aqueduct, running right alongside University Av. So, this corridor has massive ridership potential (as seen from paced  buses), an already built ROW, and has no direct subway service. These are great criteria for a LRT line, so I think that it is warranted.

The Specifics

• Fleet
  • CAF Urbos 3
    • As there would not be catenary wires along 181 St (east of FW Av), the Urbos 3 is the best model to run.
• TPH
  • Rush: 15TPH
  • Non-rush: 10TPH
  • Overnight: 5TPH
• Yard
  • Half of Devoe Park becomes yard. All maintenance is done here, however there will be 2 layup tracks at 181 St for trams to lay up.

The Map

https://www.google.com/maps/d/drive?state={"ids"%3A["18Yvv-UrWQ1Qad6xwbRDq6O8akhjNjSu2"]%2C"action"%3A"open"%2C"userId"%3A"107668199648967475686"}&usp=sharing

 

Thoughts @T to Dyre Avenue @engineerboy6561 @Collin @BreeddekalbL?

 

[Trainmaster5]

17 minutes ago, Jova42R said:

WEST BRONX LIGHT RAIL

The Rationale

The West Bronx is rather underserved, with the  being the only subway line, all the way on Jerome Av. Therefore, the , the main bus line through the area is usually packed with people. In addition, there is the old ROW of the Croton Aqueduct, running right alongside University Av. So, this corridor has massive ridership potential (as seen from paced  buses), an already built ROW, and has no direct subway service. These are great criteria for a LRT line, so I think that it is warranted.

The Specifics

• Fleet
  • CAF Urbos 3
    • As there would not be catenary wires along 181 St (east of FW Av), the Urbos 3 is the best model to run.
• TPH
  • Rush: 15TPH
  • Non-rush: 10TPH
  • Overnight: 5TPH
• Yard
  • Half of Devoe Park becomes yard. All maintenance is done here, however there will be 2 layup tracks at 181 St for trams to lay up.

The Map

https://www.google.com/maps/d/drive?state={"ids"%3A["18Yvv-UrWQ1Qad6xwbRDq6O8akhjNjSu2"]%2C"action"%3A"open"%2C"userId"%3A"107668199648967475686"}&usp=sharing

 

Thoughts @T to Dyre Avenue @engineerboy6561 @Collin @BreeddekalbL?

 

Re: your first sentence. Doesn’t the  travel in the West Bronx too ? Am I missing something ? Just curious. Carry on.

[T to Dyre Avenue]

On 5/5/2020 at 8:51 PM, engineerboy6561 said:

That would be one option; the way I would do it would be to send the  through the new tunnel as the 8 Av/Fulton local, and then build a Pitkin Av/133 Av connector to connect the  to the Rockaways directly, leave the  to take over the Liberty Av el as a local, and turn the  at a new Cross Bay Blvd station (you can get away with this because the interlocking at Euclid Av is designed so that trains can go directly from the el to either the express or the local tracks). Here's a rough map of how I'd do it:

 

By having the  and  share local duties you can push Fulton local up to 25-30tph peak, while leaving the  almost completely deinterlined; at that point it would only share tracks with the  from 59-145 Sts, and if the  stays capped at 10tph because of DeKalb Av nonsense you could push the  to 20tph peak (10 to Far Rock, 10 to Rock Park). 

So then Fulton Local (the  and  ) would have more frequent service than 2nd Avenue below 63rd St (just the )? Or will there be at least one other SAS service joining the  south of 63rd?

[engineerboy6561]

23 minutes ago, T to Dyre Avenue said:

So then Fulton Local (the  and  ) would have more frequent service than 2nd Avenue below 63rd St (just the )? Or will there be at least one other SAS service joining the  south of 63rd?

Ideally there would be more to 2 Av than just the ; the 2 Av subway really should be paired with a revamp of the Jamaica Line. In an ideal world where I had a few billion dollars to play with, 2 Av would be four tracks from 125 St to Houston and the Jamaica line would be a four-track subway. In that scenario 2 Av would carry 40-60tph from 125 to Houston and 15tph from Houston south, Jamaica would carry 30-60 tph and Fulton would carry 40ish tph. I put together a megapost on what that would look like a while back.

Edited May 10, 2020 by engineerboy6561

[Collin]

12 hours ago, bobtehpanda said:

Alt 2:

Where would you take such a line underground? And why would you go underground to go back up again a short distance away? You could build an el on Jamaica. If a three-track el is too big you could even build an express-track-only el and keep the existing alignment for local trains.

Alt 3:

Building a 4-track subway in 2020 is simply not happening. No city anywhere in the world has built a new 4-track subway from scratch in the last 50 years, and this is even before you consider NY's insane construction costs.

 

 

Alt 2:  I figured that NIMBY opposition to a new el would just be too great, even though that would be a far cheaper option.  New el construction (similar to Airtrain) would be a lot less noisy at street level, but try telling that to people who live right next to it.  I wonder if that would make the Fulton line connection impossible.  I consider that an important part of improving Jamaica Line service.  I would think that with Alt 2 improvements, the local ride would me made of similar length to the current skip-stop ride.  That would mean that skip stop service could be ditched in favor of a zone express.  Obviously the whole line would need to be 3 tracks and the question is what would the express stations be.  The new Union Street station in both Alt 1 and 2 would be configured local.  I think Woodhaven Boulevard is an obvious choice to be an express station.  Though my earlier plan called for all new stations being configured local, I think the new Norwood Avenue station should be express since it would replace the current Norwood Avenue and Crescent Street stations which combined have pretty high ridership relative to other Jamaica Line stations.  This would provide a really good express service which would take a lot of people off the .  

Alt 3:  While an outlandish idea, I think it's a defeatist attitude to say that it can never happen.  With enough money it can.  The question is whether NYC construction costs could ever be brought down to reasonable levels.  It's ridiculous to think that in the 1920's and 1930's, we could build subways better than today.

[bobtehpanda]

4 hours ago, Collin said:

Alt 3:  While an outlandish idea, I think it's a defeatist attitude to say that it can never happen.  With enough money it can.  The question is whether NYC construction costs could ever be brought down to reasonable levels.  It's ridiculous to think that in the 1920's and 1930's, we could build subways better than today.

It isn't defeatist to note that no major city anywhere in the world has built a new four-track subway since the '40s. China hasn't, Japan hasn't, Europe hasn't. And all of those have poured billions of dollars into studying it.

The major issue with building a four track subway, is that you could use the same amount of money to build a two track subway twice the length. Broadway is not even the first corridor that should be prioritized for a two-track subway extension, and a four-track instead of two-track Jamaica Line replacement is a two track subway not going down Hillside, Northern, SE Queens, 3rd Av, or Utica, to name a few.

[Collin]

2nd Avenue is in far more need of a 4 track line than Jamaica because without it, you don't have the routes that could be used to provide additional outer borough service.  Personally, I think Alt 2 is the best balance of cost and improvement.  Local service becomes faster than it is now, and there are ways to provide more options like a true express service, and a connection to the Fulton Street Line.  To extend beyond Jamaica, I believe a full replacement of the existing line with a 4 track subway is the only option.  Without full time express service, the travel time would just be too long.  Imagine if the Fulton line wasn't 4 tracks and all the trains to the Rockaways had to make EVERY stop.  The closest thing currently to that in the system would be the  and .  There are 25 stops on the  before it finally goes express at 96th Street.  While the  has rush hour express service from East 180th Street, it only goes to Lexington Avenue, so most people are stuck with slow local service.  The  has 26 stops before it gets to a point where any express service along the same line is available, unless you're lucky to get one of the  trips.  What both routes have in common is that their customers have some of the longest commutes in the city.

[Deucey]

1 hour ago, bobtehpanda said:

The major issue with building a four track subway, is that you could use the same amount of money to build a two track subway twice the length. Broadway is not even the first corridor that should be prioritized for a two-track subway extension, and a four-track instead of two-track Jamaica Line replacement is a two track subway not going down Hillside, Northern, SE Queens, 3rd Av, or Utica, to name a few.

I always figured it was because of the QBL effect - that express/local setups lead to underutilization of local trains and over utilization of Express trains outside CBDs.