Rockaway Beach Branch

[officiallyliam]

5 minutes ago, Lawrence St said:

MTA really dosent pay attention when it comes to the Rockaway Line South of Broad Channel. Heck, they're are still old signs there depicting the terminates at 59th Street when it originates from Rockaway Park.

Another thing, why was the the line chosen to operate to Far Rockaway at all times? Wouldn't the from Far Rockaway to Broad Channel be more sensible?

The Far Rockaway branch has much higher off-peak ridership than the Rockaway Park branch. The Far Rockaway terminus is in the middle of a downtown commercial district (meaning more jobs) and is also surrounded by denser housing than the Rockaway Park end, which is much more suburban.

In short, the Far Rockaway branch would be underserved by just the .

[RR503]

8 hours ago, bobtehpanda said:

Which yard was Yard A? Perhaps we should look into building a yard at, say, Hicksville or Belmont Park. 

Also, alternate compliance is a new rule essentially allowing compliance for the rest of the world's trains.

Yard A is the northwestern area of Sunnyside Yards. Back when the LIRR received most of its freight via carfloat interchange at Hunters Pt, cars would be taken from the float yard to Yard A (which had a hump), and then either dispatched directly to industries between LIC and Holban via Yard A/Fresh Pond based locals, or sent to Holban (which was also a hump yard) where they'd be classified by LI destination. Fresh Pond was just the interchange yard for New Haven traffic and the assembly point for traffic to/from the Bushwick Branch. (Holban, FYI, was where the current Hillside Facility is now). 

As for finding more yard space, that's a....challenge -- one that actually has been labored at for a while now. The destruction of Yard A (which had honestly lost most of its value in its final years with the decline in industry and the loss of the carfloat connection in LIC) was mitigated with the construction of Blissville along the Lower Montauk Branch. While that added some car capacity back, it faces the same problem as Yard A in that it isn't a useful facility. Ever since the Main Line cutoff went down, you can't route freight from the Hell Gate through Harold to the Cutoff to Blissville -- the Cutoff takes you just to A -- so all traffic that Blissville handles has to come via Fresh Pond. Sure, you can use it as overflow for FP (which is how NYA used it until WM came along), but given that it isn't providing any alternate handling facilities for freight entering the island, it isn't changing effective system capacity. In short, without sending freight through Harold via the MLC again, Fresh Pond will by merit of its geography be the place for the handling freight entering the island. Any solution to this mess, consequently, must address not the actual amount of yard capacity on the Island, but the way cars get to said yards.

So let's talk freight demographics for a sec. NYA's traffic is split pretty evenly between NYC bound freight and LI bound freight. Within NYC freight, you have LMB freight and Bushwick freight, a mildly unimportant distinction given that the same crews switch both lines.

Among LI freight, the distinctions are more important. The LI lines are broken down into three groups, each which gets its own train. You have freight on the Central Branch, which is served by RS40/41, freight on the Main Line between Pond and Pine Aire which gets from RS80/81, and freight on the Main Line east of Pine Aire, which gets through-routed to/from Pine Aire on RS50/51, and then delivered on RS70/71. 

For all destinations, however, the origin of this freight is overwhelmingly CSX (NYNJ has been growing, but still has a long way to go until it's matching the 70+ car Y101s that roll over the Hell Gate each AM, and P&W is functionally just more CSX traffic in terms of routing). Thus, the issue isn't even as much with Fresh Pond as it is with CSX. CSX's main freight facility is Oak Point Yard in the Bronx. From that yard, it dispatches a nightly road train to Selkirk, locals to Darien, Mount Vernon and Hunts Point Market, and a daily transfer job to Fresh Pond. Needless to say, the yard has little capacity to spare, but luckily, there's room to expand in the south. In the 80s or 90s (can't remember which) NYEDC built an intermodal yard at Harlem River. The southern part of the HR facility became the Waste Management trash transload, but the northern part -- never having recieved any customers -- remains an empty, weed-choked intermodal pad.

If we were to convert that space into a sort of Oak Point south, and make that the CSX arrival/departure yard, Oak Point north would have capacity to spare -- capacity that could be used for helping the situation on LI. Instead of just sorting cars into the aforementioned CSX trains, Oak Point (assuming a partnership between NYA, CSX, and P&W) could either pre-block or directly dispatch the LI RS locals, taking a massive load off of Fresh Pond (it doesn't make sense for OP to do the same with NYC stuff -- FP is just too convenient as a squirrel hole while switching). Even better would be if NYA could gain control of Oak Point entirely, as then all NYC freight ops save for the NYNJ would be under one roof, making dispatching *that* much easier.

This dispatching of LI freight from OP would require a run-around move at FP, but even still, taking a set of locos around a train at FP upper is nowhere near as impactful as having to break down an entire transfer freight and stone train there. The RX would have a clear path. And if you want there to be no need for the runaround move, you can always rebuild the Main Line cutoff, which would allow freights to run directly into LI from the Bronx via Harold. 

 

That compliance doc is quite interesting -- thanks for posting! Knew they were working on it, but never had seen that before. 

4 hours ago, T to Dyre Avenue said:

I’ll agree with most of what you’re saying here. But in response to the bolded part - not exactly. There are some existing subway lines the RX would miss because it intersects those lines just out of reach. In Jackson Heights, the rail line misses the  at 74th-Broadway/Roosevelt Ave, as it is located roughly midway between Roosevelt and 65th on the  and just out of reach of 69th St on the . Fortunately, this could be mitigated by having the RX deviate from the rail line into a short subway that could allow for an easy connection to the , possibly by utilizing the never-used upper level platforms and connecting tunnels at Roosevelt. On Vanshnookenragen’s website, he shows how that could be done. 

In Brooklyn, the rail line misses the  by intersecting 4th Ave by running in between 65th St and Shore Road (midway between the Bay Ridge Ave and 59th St stops). It also misses the  by intersecting McDonald Ave roughly midway between 18th Ave and Avenue I. I’m not saying it’s impossible to build connections to those lines, but it will likely require some deviations off the rail line to make them.  The connection to the  at Ditmars-Astoria is another story. With the existing rail line on a super-high concrete arch over the subway there, I’m not really sure how structurally sound it would be to add side platforms to a concrete arch, then connect them to a single narrow island platform with elevator shafts and staircases. And in a very built up area. It might not be feasible and we may have to forgo a connection to the . 

12

I wouldn't sweat the distance between the RX and Roosevelt. It's only about 550 feet -- ie less than 14th/6th to 14/7th, or 42/7 to 42/8. That said, routing trains to Roosevelt UL is certainly intriguing. 

As for the , those are both issues, yes. I honestly can't see an easy way to finagle a connection with the unless you're willing to build a new station on the unused trackways, but the doesn't seem that bad. The distance from the RX ROW to Avenue I is about 400 feet -- hardly some insurmountable distance. If you're willing to accept a bit more distance, the remains of the Parkville SBK interchange track still exist in the form of a parking lot. You could easily build a passage under there. 

And as for the , I'm honestly unsure as to whether it's necessary to build the RX north of Jackson Heights. The areas of the BX served by it aren't high density economically or residentially, and Astoria would be a bloody terrible terminal.

7 hours ago, LGA Link N train said:

Comparing transit projects against one another ain't no way to evaluate transit expansion son. 

No, son, it is the only way to do so.

Money doesn't grow on trees, so you have to prioritize. And sadly, the RBB doesn't have what it takes to be anywhere near the top of that list. 

 

Apologies for the endless post. 

Edited February 22, 2018 by RR503

[officiallyliam]

38 minutes ago, RR503 said:

I wouldn't sweat the distance between the RX and Roosevelt. It's only about 550 feet -- ie less than 14th/6th to 14/7th, or 42/7 to 42/8. That said, routing trains to Roosevelt UL is certainly intriguing. 

As for the , those are both issues, yes. I honestly can't see an easy way to finagle a connection with the unless you're willing to build a new station on the unused trackways, but the doesn't seem that bad. The distance from the RX ROW to Avenue I is about 400 feet -- hardly some insurmountable distance. If you're willing to accept a bit more distance, the remains of the Parkville SBK interchange track still exist in the form of a parking lot. You could easily build a passage under there. 

And as for the , I'm honestly unsure as to whether it's necessary to build the RX north of Jackson Heights. The areas of the BX served by it aren't high density economically or residentially, and Astoria would be a bloody terrible terminal.

I would use upper Roosevelt as a terminal for the first phase of Rx, and as a branch after my proposed second phase.

The problem with Roosevelt UL is that you can get in, but I don't think you can get out - the tracks stub-end facing the mezzanine around 75th St, making it impossible to go west from the upper level. The Astoria station will be an engineering challenge, no question, but not impossible. Instead of sending the RX towards Co-Op City as the RPA wants to do (which, as you said, isn't running though a very desirable area for a transit extension), I'd send the line towards The Hub using part of the old Port Morris Branch. RX trains would come over the Hell Gate, swing left into the Port Morris Branch under St. Mary's Park, then connect it to a short new tunnel under 149th. The RX tracks would arrive on the outside of the platforms, creating a cross-platform transfer from the RX to Manhattan-bound trains.

A map below to visualize:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/zhotz4uq76blrt0/Triboro_BronxPhase.jpg?dl=0

[bobtehpanda]

8 hours ago, LGA Link N train said:

Comparing transit projects against one another ain't no way to evaluate transit expansion son. 

I'm sorry, are you going to provide your own damn money to build this thing? We've got to make sure we can use what money we have.

[bobtehpanda]

1 hour ago, RR503 said:

Yard A is the northwestern area of Sunnyside Yards. Back when the LIRR received most of its freight via carfloat interchange at Hunters Pt, cars would be taken from the float yard to Yard A (which had a hump), and then either dispatched directly to industries between LIC and Holban via Yard A/Fresh Pond based locals, or sent to Holban (which was also a hump yard) where they'd be classified by LI destination. Fresh Pond was just the interchange yard for New Haven traffic and the assembly point for traffic to/from the Bushwick Branch. (Holban, FYI, was where the current Hillside Facility is now). 

As for finding more yard space, that's a....challenge -- one that actually has been labored at for a while now. The destruction of Yard A (which had honestly lost most of its value in its final years with the decline in industry and the loss of the carfloat connection in LIC) was mitigated with the construction of Blissville along the Lower Montauk Branch. While that added some car capacity back, it faces the same problem as Yard A in that it isn't a useful facility. Ever since the Main Line cutoff went down, you can't route freight from the Hell Gate through Harold to the Cutoff to Blissville -- the Cutoff takes you just to A -- so all traffic that Blissville handles has to come via Fresh Pond. Sure, you can use it as overflow for FP (which is how NYA used it until WM came along), but given that it isn't providing any alternate handling facilities for freight entering the island, it isn't changing effective system capacity. In short, without sending freight through Harold via the MLC again, Fresh Pond will by merit of its geography be the place for the handling freight entering the island. Any solution to this mess, consequently, must address not the actual amount of yard capacity on the Island, but the way cars get to said yards.

So let's talk freight demographics for a sec. NYA's traffic is split pretty evenly between NYC bound freight and LI bound freight. Within NYC freight, you have LMB freight and Bushwick freight, a mildly unimportant distinction given that the same crews switch both lines.

Among LI freight, the distinctions are more important. The LI lines are broken down into three groups, each which gets its own train. You have freight on the Central Branch, which is served by RS40/41, freight on the Main Line between Pond and Pine Aire which gets from RS80/81, and freight on the Main Line east of Pine Aire, which gets through-routed to/from Pine Aire on RS50/51, and then delivered on RS70/71. 

For all destinations, however, the origin of this freight is overwhelmingly CSX (NYNJ has been growing, but still has a long way to go until it's matching the 70+ car Y101s that roll over the Hell Gate each AM, and P&W is functionally just more CSX traffic in terms of routing). Thus, the issue isn't even as much with Fresh Pond as it is with CSX. CSX's main freight facility is Oak Point Yard in the Bronx. From that yard, it dispatches a nightly road train to Selkirk, locals to Darien, Mount Vernon and Hunts Point Market, and a daily transfer job to Fresh Pond. Needless to say, the yard has little capacity to spare, but luckily, there's room to expand in the south. In the 80s or 90s (can't remember which) NYEDC built an intermodal yard at Harlem River. The southern part of the HR facility became the Waste Management trash transload, but the northern part -- never having recieved any customers -- remains an empty, weed-choked intermodal pad.

If we were to convert that space into a sort of Oak Point south, and make that the CSX arrival/departure yard, Oak Point north would have capacity to spare -- capacity that could be used for helping the situation on LI. Instead of just sorting cars into the aforementioned CSX trains, Oak Point (assuming a partnership between NYA, CSX, and P&W) could either pre-block or directly dispatch the LI RS locals, taking a massive load off of Fresh Pond (it doesn't make sense for OP to do the same with NYC stuff -- FP is just too convenient as a squirrel hole while switching). Even better would be if NYA could gain control of Oak Point entirely, as then all NYC freight ops save for the NYNJ would be under one roof, making dispatching *that* much easier.

This dispatching of LI freight from OP would require a run-around move at FP, but even still, taking a set of locos around a train at FP upper is nowhere near as impactful as having to break down an entire transfer freight and stone train there. The RX would have a clear path. And if you want there to be no need for the runaround move, you can always rebuild the Main Line cutoff, which would allow freights to run directly into LI from the Bronx via Harold. I wouldn't sweat the distance between the RX and Roosevelt. It's only about 550 feet -- ie less than 14th/6th to 14/7th, or 42/7 to 42/8. That said, routing trains to Roosevelt UL is certainly intriguing. 

As for the , those are both issues, yes. I honestly can't see an easy way to finagle a connection with the unless you're willing to build a new station on the unused trackways, but the doesn't seem that bad. The distance from the RX ROW to Avenue I is about 400 feet -- hardly some insurmountable distance. If you're willing to accept a bit more distance, the remains of the Parkville SBK interchange track still exist in the form of a parking lot. You could easily build a passage under there. 

And as for the , I'm honestly unsure as to whether it's necessary to build the RX north of Jackson Heights. The areas of the BX served by it aren't high density economically or residentially, and Astoria would be a bloody terrible terminal.

No, son, it is the only way to do so.

Money doesn't grow on trees, so you have to prioritize. And sadly, the RBB doesn't have what it takes to be anywhere near the top of that list. 

 

Apologies for the endless post. 

Honestly, looking at the map, I can't imagine that either shopping center on either side of the Fresh Pond Yard could be doing well. Those are large enough parcels to nearly triple the yard space and still have parkland left over if you reorient some of the tracks.

It would definitely be more of a Phase II, but I would like to see the RX extended via I-278 to Astoria Blvd  before making a crosstown connection across 86 St to 72nd St  , with provisions for a third track at Astoria Blvd  . You still end up providing faster Queens-Bronx connections than exist today, but you don't go on the weird, indirect, technically challenging section of it all.

[Wallyhorse]

On 2/20/2018 at 10:29 AM, officiallyliam said:

Want to go from the Rockaways, Howard Beach, or Ozone Park to Lower Manhattan? The  does that.

Want to go from Woodhaven to Lower Manhattan? The  is right there.

Going from QBL to Lower Manhattan? The  does that; the  does via a transfer at Lex.

To go from any of the RBB neighborhoods to Lower Manhattan via Jackson Heights, LIC, and Broadway is to take just about the most circuitous route possible.

I agree, but there is a psychological factor with some about having a line serve lower Manhattan (again, even if we know better) that I was taking into account.  

[RR503]

8 hours ago, bobtehpanda said:

Honestly, looking at the map, I can't imagine that either shopping center on either side of the Fresh Pond Yard could be doing well. Those are large enough parcels to nearly triple the yard space and still have parkland left over if you reorient some of the tracks.

Sure, but you’d still have to break up/assemble interchange freights on the upper level, which is the activity that messes with RX. None of these new yard tracks would be large enough to digest a full CHFP or Y101. 

Metro mall, FWIW, is quite busy. And I’m not too sure what you mean by the other mall, but if you’re talking about the industrial firms in the yard’s armpit, you have ground zero of CURES next door. They’d rather see their houses burn than the yard expanded. I just think given that the land at OP is already intended for rail use, and also given that it'd eliminate a yarding of the cars (speeding ship times), it’s the best alternative. 

Edited February 22, 2018 by RR503

[bobtehpanda]

On 2/21/2018 at 9:01 PM, Wallyhorse said:

I agree, but there is a psychological factor with some about having a line serve lower Manhattan (again, even if we know better) that I was taking into account.  

The only psychological factor is you posting hypothetical political situations like it's the Pix11 version of Game of Thrones.

[CenSin]

On 2/22/2018 at 12:01 AM, Wallyhorse said:

I agree, but there is a psychological factor with some about having a line serve lower Manhattan (again, even if we know better) that I was taking into account.  

And what is that factor?

[Wallyhorse]

Mainly the one-seat ride to lower Manhattan.  Even if most never actually use it, that it's there is the big thing.  

[officiallyliam]

1 hour ago, Wallyhorse said:

Mainly the one-seat ride to lower Manhattan.  Even if most never actually use it, that it's there is the big thing.  

No it's not - not if the all-important one-seat ride is really a scenic tour of the subway system. People aren't going to be willing to waste money on the RBB just because it could get them to Lower Manhattan in an hour.

[CenSin]

2 hours ago, Wallyhorse said:

Mainly the one-seat ride to lower Manhattan.  Even if most never actually use it, that it's there is the big thing.  

Oh. So like a Christmas ornament? Tell me more about why money should be sunk into it.

Edited February 24, 2018 by CenSin

[Lance]

On ‎2‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 7:44 AM, Wallyhorse said:

Mainly the one-seat ride to lower Manhattan.  Even if most never actually use it, that it's there is the big thing.  

I don't think you're making the point you think you're making. Just saying...

[LGA Link N Train]

On 2/24/2018 at 7:44 AM, Wallyhorse said:

Mainly the one-seat ride to lower Manhattan.  Even if most never actually use it, that it's there is the big thing.  

I took a one seat ride on the from Cortlandt St to 67 Av and I regretted it.

On 2/24/2018 at 9:25 AM, officiallyliam said:

No it's not - not if the all-important one-seat ride is really a scenic tour of the subway system. People aren't going to be willing to waste money on the RBB just because it could get them to Lower Manhattan in an hour.

Ok. RBB was meant for direct midtown service 

[LGA Link N Train]

Something that sparked my mind yesterday is station placing of the RBB if built as a subway. I think that it should have 3 stations at least 

Parkside - Metropolitan Avenue 

Jamaica Avenue - Brooklyn Manor 

Ozone Park - 101/103 Avenues

Then continues to the

[BreeddekalbL]

On 2/21/2018 at 10:25 PM, bobtehpanda said:

I'm sorry, are you going to provide your own damn money to build this thing? We've got to make sure we can use what money we have.

In a way it happens, toronto was forced to choose between shepard and eglington for a subway project in the 90s

[T to Dyre Avenue]

Eglinton would have made far more sense. In fact, I believe they actually started building it until then-Ontario Premier Mike Harris wanted Sheppard built instead. Of course, they ran out of money and all they have to show for it is a five-station stub. Only now are they building Eglinton and as a light rail “pre-metro” line. Unbelievable.

Edited March 12, 2018 by T to Dyre Avenue

[BreeddekalbL]

18 hours ago, T to Dyre Avenue said:

Eglinton would have made far more sense. In fact, I believe they actually started building it until then-Ontario Premier Mike Harris wanted Sheppard built instead. Of course, they ran out of money and all they have to show for it is a five-station stub. Only now are they building Eglinton and as a light rail “pre-metro” line. Unbelievable.

The north york/toronto mayor lastman advocated hard for a sheppard subway 

[T to Dyre Avenue]

On 3/13/2018 at 2:23 AM, BreeddekalbL said:

The north york/toronto mayor lastman advocated hard for a sheppard subway 

He sure did. I had Lastman in my previous post before editing it. I don’t know why I edited him out, though Harris is also to blame for why Sheppard got put ahead of Eglinton and the previous Toronto mayor, Rob Ford, who torpedoed the previous mayor’s (David Miller) Transit City light rail program. That’s why only now they’re finally building Eglinton, as well as light rail on Finch Ave West. If it hadn’t been for Ford, we might have already had both the  Eglinton and Finch LRT routes in service.

But the one line Toronto really needs, over all the others (proposed and under construction), the one that should have been built decades ago and still hasn’t is the Downtown Relief Line. The Bloor-Yonge transfer station is insanely overcrowded at all hours of the day (easily rivaling New York’s most crowded transfer points) and the Yonge-University Line is maxed out on capacity, even with open-gangway cars. Yet they want to spend billions to extend the Bloor-Danforth Line further east into Scarborough, which could potentially overcrowd Bloor-Yonge transfer even more. Does this not sound familiar to us right here in New York?

Perhaps Toronto’s situation should then serve as a cautionary tale here in New York and show why we need to prioritize putting subway extensions or new lines in corridors with very high transit ridership, dense population and limited (read: slow) transit options. Like Second Ave in Manhattan, Third Ave and Fordham Road in the Bronx, Utica Ave in Brooklyn and Northern Blvd in Queens. But Rockaway Beach? Not as much the others I listed.

 

[BreeddekalbL]

3 hours ago, T to Dyre Avenue said:

He sure did. I had Lastman in my previous post before editing it. I don’t know why I edited him out, though Harris is also to blame for why Sheppard got put ahead of Eglinton and the previous Toronto mayor, Rob Ford, who torpedoed the previous mayor’s (David Miller) Transit City light rail program. That’s why only now they’re finally building Eglinton, as well as light rail on Finch Ave West. If it hadn’t been for Ford, we might have already had both the  Eglinton and Finch LRT routes in service.

But the one line Toronto really needs, over all the others (proposed and under construction), the one that should have been built decades ago and still hasn’t is the Downtown Relief Line. The Bloor-Yonge transfer station is insanely overcrowded at all hours of the day (easily rivaling New York’s most crowded transfer points) and the Yonge-University Line is maxed out on capacity, even with open-gangway cars. Yet they want to spend billions to extend the Bloor-Danforth Line further east into Scarborough, which could potentially overcrowd Bloor-Yonge transfer even more. Does this not sound familiar to us right here in New York?

Perhaps Toronto’s situation should then serve as a cautionary tale here in New York and show why we need to prioritize putting subway extensions or new lines in corridors with very high transit ridership, dense population and limited (read: slow) transit options. Like Second Ave in Manhattan, Third Ave and Fordham Road in the Bronx, Utica Ave in Brooklyn and Northern Blvd in Queens. But Rockaway Beach? Not as much the others I listed.

 

Sheppard should be finished as a subway it would make it more useful then 5 stops and then build lrt bad idea

The finch lrt was deferred and eglington is already under construction 

The scarborugh subway extension should be build as 3 stops and you have doug ford on record saying he and his bro rob that he had a 3 stop agreements

And yeah the drl needs to get done to improve crowding.

Also go look in the world transit forum and see what i think of my ideas for toronto

 

I agree rockaways priority is lower, but obviously soon the time to decide is approaching and i dont want to see an article generations from noe saying that they should have chose subway etc and the park was a waste.

Obviously we should finish 2nd ave and build the future phase 3 as it was planned to make connections to B and D easier and springboard it to a bronx extension via 3rd ave 

Utica will be sending the 4 train down there to kings plaza also extend the 2 from flatbush

Fordham and northern are gonna be really hard to build

[LGA Link N Train]

7 hours ago, BreeddekalbL said:

Fordham and northern are gonna be really hard to build

TBH. Fordham and Northern are almost NOT feasible whatsoever 

[officiallyliam]

8 hours ago, BreeddekalbL said:

I agree rockaways priority is lower, but obviously soon the time to decide is approaching and i dont want to see an article generations from noe saying that they should have chose subway etc and the park was a waste.

Obviously we should finish 2nd ave and build the future phase 3 as it was planned to make connections to B and D easier and springboard it to a bronx extension via 3rd ave 

Utica will be sending the 4 train down there to kings plaza also extend the 2 from flatbush

Fordham and northern are gonna be really hard to build

Why couldn't Rockaway be a rail trail now? From what I understand, those are set up as a way to preserve the right of way, with a full understanding that it may eventually be converted to some from of transit.

As for SAS, Phase 2 and beyond should only be done when costs can come under control. Considering we're using mostly existing tunnel, the estimated $6 billion dollar price tag needs to be called into question; it is neither acceptable nor sustainable for future subway projects. SAS Phase 3 should be changed slightly - I'll mention this below.

Utica should be done concurrently with SAS; there's no reason it couldn't be. The MTA should rebuild Rogers Junction as part of it using Alternative 4 of their 2009 study, sending the and to Nostrand, the to New Lots, and leaving the to serve the Utica branch. Nostrand is somewhat harder as the LIRR tracks are right there, but the MTA should go ahead with past proposals to use that ROW as a small yard for Nostrand Avenue trains.

1 hour ago, LGA Link N train said:

TBH. Fordham and Northern are almost NOT feasible whatsoever 

Northern should be built as a branch of SAS using a new river tunnel, as none of the current tunnels will be able to accommodate that traffic by the time the line is done. SAS Phase 3 should be altered to include provisions for a new Queens tunnel at either 38th or 50th Street; this tunnel can be the branching-off point for both a Queens bypass and for a Northern Blvd subway.

Fordham, though, is more difficult. I don't think it should be a subway extension - the is more than long enough as it is. The corridor is better suited to LRT; in practice, though, the width of Fordham Road may preclude this unless the city is willing to pursue physically-separated LRT lanes. The LRT line can run in its own right of way through Pelham Parkway relatively easily, though.

Edited March 18, 2018 by officiallyliam

[Lawrence St]

Fordham Road won't be as hard to build because I would rather build it as an elevated, since those are much cheaper, and Fordham Road can not have a subway built in it with all of the crazy amount of traffic it gets on a daily basis.

The Rockaway Branch NEEDS to have SOME form of transit running on it, the Q52/Q53 SBS ridership is already getting out of hand.

[R68OnBroadway]

Ideas for Fordham Road extension:

 train option:

To do this, I would do the following:

-fold 148th back into Lenox Yard

-lengthen the platforms at 145th to accommodate 10-car trains, also install elevators

- around the 148th st curve, the  will head deeper under the Harlem River Drive and connect with the  and  at 155th Street. The line will then run under the Harlem River to the MNR ROW, where it will resurface at the two junkyards by Highbridge. After the bridge, it will run over the Major Deegan to Fordham with stops at the MNR stations. Line will then run  either underground (cut and cover must be used) or as an elevated. Stops at Grand Concourse, Southern Blvd, White Plains Road, Williamsbridge Rd, Eastchester Rd, and Pelham Bay Pk. 

 train option:

 is extended east under Fordham to Pelham Bay Pk with same stops mentioned (minus ones west of Concourse)

 train option: 

 is extended over to Fordham Rd. Stop at University Heights replaced with a stop at University Av, then continues on with earlier stops mentioned.

Edited March 18, 2018 by R68OnBroadway

[BreeddekalbL]

14 hours ago, officiallyliam said:

Why couldn't Rockaway be a rail trail now? From what I understand, those are set up as a way to preserve the right of way, with a full understanding that it may eventually be converted to some from of transit.

As for SAS, Phase 2 and beyond should only be done when costs can come under control. Considering we're using mostly existing tunnel, the estimated $6 billion dollar price tag needs to be called into question; it is neither acceptable nor sustainable for future subway projects. SAS Phase 3 should be changed slightly - I'll mention this below.

Utica should be done concurrently with SAS; there's no reason it couldn't be. The MTA should rebuild Rogers Junction as part of it using Alternative 4 of their 2009 study, sending the and to Nostrand, the to New Lots, and leaving the to serve the Utica branch. Nostrand is somewhat harder as the LIRR tracks are right there, but the MTA should go ahead with past proposals to use that ROW as a small yard for Nostrand Avenue trains.

Northern should be built as a branch of SAS using a new river tunnel, as none of the current tunnels will be able to accommodate that traffic by the time the line is done. SAS Phase 3 should be altered to include provisions for a new Queens tunnel at either 38th or 50th Street; this tunnel can be the branching-off point for both a Queens bypass and for a Northern Blvd subway.

Fordham, though, is more difficult. I don't think it should be a subway extension - the is more than long enough as it is. The corridor is better suited to LRT; in practice, though, the width of Fordham Road may preclude this unless the city is willing to pursue physically-separated LRT lanes. The LRT line can run in its own right of way through Pelham Parkway relatively easily, though.

There are some who suggest doing both regarding the rbb and queensway clowns dont like that it could be taken from them they want it all for themselves

Costs do need to be controlled, change station designs maybe that will bring costs down but how do u do that when it costs u 2 billion per mile (correct me on that if wrong)

I can agree with keeping the to nostrand  and keeping the  to utica and new lots, i take when utica subway could be built who would go down there the or (5)? Should also extend the nostrand ave lines and they split at flatbush 1 goin down nostrand and one going to kings plaza

Adding tunnel provisions will jack up the cost 

In order for lrt to be successful in nyc u have to seprate its row