Department of Subways - Proposals/Ideas

[Robert Spire]

14 minutes ago, MTA Researcher said:

I want my Broadway Express  in Astoria. Why not do a 57 St/7 Av Flip like in my proposal?

Because the BMT 63rd Street tracks feed the express tracks. This avoids a merge. 

[MTA Researcher]

44 minutes ago, Robert Spire said:

Because the BMT 63rd Street tracks feed the express tracks. This avoids a merge. 

This can be solved by rearranging the track feeds:

Bway Exp feeds into 60 St

Bway Lcl feeds into 63 St

 

i just find it to be a waste of good Bway Exp service if north of 57 st it goes local…

2 Av is seriously flawed…

[Wallyhorse]

22 hours ago, MTA Researcher said:

I want my Broadway Express  in Astoria. Why not do a 57 St/7 Av Flip like in my proposal?

I think the problem has to do with the reverse southbound.  They need to put in punch boxes at 5th Avenue-59th that would allow the to go express from 57th-7th south since the merge north can occur after 57/7 as it is without issues.  

[MTA Researcher]

3 hours ago, Wallyhorse said:

I think the problem has to do with the reverse southbound.  They need to put in punch boxes at 5th Avenue-59th that would allow the to go express from 57th-7th south since the merge north can occur after 57/7 as it is without issues.

Wally, thank you for advocating!

[darkstar8983]

Reading all these new routes I think I’d be able to understand easier if there was a map drawn

[TMC]

On 8/31/2023 at 2:51 PM, Amiri the subway guy said:

So according to your logic, we should just cancel the 2nd avenue project all because the  merges with the  and will merge with the future ? Or the Utica avenue and Rockway branches studies should just be burned because those respective routes merge with each other? mAkE “CoMPlEtE SEsNe”!🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️(Sarcasm)

Maybe not cancel, but they become less valuable, because people are attracted to frequency and reliability (reliability is more important though)

[TMC]

On 9/10/2023 at 12:22 PM, MTA Researcher said:

I want my Broadway Express  in Astoria. Why not do a 57 St/7 Av Flip like in my proposal?

Lots of concrete for little benefit, express or not doesn’t matter. 

[CenSin]

What potentially cheap physical changes using already existing infrastructure would massively increase the quality of commutes during common planned changes (especially on the weekends)? I can think of 3 which are low-hanging fruit.

• Between 7 Avenue and Atlantic Avenue–Barclays Center: A switch added to facilitate termination of trains between Atlantic Avenue–Barclays Center and Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue. There is already a provision for switches there, and planning work that cuts Brighton off from Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn is frequent.
• East of 4 Avenue–9 Street: A switch in each direction between the local and express tracks to allow for transfers between 4 Avenue local trains and Culver trains when the planned work is northwest of the station. The tunnel portion for a few hundred feet isn’t under street level or even any buildings, but actually an above-ground tunnel with a parking lot for a roof. Removing columns here isn’t as much of a problem as removing them from under an occupied building.
• West of Marcy Avenue: Switches for turning back trains so people can connect to the bus terminal by Marcy Avenue when the Willamsburg Bridge is out-of-service.

[Lawrence St]

14 minutes ago, CenSin said:

What potentially cheap physical changes using already existing infrastructure would massively increase the quality of commutes during common planned changes (especially on the weekends)? I can think of 3 which are low-hanging fruit.

• Between 7 Avenue and Atlantic Avenue–Barclays Center: A switch added to facilitate termination of trains between Atlantic Avenue–Barclays Center and Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue. There is already a provision for switches there, and planning work that cuts Brighton off from Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn is frequent.
• East of 4 Avenue–9 Street: A switch in each direction between the local and express tracks to allow for transfers between 4 Avenue local trains and Culver trains when the planned work is northwest of the station. The tunnel portion for a few hundred feet isn’t under street level or even any buildings, but actually an above-ground tunnel with a parking lot for a roof. Removing columns here isn’t as much of a problem as removing them from under an occupied building.
• West of Marcy Avenue: Switches for turning back trains so people can connect to the bus terminal by Marcy Avenue when the Willamsburg Bridge is out-of-service.

Doesn’t Marcy Ave already have switches?

[CyclonicTrainLookout]

2 hours ago, Lawrence St said:

Doesn’t Marcy Ave already have switches?

Probably means switches west of the station which would allow trains to relay to the eastbound platform and start service there rather than have passengers play "guess the platform" for the next train to leave Marcy Avenue with the current switches.

[darkstar8983]

15 hours ago, CyclonicTrainLookout said:

Probably means switches west of the station which would allow trains to relay to the eastbound platform and start service there rather than have passengers play "guess the platform" for the next train to leave Marcy Avenue with the current switches.

 not necessary, you could just assign one track for the  and one for the  and make sure the trains are properly alternating before they enter Myrtle Av

[CenSin]

21 hours ago, CyclonicTrainLookout said:

Probably means switches west of the station which would allow trains to relay to the eastbound platform and start service there rather than have passengers play "guess the platform" for the next train to leave Marcy Avenue with the current switches.

There’s no free transfer between platforms at Marcy Avenue. If you walk up to the wrong platform and the train just left, you’re waiting until the train on the other track leaves and the one after that train before you are moving. An alternate change would be to install an underpass.

[LGA Link N Train]

Simple one but not much merit to it.

Re-Open and Refurbish the Abandoned Mezzanine of 21st-Van Alst on the  Line. Extra Set of Cameras to keep an eye on the South Side of the station.

[MTA Researcher]

Hypothesis Question:

 

Would Brighton Folks prefer 2 Av over 6 Av?

 

A potential proposal I’m currently contemplating upon Manhattan Bridge and Williamsburg Bridge Wise is as follows:

Manhattan Bridge Trains

 as is except that now skips 49 St

 71 Av - 95 St: QBL Local via 60 St - Bway/4 Av Express stopping at 45 and 53 Sts

 Co-Op city - CI: Bronx Local - 2 Av Express - Brighton Local

  via Brighton Express

Williamsburg Bridge Trains

 168 - Bway Jct: CPW Lcl - 6 Av/Jamaica Exp

 BPB/145 - JC: Concourse/CPW Lcl - 6 Av/Jamaica Exp

  Metro Av - Broad St: Nassau St Local

 

I will say more, but for now this is a tip of the iceberg.

[Kamen Rider]

well, problem #1 with that...  Who's serving 205th street? 

 

The direct Mikey up 6th avenue is popular with riders. Then again, 95% of these sorts of plans involve, for lack of a better wat to put it, "robbing Peter to pay Paul" in some fashion. 

[MTA Researcher]

1 hour ago, Kamen Rider said:

Who's serving 205th street? 

Glad you asked. Here’s the full proposal:

 

 207 - Lefferts: CPW/8 Av/Fulton St Exp via Cranberry St Tunnel

 205 - Far Rock: Concourse/CPW/8 Av/Fulton St Exp

 JC - Euclid Av: QBL Exp, 53 St, 8 Av/Fulton St Lcl via new Tunnel south of WTC that would connect to abandoned Hoyt St Local tracks and continue via Fulton St Local

 and  already mentioned

  179 - CI: As is with potential for more Culver Exp 

 extended to 71 Av

 R.I.P

  Already mentioned

 and  already mentioned

  125  - CI: 2 Av/Bway/4 Av Lcl via Montague St Tunnel and West End

 and  already mentioned

 

If   to 71 Av is bad; then check this out:

Turquoise Q train: 71 Av - BB: QBL Lcl - 2 Av/Brighton Exp via North Side of Manhattan bridge along with  , thus absorbing  .

[Z] Fordham Plaza - Hanover Sq: via Bronx/ 2 Av Lcl in which case:  via Bronx Exp

The  and Turquoise Z would go via 3rd Av in Bronx

 

Well this is what is currently in my mind. Tell me your thoughts

[Kamen Rider]

Yeah… um… reading that… as a transit worker… specifically RTO… yeah you don’t want to know my thoughts. 

 

At all…

[LGA Link N Train]

On 9/27/2023 at 10:38 PM, Kamen Rider said:

Yeah… um… reading that… as a transit worker… specifically RTO… yeah you don’t want to know my thoughts. 

 

At all…

I do. 

[CenSin]

You know how cute young kids can be when they are pretending to be cashiers with their toy cash registers/monopoly money or professors in a classroom? Then they occasionally have momentarily rational outbursts (e.g., about investing or publishing a research paper) that fall apart when you poke even gently. Those vibes…

[LGA Link N Train]

On 9/27/2023 at 10:23 PM, MTA Researcher said:

Glad you asked. Here’s the full proposal:

 

 207 - Lefferts: CPW/8 Av/Fulton St Exp via Cranberry St Tunnel

 205 - Far Rock: Concourse/CPW/8 Av/Fulton St Exp

 JC - Euclid Av: QBL Exp, 53 St, 8 Av/Fulton St Lcl via new Tunnel south of WTC that would connect to abandoned Hoyt St Local tracks and continue via Fulton St Local

 and  already mentioned

  179 - CI: As is with potential for more Culver Exp 

 extended to 71 Av

 R.I.P

  Already mentioned

 and  already mentioned

  125  - CI: 2 Av/Bway/4 Av Lcl via Montague St Tunnel and West End

 and  already mentioned

 

If   to 71 Av is bad; then check this out:

Turquoise Q train: 71 Av - BB: QBL Lcl - 2 Av/Brighton Exp via North Side of Manhattan bridge along with  , thus absorbing  .

[Z] Fordham Plaza - Hanover Sq: via Bronx/ 2 Av Lcl in which case:  via Bronx Exp

The  and Turquoise Z would go via 3rd Av in Bronx

 

Well this is what is currently in my mind. Tell me your thoughts

Alrighty, I’ve decided that I’ll throw my own 2 cents into the matter.

I’ll start with CPW first since that’s the easiest thing to comprehend here. I see you’ve taken the Liberty to Deinterline 59th Street. While I’m not entirely opposed to the idea, it goes against the IND’s Design Philosophy when it comes to the design of their track Layouts and what not, at least you compensate by providing both 8th and 6th Service to both Branches north of 145th and 8th. Would be a shame if nothing Served 50th Upper Level though….
 

The  Line…. WTC/Hudson Terminal’s position is at the same Grade Level as Cortlandt Street on the  Lines, so this means you’ll have to either bore a new tunnel under Church Street or royally screw over Broadway Local Riders in order to get the  to connect to Fulton Local. Honestly any plan involving adding a new East River Tube to Fulton Local should either involve Whitehall or SAS. Anything other than that is overkill.

Credit where Credit is due, at least you didn’t Squeeze all of 8th Avenue into the Cranberry Tubes.

QBL and 6th Avenue…. I’m assuming you want to increase  Service by Sending the back to Nassau and having the  take over QB Local with the  . A big point I want to address here. 

• While travel between the outer boroughs has been steadily increasing since COVID, I’m not sure if Ridership is high enough to replace the  with the . Not to mention that 53rd Street would be getting a Service Cut under this proposal, given that it has a much higher demand compared to 63rd Street, that is a Non-Starter.

Now for BMT East. There’s quite a bit happening here that I disagree with.

Its important to remember that due to the Infrastructure surrounding the Williamsburg Bridge, we’re working with a hard Capacity Limit of 24 TPH. Which means we can’t do too much here.

You have your  Train to Broadway Junction, your  Train to Parsons/Archer and your  to Metro via Nassau…. If we wanna get 24 TPH, you’d need:

: 6 (minimum) 

: 6

: 12

Okay Fair Enough although you’d need to play with Myrtle Junction, and Expand some platforms here and there. The Cost;Benefit Ratio of this I don’t believe is high enough to justify this especially when the problems with the  lies more within its infrastructure rather than the Route itself. 6th Avenue is popular with BMT East but not enough to Justify rebuilding Chrystie Street. Speaking of which:

Your SAS proposal with the  leans too heavily with Fantasyland which makes it hard for me to take Seriously.

Also Bronx doesn’t really NEED a 3rd Avenue Subway. Many railfans propose that just to right an old wrong when the nearby Metro North Corridor on Park Avenue has a lot of Untapped Potential. I do agree with Subway Service to Co-Op City but that’s better achieved by sending the  Up there (or if you wanna be fancy, send the  past 205th to Co-Op city given that 205th was never intended to be a Terminal in the first place)

Now Broadway…. If you’re going to Propose the 57th Street Flip, then I would leave the  on 2nd Avenue or the  in Bay Ridge. If any Service is going to get the Boot on Broadway, it will be the  first. Also Deinterlining DeKalb loses all merit when SAS replace’s 6th Avenue. While I understand that the current Plans for SAS lack GOOD transfers with other lines, sending it to South Brooklyn at the expense of the  and  isn’t a good idea. 
 

All in all, I DO take lots of issues with this proposal as you’re tampering with a lot of things that don’t need to be tampered with.

[TMC]

On 10/1/2023 at 4:05 PM, LGA Link N Train said:

Honestly any plan involving adding a new East River Tube to Fulton Local should either involve Whitehall or SAS. Anything other than that is overkill.

I want to like these kinds of proposals, but Fulton isn’t at capacity yet. It doesn’t really need an entire trunk’s worth of capacity. 

[Teban54]

2 hours ago, TMC said:

I want to like these kinds of proposals, but Fulton isn’t at capacity yet. It doesn’t really need an entire trunk’s worth of capacity. 

Newcomer here, so please correct me if I'm wrong.

Isn't the only reason why Fulton isn't at capacity because both its express and local feed into the Cranberry St tunnel, which is at capacity?

 

If another trunk under East River is connected to Fulton St local, not only does it boost service at the local stations - where the 's frequency is terrible today (and may be suppressing ridership) - but it allows better headways to all the terminals, since you can have on Fulton express to Lefferts and dedicated to Far Rockaway.

[CenSin]

2 hours ago, Teban54 said:

but it allows better headways to all the terminals, since you can have on Fulton express to Lefferts and dedicated to Far Rockaway.

You could have the dedicated to Ozone at Park and leave the dedicated to the Rockaways now. The problem is that folks at Ozone Park prefer to wait longer for less service than to be served trains at more normal frequencies.

[TMC]

On 10/14/2023 at 12:51 PM, Teban54 said:

Isn't the only reason why Fulton isn't at capacity because both its express and local feed into the Cranberry St tunnel, which is at capacity?

Yes, but Cranberry is reverse-branched, so it's not truly at capacity. Crowding is also not high on the Fulton Street Line on average, although inconsistencies in scheduling and low frequencies might affect crowding on individual trains. Cranberry tops out at 24 TPH when it should really be doing 30 TPH, which is solvable through de-interlining. This would allow an even split of 15 TPH running express, and 15 TPH running local along Fulton Street. Nothing more is needed, due to a parallel regional rail corridor existing, which could be improved upon to cheat in an additional 24 TPH. Adding an additional trunk is an additional cost for a capacity issue that is fixable for far cheaper, and the fact that Fulton Street isn't strong enough of a line to need 60 TPH (30 TPH local, 30 TPH express). 

Edited October 21, 2023 by TMC
Additional detail added

[ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ]

On 10/20/2023 at 11:10 PM, TMC said:

Yes, but Cranberry is reverse-branched, so it's not truly at capacity. Crowding is also not high on the Fulton Street Line on average, although inconsistencies in scheduling and low frequencies might affect crowding on individual trains. Cranberry tops out at 24 TPH when it should really be doing 30 TPH, which is solvable through de-interlining. This would allow an even split of 15 TPH running express, and 15 TPH running local along Fulton Street. Nothing more is needed, due to a parallel regional rail corridor existing, which could be improved upon to cheat in an additional 24 TPH. Adding an additional trunk is an additional cost for a capacity issue that is fixable for far cheaper, and the fact that Fulton Street isn't strong enough of a line to need 60 TPH (30 TPH local, 30 TPH express). 

I always think of an alternate reality where Brooklyn grew to be much denser and Fulton St was somewhat akin to Queens Blvd. A new tunnel in Manhattan would've needed to have been built, my guess is using the existing Court St station. It's just weird to think how both IND Fulton St line and IND QBLVD line are both quad-tracked IND lines in the outer-boroughs, yet they've diverged so much in terms of ridership.

 

So much of the Fulton St line feels like an errie liminal space

Edited October 22, 2023 by ABCDEFGJLMNQRSSSWZ