MTA LIRR Double Track Project - Ronkonkoma to Farmingdale

LIRR will hold an informational event April 19th for businesses interested in providing goods and services for the second track services. This will be held at Suffolk County Community College. Sparing no expense the event is aimed at minority and women-owned small businesses. This is how half the MTA projects become boondoggles mired in all sorts of problems. You would think the MTA has learned by now awarding to the lowest bidder and what it cost the taxpayer in the long run having to redo the work. This event is also held in conjunction with Suffolk County.

Well, it looked like the project was all set and ready to have the bid awarded today, but all of a sudden, they drop in a line saying "Significant Adverse Information was discovered concerning Skanska. An award will not be made until the required approvals are obtained and Skanska is viewed to be a responsible bidder."

Anybody have any idea as to what went wrong?

Patrick what in the name is Skanska......

Sorry, Mr. Chris, Skanska AB is half of Skanska-Posillico, the joint venture of two companies who were about to get the contract to build the second track today, but something went wrong.

They worked on building the new Meadowlands stadium, the renovation of the United Nations building, parts of the PATH WTC hub and some of the Second Avenue Subway tunnels.

They are also doing the work on the Penn West or whatever it's called.

The project has been going steadily over the past month or two between ronkonkoma and the state park. I am also startng to see some work past CI. With all of the land clearing and excavation I am wondering what hidden treasures left behind over the years will be unearthed.

Do they have all the track ties, ballast, and railing? I thought they started this months ago.

From ocean ave west to the pedestrian overpass in the residential neighborhood is cleared. Some areas are packed down in preparation for the next steps, but deep in the park they are still re grading. Not sure how they intend to complete it but in one spot there is a substantial difference in elevation. The area west of CI that I saw last week is cleared and packed down awaiting the next step also.

I'll be going through again tomorrow. I'll see if anything is different since last Monday. Interesting - some of the equipment has Posillico logos.

Central Islip west to the 111 crossing the roadbed area is cleared and graded on the south side. Some preparation of the sub roadbed is in progress.

Nice to hear the work has started. How long is it supposed to take?

This is a multi-year project,better question is have they started on the distrubtion network
and Substations for the 3rd rail?

I was under the impression that when they electrified out to Ronkonkoma in the 1980's provisions were made for the expansion of electrification to a second track later in time, so that should hopefully speed things up a tad.

Well before the electrification, Brentwood and Deer Park (the current location) only had one track. When they electrified that area, they added a second electrified track from JS Interlocking to Brentwood Interlocking. This also caused them to widen Executive Drive from a two lane crossing to a four lane crossing with medians.

On January 17, 2015, I drove along the Main Line between Ronkonkoma to see what I could about the double-tracking. I saw little, but the following photographs may help some railfans who are unfamiliar about the scene to get a glimpse. I have about ten photos, a few showing preliminary work.



Cost: $134,000,000 for about four miles of rather simple electric double-tracking. No grade-crossing elimination; flat ground; land already owned. Dad was amazed that the Sixth Avenue subway cost a million a mile!



The station has two tracks and three platforms. It's busy, even on a Saturday morning. The nearby Long Island Expressway and north-south roads feed it. There was a line at each of the two ticket windows.



Taxis and the S57 bus connect with Long Island MacArthur Airport. Ten or fifteen years ago, the Town of Islip chose to keep the terminal facing south (to Town Hall) rather than facing north to the adjacent LIRR and the expressway.





Looking east from Pond Road, a track diverges to the left, but one also diverges to the right. I suspect that the right-hand one becomes the second track at the station.



I wonder whether the signal in this photo would sometimes show taking the right-hand track. Almost all arrivals at Ronkonkoma are handled at Platform C, near the largest parking lot.





I neglected to visit Lakeland County Park, which apparently has a walkers' bridge over the Main Line. The park is on the south side of Johnson Avenue in Islandia. My next inspection trip through this work will probably be by train on a weekend, when parking is easier and there are fewer gaps in service each direction.



As I traveled Suffolk Avenue, some work equipment was seen on the embankment, and there were contractors' gates in the fence. In the above photo, the bridge in the distance is NY 454, Vets Highway.



At present, almost all service at Central Islip uses platform B, adjacent to the parking lot.

The paved area over Pond Avenue and Ocean Avenue is where the NEWLY constructed second track will be put, so basically all trains will be going Eastbound on the existing track that has always been there. This new track (Phase 1 of the project) will be located to the North of the existing track from KO Interlocking to CI 2 Interlocking East of Central Islip, so the crossing signal will be moved slightly North, with this new track. Phase 2 will see the new track being constructed to the South of the existing in two sections (CI 1 in Central Islip to Brentwood Interlocking) and (JS in Deer Park to Farm 2 in Farmingdale). It will be interesting on what they will do at Pinelawn and Wyandanch.