EuroStar wrote:You have to consider the Eastbound trains are being slowed in a 90-60-45-30-15 and then crawling to the assigned track, especially the stub tracks, it's just like going over a highway. The one I have in mind is the Clearview Expressway in NYC going Northbound you have a few miles of relatively tame highway but going south the Highway terminates at Hillside Avenue and forces a left or right turn timeshared with one of the Busiest streets in Queens. Cars are more prone to stop heading south than they are heading north so the southbound journey is on average slower.CTG wrote: The evidence of a pad is when you compare the times in the opposite direction. As you note, times from Secaucus to NYP are consistently 13 to 15 minutes. Yet times from NYP to Secaucus are either 9 or 10 minutes. The same thing happens at the other end of the line. Schedule time from Hamilton to Trenton is anywhere from 9 to 13 minutes. From Trenton to Hamilton, however, is nearly always 6 minutes. This type of time/distance warp happens across nearly every NJT schedule.Thank you! That is exactly what I had in mind.
Penn Station acts as the same sort of impediment, meanwhile westbound trains have to follow a train with a 90 second headstart. While you're heading west the train ahead is accelerating to 60 while your train is doing 15, then when you clear to 60 the train ahead is doing 90, so you should never catch him. Then once you pass Portal some trains are going down the Kearny connection instead of the Corridor so traffic is *decreasing* allowing more speed.
That isn't a fraudulent schedule, it's a practical limation based on traffic conditions that are not equal in both directions.
As to your Plandome-Port Washington pad, again a track in one direction is not the same as the other direction and in this case BOTH times are wrong. Its closer to 6.5 minutes west and 6-7.5 minutes east, I can say that as I've been running that section personally for a bit
I'll lay out the math. Port Washington and Plandome are 1.6 miles apart, Port Washington is a yard governed to Restricted Speed 10mph, and you have to travel 1900ft before you can accelerate, at that point the speed restriction will be 40 mph until the curve just east of Plandome where the MAS is 50 although you may not have time to accelerate to that speed as Plandome is close behind.
On a good day in an M7, all motors running, no third rail lag, no time penalties for the running brake tests and prompt permission out of the yard you could cover the distance in about 5 minutes.
You may think that proves the running time is padded, but it does not, schedules in the timetable are *Leaving* times, sou you will arrive to Plandome at departure time. This means you start you run with a 1 minute disadvantage, the same situation repeats at Manhasset and Dominoes down the line until Woodside where there is extra running time to make up for the impossible east end schedule and to assure you make your slot through Harold.
A similar circumstance occurs in the oppisite direction but I will spare you the details, but the point is you cant just look at a map one way and assume the track will be good for the same speed the other way. In fact between Plandome and Port Washington Westbound you can do 40, Eastbound you'll be restricted to 30 MPH, in fact you may even be limited to 15. So it is a fallacious to compare opposing times and draw conclusions from that.
