Increased dual-mode service to Penn Station?

It has been now six years that the last time some dual mode trains operated into Penn Station, NY, is the LIRR going to add more additional dual mode trains into Penn Station anytime soon during peak hours as well as during off peak & weekends.

<i>It has been now six years that the last time some dual mode trains operated into Penn Station, NY, is the LIRR going to add more additional dual mode trains into Penn Station anytime soon during peak hours as well as during off peak & weekends.</i>

Maybe sometime after hell freezes over....

On Sunday's May 15&22 All KO trains will be DM's. They will run Penn to Babylon, reverse move on the Central Branch to Beth, reverse move to KO with all regular stops east thereoff. So all you DM wags can catch one just about hourly on a weekend!!

I'm doubtful that they'll ever increase DM service.

They bought about 20 DM engines. I don't know how many are left in working condition. Because of the restriction requiring engines on each end, you need 8 engines to cover the 4 rush hour trips they currently have.

The mechanical failures of the DM's have been well-documented. LIRR has gotten a pass on what I consider to be the bigger case of short-sightedness. The DM's are needed on only the longest LIRR trips. A pair of DM engines can only cover one rush hour roundtrip per day!

Consider the 5:44 from Port Jeff to Penn. It's scheduled for a 7:20 arrival. You can't then get it from Penn to any of the other diesel terminals in order to squeeze a second rush hour DM run out of it. So by 7:20 AM you have 2 engines (and the coaches between them) wasted for the rest of the rush hour. When an MU set arrives in Penn at 7:20, the LIRR can race it out to Freeport, Wantagh, Port Wash or Great Neck for a second rush hour trip.

LIRR might have the equiptment to add another 2 or maybe even 3 DM runs during the rush hour. Given that it hasn't happened already, though, I wouldn't recommend holding your breath. If you're looking for the day when you see more trains from Port Jeff to Penn than you do from Port Jeff to HPA during the AM rush -- well, t'aint gonna happen.

Port Jeff already has 2 round trip DMs during each rush hour. West it is the 5:44 (605) and 7:35 (615), and east out of Penn to PJ it is the 4:19 (658) and the 4:49 (660). With the other 2 sets (one to Oyster Bay, and the other to Speonk), it takes up 8 DM's because each DM set has to have one engine on each end for gaps when entering Penn. If those gaps weren't there, more DM's would be available which would give more for direct dual-mode service. Also during the rush hour, due to the slots mostly filled, that's where you can't also add those trains to compliment the existing service.

If these morons will stop flushing out taxmoney down the toilet, then ESA might actully be a reality. that will free up more space to acess NYP with more DMs.

Its a shamefull act, that back when the railroad was a real business and ran by a real railroad, things got done.

today we the people of long Island and New York City, keep being dicked around, this is total bullshit and some people responsable for the delays should be financially punished big time for screwing the public out of their ESA for more then a decade.


this is a serious problem in out financing, why is every one blind to it.

Supposedly, the MTA's gonna push a bond issue next election.

I suspect it'll fail.

Then, wave goodbye to ESA, 2nd ave, or both.

At least Roslyn Road's gonna get bridged over. Any grade crossing elimanation on the main is a Good Thing(tm) longterm. Hopefully, the other two in the area will follow...

Owning 23 DMs, couldn't the LIRR assign as many as 16 DMs for 8 trainsets, and have 7 DMs as spares for maintenance cycles, and for substitutes when a DM needs to be taken out of service? As nimbykiller explained in another post, it seems that 2 DM trainsets from Port Jefferson could replace 2 mu trainsets from Huntington with minimal schedule problems. This would make about 50% of the peak hour Port Jeff trains one seat rides to Penn Station. Nimbykiller's analysis seemed rational. I have often wondered why the RR does not do it. He said it would be harder from a schedule standpoint to increase the number of DM trains on the Oyster Bay and Patchogue branches.

Correct about the OB. I could not find any OB runs that coincided with any electric MU runs that could be coverted to part of a DM OB run.

I did find one from Patchogue, or somewhere east of there, that could be combined with an MU run that originates in Bethpage. The difference is only about 10 minutes.

I think I found one or 2 for the Greenport.

I can't remember if I found any for the PJ.

Those were based on schedules from the time of the posting. I don't know if it works out today. I'm sure there are some runs that they could combine.

NK's point about combining runs is 1/2 on and possibly 1/2 off.

You can combine the trains to go through one slot in the tunnel to Penn, but there is a limit on the number of cars. For example, I've seen NK suggest that you could combine a Port Jeff local to Greenlawn then express to HPA diesel with a Huntington local to Hicksville then express to Penn MU.

That's fine for only having one train through the tunnel, but if the diesel has 6 cars that are full and the MU has 10 full cars, you can't get all those people onto one DM train. (and that analysis is static -- it doesn't consider that passengers east of Huntington will change their ridership patterns to take advantage of a one-seat ride).

That being said, I do think that they could offer a couple of additional DM runs through improved scheduling (if the equiptment is available) -- I'm not convinced it's as easy as NK has suggested.

CTG

Well, how many C3s are there? I've seen DM runs as long as 10 cars and double ended. Obviously they can't do that for every run, nor should they.

Easy, one eastbound train example train 1736, and 668 can be combined as well as possibly train 1714, and 656. Westbound you have train 601, and 1613 as well as train 611 (the Hunterspoint express that can be eliminated), and train 1623 (another wasted express stopping at CSH, and Syosset enroute).

Neil -- could you do the favor of posting the times of those trains? My only schedule access is online, and they don't print the train numbers there.

Thanks,

CTG

would it be possble to schedule a DM so that it won't have to span any gaps when it hits Penn? Why not put a jumper cable on the front of a cab car if power is a problem? Use some ingenuity....

why didn't they put shooes on the cabcars. so they can pick up power and avoid gapping, this will allow more DM service

Maby that can be in the C3 Rebuild program