5 train to Flatbush Av

[Danny boateng]

Why does the 5 train not run to Flatbush on weekends.Why is it the least used in irt?

[Lex]

23 hours ago, Danny boateng said:

Why does the 5 train not run to Flatbush on weekends.Why is it the least used in irt?

Have you seen Brooklyn ridership on weekends?

[RR503]

23 hours ago, Danny boateng said:

Why does the 5 train not run to Flatbush on weekends.Why is it the least used in irt?

 doesn’t run to Brooklyn on weekends because there’s no space for it. A GO with  and  on a single track in one direction with flagging would force service reductions to 12-16 min headways each. The demand for more weekend service is certainly there, but ops get in the way.  

[Jemorie]

23 hours ago, Danny boateng said:

Why does the 5 train not run to Flatbush on weekends.Why is it the least used in irt?

Same reason why the  was permanently cut from the IND Queens Boulevard Line at night and on weekends. General Orders and flagging (meaning track/signal workers while train traffic is in place).

Any two-track corridor and also four-track corridor cannot have more than 3 different lines running on the same track on weekends.

[Lex]

1 hour ago, RR503 said:

 doesn’t run to Brooklyn on weekends because there’s no space for it. A GO with  and  on a single track in one direction with flagging would force service reductions to 12-16 min headways each. The demand for more weekend service is certainly there, but ops get in the way.  

That's not it. The ridership simply isn't there to support four routes.

[RR503]

25 minutes ago, Lex said:

That's not it. The ridership simply isn't there to support four routes.

I mean, if you asked someone internal they’d likely say that because they measure demand entirely relative to existing ridership. That’s pretty damn near the definition of myopic. 

Regardless, I’d imagine that the reason this was never considered seriously was this ops issue. 

[paulrivera]

2 hours ago, RR503 said:

 doesn’t run to Brooklyn on weekends because there’s no space for it. A GO with  and  on a single track in one direction with flagging would force service reductions to 12-16 min headways each. The demand for more weekend service is certainly there, but ops get in the way.  

That might be the case right now, but the current flagging issue isn't relevant to why weekend  service hasn't been added for all the years prior to that.

[Lex]

36 minutes ago, RR503 said:

I mean, if you asked someone internal they’d likely say that because they measure demand entirely relative to existing ridership. That’s pretty damn near the definition of myopic.

You can't simply throw pasta at the wall and hope it sticks.

[RR503]

59 minutes ago, paulrivera said:

That might be the case right now, but the current flagging issue isn't relevant to why weekend  service hasn't been added for all the years prior to that.

Nah, it is. Even back when we got 20tph on a single track during GOs (approx. the pre-ATF standard) there wasn’t space for the  with the  and  on 8s and the  on a 12. Sure there wasn’t ridership in 1990, but there’s also a reason it wasn’t including in something like the 2008 service enhancements proposal.

57 minutes ago, Lex said:

You can't simply throw pasta at the wall and hope it sticks.

You also can't ignore latent demand, but hey, whadda I know. 

Edited September 1, 2019 by RR503

[Lex]

32 minutes ago, RR503 said:

Nah, it is. Even back when we got 20tph on a single track during GOs (approx. the pre-ATF standard) there wasn’t space for the  with the  and  on 8s and the  on a 12. Sure there wasn’t ridership in 1990, but there’s also a reason it wasn’t including in something like the 2008 service enhancements proposal.

The  didn't get 8-minute weekend intervals until well into 2016, so I don't know what you're going on about.

37 minutes ago, RR503 said:

You also can't ignore latent demand, but hey, whadda I know. 

Yes, and most of the people who attended Trump's inauguration were merely invisible.

[RR503]

1 hour ago, Lex said:

The  didn't get 8-minute weekend intervals until well into 2016, so I don't know what you're going on about.

The dangers of typing quickly. Yes, that should read the  on an 8 and  on a 12. That's a total of 17.5 tph, or not enough space for the . 

1 hour ago, Lex said:

Yes, and most of the people who attended Trump's inauguration were merely invisible.

I'm not sure if you're just trying to be clever or you actually don't think there's ridership that the agency drives away or does not receive because of poor service quality/design... If it's the latter, please consider all the non-MTA trips taken in this city, and all the trips that are simply not taken because of the MTA. 

Edited September 1, 2019 by RR503

[Lex]

50 minutes ago, RR503 said:

I'm not sure if you're just trying to be clever or you actually don't think there's ridership that the agency drives away or does not receive because of poor service quality/design... If it's the latter, please consider all the non-MTA trips taken in this city, and all the trips that are simply not taken because of the MTA. 

Thing is, that applies considerably less to the subway (weekends are mostly limited to Queens Boulevard, the Rockaways, and Dyre Avenue/White Plains Road) than it does to the buses. Also, this is going from a fairly small scope to a massive one, which obfuscates the issue at hand, along with the potential to ignore how heavy a role money plays.

[RR503]

11 hours ago, Lex said:

Thing is, that applies considerably less to the subway (weekends are mostly limited to Queens Boulevard, the Rockaways, and Dyre Avenue/White Plains Road) than it does to the buses. Also, this is going from a fairly small scope to a massive one, which obfuscates the issue at hand, along with the potential to ignore how heavy a role money plays.

I'm honestly unsure of what you're trying to say, but the relationship between weekend service levels and operating cost isn't perfectly inverse. This is obviously case-dependent, but on a high density, high activity corridor like Lex/EPW, it's likely that the demand elasticity relative to service delivery is great enough that the marginal cost of providing more service is small. 

[paulrivera]

15 hours ago, Lex said:

The  didn't get 8-minute weekend intervals until well into 2016, so I don't know what you're going on about.

Yes, and most of the people who attended Trump's inauguration were merely invisible.

The improved  headway is on its way out the door and the headway is probably going back to 12 permanently before too long (it’s already gone by supplement)

Edited September 1, 2019 by paulrivera

[B35 via Church]

Why would the notion of it being the least used in the A division make it a reason to not have it run on the weekend? The Lex is a heavily utilized furnace corridor, regardless....

Eh, 5 to Flatbush, B in & of itself, 7 diamond, any other service pattern that operates during the weekday that doesn't on the weekend, what difference does it make? Getting around in this city on the weekends are the pits... You never know what line is going to do what on any given weekend without doing research... That added stress & confusion is most certainly no way to have to travel..... I shouldn't have to feel a sense of luck & relief that the train I'm boarding on a weekend is going to actually take me to my destination, without having to go on a grand tour of the subway system like a rat in a maze in a cage otherwise.....

Man, I'm good on that.....

[Trainmaster5]

Let me point out something that I lived through. This dates back to the late fifties until 2010 or so. The Nostrand Avenue corridor didn’t have any Lexington service during weekend daytime hours. The nine car  trains provided service. Every 10 minutes on Saturday and every 12 minutes on Sunday . The  mirrored that from New Lots. After  service ended for the day the  replaced it on Nostrand Avenue. The  provided Lexington service to Utica during the daytime hours on Saturdays on 10 minute headway’s.  On Sunday it was either the  or  that ran out to Utica daytime but the  would still go to Flatbush after the last  left. I don’t remember when the express service ended on the weekends, probably about 8:30 or so, but I know that only one Lexington Avenue service ran into Brooklyn at a time. By the time I became a C/R the  ,  ,  and  lines ran on 10 minute headways on Saturday and 12 minute headways on Sunday daytime no matter the southern terminal. Hope I didn’t confuse everyone. Carry on.

[trainfan22]

I remember the ridership patterns when I use to live in Flatbush and take the  into the city during the weekends, by the time the train got to Franklin Ave, most of the riders got off at Franklin to transfer to the  .  The  trains weren't exactly busting at the stems with ppl between Flatbush and President St, all the seats were taken with a few standees... Weather or not that justifies the the  running into BK on weekends, well I guess its up for debate. 

[Jemorie]

Ridership on Saturday and Sunday, especially the latter, is different than on Monday through Friday. Alot of people are off from work and school. Otherwise, the Rockaway Park huttle aka the  wouldn't be a full 600 feet long train like it currently is every summer weekend daytime and evening hours. Even the most demanding lines in the system, depending on the area and direction, tend to be less crowded at certain times of the day. I can think off the top of my head that the "heavy" ridership on weekends are by those who are off from work and school that are going towards movie theaters, musical theaters, public libraries, museums, retail, fast food, fancy restaurants, sports games, supermarkets, corner stores, pharmacies, airports, malls etc etc. Sometimes on weekends, when I take the , it is crushloaded leaving 59th Street with all the Yankee Stadium goers as well as those going back home from Manhattan to the Bronx.  Same with coming back from the Bronx to Manhattan from Yankee Stadium, the  is literally full to the brim until it scoots along through Midtown, and then it is lightly loaded the rest of its route to Coney Island.

It also depends on the borough itself. Most people who are traveling within a borough probably aren't taking the subway, but those that are traveling from one borough to another most likely do. In most cases, from my perspective, however, the platforms tend to be pretty crowded, yes. Trust me as I say this. However, it does not mean that the trains themselves will be, given the subway's complexity and the current one-seat rides to/from one particular trunk line. Perhaps the crowded platforms are why alot of folks in the railfan community (including this site) call for more frequent service during the off-peak hours?

During middays, everyone is working and is at school, so they aren't going to the beach and pools, or any other places of entertainment or whatever for that matter. On weekends, they of course have all the time in the world to do all that.

I don't know. Maybe it's just me. I can't speak for anyone else here. Some lines during middays, like the  and  for example, have similar rush hour frequencies (but just a little bit less than during the actual rush hour timeframe itself) due to ridership demands. The Queens ends of both the  and  connect with many other modes of transportation where people have length commutes to/from the outer parts of Queens no matter what time a day. That's why these two lines run express in Queens. So an express train with shorter wait times to/from Manhattan = every second and minute counts.

EDIT: I just want to point out that certain places, such as courts, banks (except ATMs), health clinics (other than the pharmacy pick ups), are closed on weekends. That pretty much adds up to ridership. Could this be way the  always does GOs and flagging every weekend in the subway other than the fact that the system itself being run 24/7?

Anyway, about this issue with lack of weekend  service in Brooklyn, I don't think it is needed unless the  and  are both above NYCT loading guidelines leaving their most crowded points of their lines (the  arriving north or leaving south at Wall St, and the  arriving north or leaving south at Bowling Green).

Edited September 2, 2019 by Jemorie

[Lex]

4 hours ago, paulrivera said:

The improved  headway is on its way out the door and the headway is probably going back to 12 permanently before too long (it’s already gone by supplement)

I can't really call that surprising. The Brooklyn leg has historically been pretty weak (in spite of the Brooklyn IRT's generally higher-than-average consistency), the Bronx leg has been subjected to more frequent service changes (admittedly, more of an issue for the , but the effects still spill over), and I can't exactly say it's had too much of an impact on Manhattan service.

[RR503]

48 minutes ago, trainfan22 said:

I remember the ridership patterns when I use to live in Flatbush and take the  into the city during the weekends, by the time the train got to Franklin Ave, most of the riders got off at Franklin to transfer to the  .  The  trains weren't exactly busting at the stems with ppl between Flatbush and President St, all the seats were taken with a few standees... Weather or not that justifies the the  running into BK on weekends, well I guess its up for debate. 

FWIW, if NYCT still paid any heed to guidelines on weekends, anything more than a few standees per car would trigger a service increase. 'At capacity' during off peak periods is 20% of a trains load being standees. 

5 hours ago, paulrivera said:

The improved  headway is on its way out the door and the headway is probably going back to 12 permanently before too long (it’s already gone by supplement)

It's a shame that this is likely true. The  gets slammed in Manhattan when it runs on a 12. 

[paulrivera]

38 minutes ago, RR503 said:

FWIW, if NYCT still paid any heed to guidelines on weekends, anything more than a few standees per car would trigger a service increase. 'At capacity' during off peak periods is 20% of a trains load being standees. 

It's a shame that this is likely true. The  gets slammed in Manhattan when it runs on a 12. 

And to think the big selling point at that board meeting a couple years ago for the  to go to 8 minutes was basically so that the  running every 20 minutes wouldn't sting so much.

Only took them a couple of years to break their word on a regular basis. Next time the  might see an 8 minute headway on a Saturday or a Sunday is October at the earliest.

Edited September 2, 2019 by paulrivera

[Union Tpke]

On 9/1/2019 at 9:32 PM, RR503 said:

FWIW, if NYCT still paid any heed to guidelines on weekends, anything more than a few standees per car would trigger a service increase. 'At capacity' during off peak periods is 20% of a trains load being standees. 

It's a shame that this is likely true. The  gets slammed in Manhattan when it runs on a 12. 

Tell me about packed E and F trains on weekends.

[Union Tpke]

13 hours ago, Union Tpke said:

Tell me about packed E and F trains on weekends.

Also, there is no reason that  trains are more crowded during late evenings and weekends than they are during rush hours.

[Metro CSW]

I like how these arguments just trails off the subject title in question. Bravo, guys lol. I simply think that the weekends don't really much demand unless it's a planned GO, obviously. Besides, that switch formation between Franklin Ave and Nostrand Ave don't need to be utilized if it's not peak hours; it'll just halt the trains unnecessarily when they can just go pass without waiting for a crossing train. It was always the  that made it possible and I believe that was the brief reason why they cut it after 2010 regardless on finances but of course, brought it back for weekday demands. I think most of us know these reasons are obvious. No? Well.... ain't that something.

[Jemorie]

Remember, frequencies on every line in the system in general are based on average loads per car, not on what tracks or signals can handle. If I have to wager a guess, the loading guideline for any numbered line in the system during the off-peak hours is approximately 50 people per car, or 500 people per train (10-cars).

http://web.mta.info/mta/compliance/pdf/supplemental-info.pdf (see page 24).

By that particular definition, is the  leaving Bowling Green southbound/arriving at Bowling Green northbound at any given time of the day on both Saturday and Sunday (6 a.m. to midnight) carrying more than 50 people per car, or 500 people per train? Probably or probably not. But knowing the , they likely will not increase service or extend service on weekends, where they continuously do endless track/signal work and flagging, forcing service to run less frequently (in some cases, violating the minimum scheduled frequencies) and loads probably being well above their guidelines.