Amtrak/LIRR Moynihan Train Hall

Yikes! The first car of 3271 was packed tonight! What's up with that JT?

Yea, I konw, right, it was crowded!!!!

Too bad I almost missed the train, they decided to change the track after me and my crew already went down stairs to wait for the inbound train to arrive!!! So we had to run up and over to track 9 or whatever track we left on, because we didn't know they changed it....I got a phone call from the trainmaster - "uh your train is on 9 track, it was changed.....thanks"........gotta love it

good to meet you too RVRR, and thanks again Don!!!!

Changed tracks huh JT? Why am I not surprised?? Is that NJT people or Amtrak people who make those decisions?

And you're welcome. Enjoy it and if any questions, let me know.

PSCC makes those decisions and PSCC is Amtrak/LIRR. the problem is is that we have no way to check to see if anything has changed from the time we leave the monitors upstairs in the crew rooms to teh time we get down and wait on the platforms for the trains. There is a monitor on track 1/2 in the coach cleaners office, and actually my crew was standing there with the coach cleaner who was waiting for our train to flip the seats real fast!

Actually I got a phone call from teh TM at teh same time a road foreman came down and got us. Boy we felt special! hahahhaah

Just think of the delays when they build this new station under 34th st, and change the tracks and the crew, and in turn passengers, has to walk almost 3 blocks east, because THEY WILL change tracks and equipment and will change tracks from track 1 or 2 to track 24, 25, or 26 or whatever the new tracks will be.

Jt, couldn't they notify each crew via radio/cell phone of any changes? Or would that be too easy?

I asked around about the rationale for the 34th Street station and was told that it will help to relieve pedestrian congestion inside NYPS, on the platforms, stairways, main waiting areas, etc. Also, because the 3 stations will be interconnected, it would help disperse pedestrian traffic over many exits on several different streets. Not sure if I agree with all this though. As far as the yards, your point about the 2 extra non-revenue moves makes perfect sense. I'd love to see the Sunnyside option resurrected.

Development for the station progresses:

The Empire State Development Corporation has picked a joint venture of the Related Companies and Vornado Realty Trust to turn the blocklong James A. Farley Post Office on Eighth Avenue into a grand Moynihan Station, named after Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the senator who was its champion until his death in 2003. The project includes not only a train station but also a major block of space for retail, office or residential use.

"It's my hope that it'll be a great train station, serving as the city's front door," said David A. Childs, an architect at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill who had designed an earlier version of the Moynihan renovation. "It would be a chance to reclaim the glory of the original Penn Station."

More:
www.nytimes.com/2005/07/18/nyregion/18penn.html
At least we'll have this long before the ARC/THE tunnels and their access stations are built. Good to get out (mostly) of the Amtrak/LIRR underground crowd and mess during rush hour – even if it's an extra block to walk

The Moynihan Station's principal tenant will be New Jersey Transit, which is desperate for additional platforms. New York State has already made a $20 million down payment on the $230 million purchase of the Farley building from the Postal Service.

Isn't that ironic? A station is being built in NYC w/ Federal & NY State dollars, and being named after a NY senator, for the enjoyment of NJ commuters. Never have I been so proud to be from the Garden State.

NJT's officially being courted; but originally, the new concourse was to be for Amtrak's use, ostensibly part of the Acela Express promotion.

I'm still of the mind that squeezing NYP any further than it currently is remains an impossible task. Pork such as the Moynihan "Station" ought to never have come to be, and the money allotted thereof instead diverted to a new station, preferably further south towards the original "region's core", namely Lower Manhattan—a station joining the Hoboken Division with LIRR's Atlantic Avenue branch. JMHO...

After much fooling around, and Amtrak bailing out, it appears that the project to make the Post Office's Farley building into a train station may happen after all.

This has been in the local papers, but this article, from the Architectural Record, gets into funding and other details. You guys in other areas of the country and world may not have seen this yet.

The station space would be mostly for NJT, and some for the LIRR, with only a little for Amtrak. [Gleaned from newspaper articles].

http://www.railserve.com/railnews/newsj ... 0719ny.asp

My opinion: Let's hope this comes to fruition, as we can perhaps once again be somewhat proud of a station worthy of being a major portal and representation of NYC, and not only a moldy basement as said major portal known as Pennsylvania Station presently is. Right now, GCT is kicking our butts as a gateway to NYC. (It still will, anyway, but at least we can try. )

Opinions, fellas?

Tom

They have some nerve spending our money on somthing like this which is quite expensive and clearly unncecessary.

Clem

It isn't that it's unnecessary -- it's just plain stupid. Especially from an LIRR perspective. How many of the LIRR platforms even extend underneath Farley? I think it's only tracks 13-17.

Even for NJT it doesn't make sense. Commuters don't work in Penn Station -- they want to make connections to the subway. How does dropping them off on the other side of 8th Avenue help?

A beautiful station would be nice. But "pretty station" is pretty far behind "convenient location" on the list of things riders want from their railroad.

kill the NY Rangers, move the Knicks to Nassau Coliseum, and build a big atrium where Madison Square garden is.

Who Needs The NY Rangers LoL

I agree with Clemuel. I have never understood the point of this project. The existing station does the job just fine, though I might feel different if I rode it in rush-hours. Didn't we spend huge amounts of money to rehab Penn Station not 10 years ago? I don't understand why a new station is needed............

Let's spend the money instead on the Second Ave. subway which was promised to the East Side residents about 40 years ago! That should be MTA's highest priority right now, even before East Side Access to Grand Central, which I agree is a nicer station. But the idea is to move people via trains. That's priority one, or should be.

The Farley building will NOT provide platform or track space, just a glorified shopping center above the west end of existing Penn station.
It is a waste of Money, its out of mainstream commuter traffic and useless as T**s on a bull.