New York City - Transit News

[NYC4Life]

Port Authority video released yesterday of the flooding from Hurricane Sandy on its PATH stations in Hoboken and Exchange Place:


• Video Link

[NYC4Life]

Hurricane Sandy Transit Update:

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?se...fic&id=8873270

LIRR

The LIRR is running limited weekday service on the Long Beach branch, with hourly trains during peak periods and every two hours during the off-peak, between 4:58 a.m. and 8:58 p.m. The LIRR is operating diesel train shuttle service between Long Beach and Lynbrook, making all stops. It's a 20 minute ride.

Nineteen of the LIRR's 143 morning rush hour trains will be canceled or diverted to another terminal. In the evening peak period, 23 evening rush hour trains will be canceled. Visit MTA.info/LIRR for a complete list of the changes.

PATH

PATH is operating limited rail service between 5 a.m. and 10 p.m, from Newark to 33rd Street in Manhattan.

Stops include Newark-Penn Station, Harrison, Journal Square, Grove Street, Newport, 9 Street (exit only between 5 a.m. and 9:30 a.m.), 14 Street, 23 Street and 33 Street.

PATH service to the WTC station should be back by the end of the month. That service will be Newark to WTC only. There is currently no date for the reopening of the PATH station in Hoboken. The PATH station at Christopher Street in Greenwich Village will reopen this weekend. It will only be open on weekends for now, to help reduce crowding.

Click to see some amazing video of the flooding: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afe2T...ature=youtu.be

NJ TRANSIT

Northeast Corridor Line: Trains operating on a modified schedule with limited express service. The Jersey Avenue Station is closed until further notice. Customers can also use emergency bus shuttle service at Metropark Station.

North Jersey Coast Line: Service remains suspended until further notice. Customers can use emergency bus shuttle service at the PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel or at Aberdeen-Matawan Station.

Raritan Valley Line: Trains are operating on a modified schedule between Raritan and Newark with limited peak-period service between High Bridge and Newark. Train 5503 (the last train of the night) departd Newark 20 minutes later to allow for last train connection with the Northeast Corridor leaving New York.

Montclair-Boonton Line: Service has been restored between Hackettstown and Hoboken/New York on a modified schedule. Eastbound service (to Hoboken/New York) will operate approximately once an hour until noon. After 12 p.m., limited service will operate to New York only. Limited westbound service (from New York/Hoboken) will be available before 1 p.m. After 1 p.m., westbound service will operate every 60-90 minutes. Customers can use emergency bus shuttle service at Bay Street, Glen Ridge and Bloomfield stations.

Morris & Essex Line: Midtown Direct service on the Morristown Line between Dover/Summit and New York is operating on a modified schedule. Customers can also use emergency bus shuttle service at Morristown, Convent, Madison, Chatham and Maplewood stations. There is no Morristown Line service to/from Hoboken due to extensive damage in Kearny that has made the tracks impassable.

Gladstone Branch service remains suspendeduntil further notice due to storm related damage.

Main/Bergen County/Port Jervis Lines: Trains are operating on a modified schedule. Trains will begin stopping at Secaucus this weekend. Customers can also use emergency bus shuttle service at Ramsey-Route 17 Station or from MetLife Stadium's Lots J and K.

Pascack Valley Line: Trains are operating on a modified schedule. Trains will begin stopping at Secaucus this weekend.

Atlantic City Rail Line: Regular schedules are in effect.

METRO-NORTH

On the Port Jervis Line: full-day weekday train service is restored to/from Hoboken (no stops at Secaucus). On the Pascack Valley Line: Llimited Weekday train service is restored to/from Hoboken (no stops at Secaucus).

NYC MTA

The Queens-Midtown Tunnel reopened to truck traffic Friday morning. As for the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel (formerly the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel), one tube is open to cars and buses into Manhattan from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. and into Brooklyn from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. Trucks are not allowed.

Some limited service remains in effect following Sandy. Visit MTA.info for the latest changes.

Temporary ferry service is operating between the Rockaways and Manhattan while subway service on that route is suspended. Ferries will depart from Beach 108th Street and Beach Channel Drive, where the Economic Development Corporation has been working to install a temporary landing, and stop at Pier 11 in Lower Manhattan with free transfers between Pier 11 and East 34th Street in Midtown. The service will start at 5:45 a.m. in the Rockaways with ferries departing for Manhattan regularly until 9:20 a.m., with regular service resuming during the evening rush. One-way fares will be $2.

For MTA travel information, check MTA.info online or phone 511.

[mrnyc]

#7 subway train extension progress -- as of this morning:

this is the south end -- where the boring machine went in










permits! have me got permits!!!



air vents n stuff -- on the north end
across from the javits convention center



these are from a couple weeks ago

[J. Will]

Why New York City has a second-tier bus system

http://www.capitalnewyork.com/articl...ier-bus-system

New York City does in fact have a version of bus rapid transit. It’s called “Select Bus Service.”

But select bus service is so lacking in the accoutrements typically associated with bus rapid transit that some transit experts argue it doesn’t even merit the label.

It has no truly separated bus lanes, or elevated boarding platforms. It has off-board fare collection in places, but not universally. Its "dedicated" bus lanes are only dedicated in theory, demarcated by a frequently ignored terra-cotta-colored paint. Other vehicles routinely infringe upon them, and when those vehicles are making right turns, they actually have to.

SBS buses move through the city’s grid more quickly than ordinary buses, but not that much more quickly.

In 2011, the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy issued a report called “Recapturing Global Leadership in Bus Rapid Transit,” in which the authors came up with a way to grade the robustness of a bus rapid transit system based on its inclusion of elements like off-board payment, connectivity, right-of-way enforcement, separated lanes, elevated boarding platforms, and so on.

The top score was 100. The Institute gave New York City’s system a failing grade of 35 and called it, stingingly, “not BRT.”

The city and M.T.A., says Giles, can do “much, much more.”

[yankeesfan1000]

UPDATED: Tappan Zee Constructors wins selection panel recommendation


"The three proposed designs for a new Tappan Zee Bridge. Proposal 1 is at top, Proposal 2 in the middle and Proposal 3 at bottom. The state didn't release the names of the companies that made each design. The construction time for each proposal was about five years. The state's selection committee recommended proposal #1."

"... The state Thruway Authority on Wednesday released three designs that are competing to build a new bridge, but did not identify each team’s proposal. All three came in more than than $1 billion under the initial price tag of $5.2 billion, ranging from $3.1 billion to $4 billion...

...The winning project will be selected by the state Thruway Authority on Dec. 17...."

[Inkoumori]

A selection committee has recommended a futuristic design for the new Tappan Zee Bridge, with suspension supports leaning outwards, giving the bridge the look of a stripped-down building by Santiago Calatrava.



http://transportationnation.org/2012...sign-released/

[aquablue]

Originally Posted by Inkoumori

A selection committee has recommended a futuristic design for the new Tappan Zee Bridge, with suspension supports leaning outwards, giving the bridge the look of a stripped-down building by Santiago Calatrava.



http://transportationnation.org/2012...sign-released/

Very nice!

[Busy Bee]

Great! Now that they're all a billion dollars cheaper, there's no more excuse for not including a rail element.

[NYC4Life]

3:11 PM
MTA Releases Video Of Progress On 7 Line Extension
By: NY1 News

http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stori...line-extension

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority has released new video of workers' progress on the extension of the 7 subway line on Manhattan's West Side.

The 7 line is being extended 34th Street and 11th Avenue in Midtown, where it will connect to the Hudson Yards.

The agency says work is well underway on two ventilation buildings and the upper and lower mezzanines are taking shape.

The station will feature the system's first ever incline elevator, which will transport New Yorkers between the upper and lower levels.

The new station is expected to open in June 2014 and MTA officials expects it to be the most heavily used station by 2020.

© 1999-2012 NY1 News and Time Warner Cable Inc. All Rights Reserved.

[M II A II R II K]

No Seoul-style platform doors for New York subways, even in new stations

Read More: http://www.capitalnewyork.com/articl...n-new-stations

.....

It's called a platform screen door, and some transit experts say they can't understand why the M.T.A. has no plans to install any, even in the new stations being built on the Second Avenue line or the 7-train extension.

- "You know, that was a disappointment," Richard Barone, the director of transportation programs for the Regional Plan Association, told me. "We were surprised that that wasn't going to be happening." There are already platform screens—glass walls that screen platforms from tracks with doors that open in sync with the subway's own—on the AirTrain. Seoul's Metro has them, and Paris has been installing them in its aging subway system. New York City's subway system has none.

- "The doors are really the solution to prevent [subway falls] from happening," said Barone, which will presumably be an ever-greater concern as crowding on platforms continues to increase. He also said they "prevent garbage and other debris from falling onto the tracks," preventing the fires that result when debris comes into contact with the electrified third rail. And by keeping trash off the tracks, they could reduce the costs of sending workers out every day to clear debris. Such screens could allow the M.T.A. to air-condition the platforms, as crazy as that sounds.

- "It is something that I strongly feel needs to be on the table," said Barone. "Especially in places that are high-traffic and high-volume and very congested." There are people at the M.T.A. who share Barone's enthusiasm for platform screens, among them, Tom Prendergast, the president of New York City Transit. "The primary reason is safety," he said earlier this year. "The second is environmental control and the third is to have a better means of getting the train into the station, doing the loading and unloading, and getting the train out of the station."

- But Prendergrast's boss, M.T.A. chairman Joe Lhota, is more equivocal on the matter. "They’re quite expensive and given the 496 stations, I think that’s the number, it’d be quite prohibitive,” he said in March. Installing them in the system's hundreds ofstations is one thing, but installing them in the handful of new ones the M.T.A. is in the process of building on Second Avenue and at the 7-train extension on the far west side is another.

- Barone argues that by installing them in the new stations, the M.T.A. would essentially create a pilot program and learn about the operational issues and benefits of the platform screens. In a statement, M.T.A. spokesman Aaron Donovan said, "Platform edge doors are not currently planned for the new stations on the Second Avenue Subway or the 7 extension. They would present operational challenges and incur long-term maintenance funding costs."

.....

[aquablue]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

No Seoul-style platform doors for New York subways, even in new stations

Read More: http://www.capitalnewyork.com/articl...n-new-stations

God, NYC is so friggin backwards when it comes to transportation infrastructure... and so miserly as well which is uncalled for when public safety issues are at play. When can we get new management and leadership at MTA?[/SIZE]

[NYC4Life]

UPDATED 3:01 PM
Straphangers Enjoy Fully Restored R Train Service
By: Roger Clark

http://www.ny1.com/content/transit/1...-train-service

The R train is rolling once again between Manhattan and Brooklyn.

The R had been running in two sections since Hurricane Sandy when flood waters filled the Montague Tube connecting Brooklyn Heights and Lower Manhattan.

One portion had been running between 71st Avenue in Queens and Whitehall Street in Lower Manhattan, the other between Bay Ridge and Court Street in Downtown Brooklyn.

Officials say more than 27 million gallons of water had to be pumped out of the tunnel which serves the line used by an estimated 65,000 commuters daily.

Straphangers have had to find other ways to get across the East River, but are now breathing a sigh of relief.

"It's been hell taking this commute from Staten Island. I could be taking the ferry and taking the R train back to Brooklyn instead I've been commuting through the buses and it's been like an hour and a half to get home and it's been difficult," said one straphanger.

"I'm grateful because I had to transfer to another train taking the elevator and escalator up to the number 4 train, 2 train to get my destination so now it's just a straight ride," said another straphanger.

While enough has been done for the R to operate safely, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority says some temporary service suspensions will be necessary in the future to to make more permanent repairs to the line.

The R train restoration means the 1 train south of Rector Street and the A line to the Rockaways are the only parts of the subway system out of service because of the storm.

© 1999-2012 NY1 News and Time Warner Cable Inc. All Rights Reserved.

[The North One]

Originally Posted by yankeesfan1000

UPDATED: Tappan Zee Constructors wins selection panel recommendation

I REALLY love the middle design. Proposal one is boring as F&@K.

[aquablue]

Originally Posted by The North One

I REALLY love the middle design. Proposal one is boring as F&@K.

The middle one is basically the usual suspension design you see everywhere, which makes it boring to me. I've never see design 1 in the USA.

[The North One]

Originally Posted by aquablue

The middle one is basically the usual suspension design you see everywhere, which makes it boring to me. I've never see design 1 in the USA.

No its not, the cabels are connected directly to the towers, making it a cable stayed bridge. And its not like we don't see hundreds of variations of the design chosen either. Also theres alot less mess with the 2nd proposal as well.

[aquablue]

The Gov. of NY is actively trying to handicap the city of NY from expanding its transit, and perhaps ending any hope for a future JFK airport 1 seat ride to manhattan.

http://secondavenuesagas.com/2012/12...eens/#comments

Why is he deliberately trying to handicap his own city which desperately needs more transit links while appeasing the NIMBY's?. How shortsighted! He doesn't seem to get it.

[Nexis4Jersey]

Originally Posted by aquablue

The Gov. of NY is actively trying to handicap the city of NY from expanding its transit, and perhaps ending any hope for a future JFK airport 1 seat ride to manhattan.

http://secondavenuesagas.com/2012/12...eens/#comments

Why is he deliberately trying to handicap his own city which desperately needs more transit links while appeasing the NIMBY's?. How shortsighted! He doesn't seem to get it.

Hes concerned about running for a higher office like Christie or Lahota....or Even Booker...

[aquablue]

Originally Posted by Nexis4Jersey

Hes concerned about running for a higher office like Christie or Lahota....or Even Booker...

Pissing off a few people in queens will prevent him from this? I don't buy it.

This is ironic since he is the one who wanted to develop the race course. This line is probably the best way to get people from Manhattan to that location quickly and efficiently.

[Inkoumori]

N/a

[aquablue]

Originally Posted by Inkoumori

I'm not sure what you mean by a "1 seat ride" to Manhattan? Airtrain does the airport loop and LIRR does the Manhattan (also Brooklyn) trip @ Jamaica. Plus the E, J, Z.

You can also pick up the A at Howard Beach @ Airtrain.

It only takes a few minutes to get off those trains and get on the Airtrain to all the terminals, I do it quite often, it works well.

LIRR is direct from Jamaica to Penn or Atlantic.

It still isn't a 1 seat ride, like we see in NY's competing world cities (London, Paris, HK, Singapore, Tokyo, Shanghai etc, etc.) The connection at Jamaica is still a pain in the ass for everyone, visitors especially.

The Rockaway line would be a good option for a future JFK express train that would go right into the terminal area, also for commuters in queens.