E train to 179th street

[Yellowspoon]

On a recent visit to NYC, I took a ride on an F train to 179th Street. There were signs that during rush hours, some E trains ran to 179th Street. When I arrived home, I checked the MTA timetables and only four E trains run to 179th Street during a rush hour.

What's the point? I would think that people who see the blue E would assume the destination is Parsons/Archer. And if I were on 8th avenue and wanted to go to 179th Street, I'd just take the first E to transfer at Kew Gardens rather than wait for the remote possibility that the next E was going to 179th Street.

[rr503]

On a recent visit to NYC, I took a ride on an F train to 179th Street. There were signs that during rush hours, some E trains ran to 179th Street. When I arrived home, I checked the MTA timetables and only four E trains run to 179th Street during a rush hour.

What's the point? I would think that people who see the blue E would assume the destination is Parsons/Archer. And if I were on 8th avenue and wanted to go to 179th Street, I'd just take the first E to transfer at Kew Gardens rather than wait for the remote possibility that the next E was going to 179th Street.

Two reasons:

When the MTA rerouted F service to 63rd in 2001, Hillside riders threw a fit because they were losing direct service to 53rd st (a major employment corridor), so the MTA gave them some rush hour E runs, as it also fit in with the second reason.

....which is that Jamaica Parsons/Archer can only turn 12 tph. Remember, the station was never supposed to be a terminal -- the E was supposed to go to Rosedale -- so when the MTA realized that they didn't have the cash to finish the job, they had to jury-rig a crossover into existing tunnels, resulting in a less-than-optimal switch placement and signal setup. Before the F was sent to 63, this wasn't and issue (they just ran 18tph F and 12tph E), but with only the E serving the busy 53rd st corridor from the QB express tracks, they had to bump its frequencies. Given that they didn't want to add to the FHills conga line, or turn trains at Kew Gardens, they decided they'd kill two birds with one stone and send those overflow Es to 179.