Railroad Forums 

Discussion relating to the past and present operations of the NYC Subway, PATH, and Staten Island Railway (SIRT).

Moderator: GirlOnTheTrain

 #994416  by Head-end View
 
Does anyone know if the TA will be running the antique R-1 train on Sundays on the 6th Ave. Line as they have in past years in December? I checked the Transit Museum's website but didn't see anything about it.
 #996998  by Head-end View
 
Great ride yesterday on the "Christmas train". Imagaine being able to see out the front "railfan window" again on a NYC Subway train! Way to go! And you should see the looks on people's faces on the platform when it comes into the station. Many are too young to have ever seen an R-1 or R-10 in passenger service.
Funny, as a little kid 50 years ago, I didn't like those "old trains". I always wanted to ride the newer ones, back then. Who would have thought?
 #997023  by railfan365
 
Isn't it funny how old age can make one nostalgic for so much of our youth? BTW, I'm also in my 50's. Interestingly, my all time favorite subway car model is the R-10's, even when they were runing. Especially after the mid-80's overhaul began and some of them were like new.
 #997303  by Head-end View
 
Railfan, you sure you mean the R-10? Mid 80's overhaul? The last ones were retired in 1989, right?

My all-time favorite was the unpopular R-40/Slant. In 1968 they were the first replacements for those "dirty old R-1's", and with that long front door window, it was like boarding a spaceship. I still remember my first ride on one from the Union Turnpike station on the "F". Rode one of the last ones too on the Brighton Express in the Spring of 2008.
 #997571  by Head-end View
 
In the book New York City Subway Cars, James C. Greller wrote that the problem with the R-40's ends re: moving from car-to-car might not have happened if (instead of married-pairs) they had been built like everything from the R-44 on using slant/cab and flat ended/cab-less cars to create sets of 5 cars. Then you would only have had one location in the middle of the train where you could not safely cross over. And the aesthetics of the futuristic slant design might have been more successful. Mr. Greller points out that design was successful on San Francisco's BART fleet built in the early 1970's.
 #999029  by EastCleveland
 
Rode the Holiday Train this afternoon, which was packed from the moment it departed from Second Avenue.

For some reason, the well-meaning souls at the MTA/Transit Museum seem to feel that a vintage train alone is sorely lacking unless it has live music. The on-board, vaguely Dixieland Band-ish combo was certainly competent. Unfortunately, they were also piercingly loud (blaring trumpet and old subway car definitely do not go together). And it was a style of music more suited to the grand opening of a St. Louis shopping mall. One more sign of the city's increasing suburbanization, I guess.

I'm glad the MTA continues to run the train each year. But next time? If they insist on adding a soundtrack, please find one that's more Gotham-appropriate. 53rd Street Jazz. Bronx Doo-Wop. Whatever. Just make sure it says "New York."

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 #999055  by chuchubob
 
I think the vast majority of riders enjoyed the trip(s). It did get quite crowded in the afternoon when two bands were on the train.
The consist: R6 1000
R1 381 and 100
R9 1802
R6 1300
R7A 1575
R4 484
R4 401

I suspect that the reason the Arnines are operated only underground for the shoppers' specials every December is the conductor's perch for operating the doors.