Septa R-7 to N.Y.P

Is it possible for Septa to operate to the New york Penn station?? I know it is but Septa probably would not fund it!! It would make things alot easier for Philadelphia sub-burb residents to get to NY. I think Septa would gain more ridership! I know the NEC is all ready congested but im sure something could be done. It would be neat to see septa trains pull in to NYP....... All they have to do is extend the R-7. It would be easy because people wouldnt have to get of the r-7 in Trenton and transfer to NJT!!

Njt4200 wrote:Is it possible for Septa to operate to the New york Penn station??

Yes. It already runs to Trenton on the NEC mainline. Just stay the course.

Njt4200 wrote:Is it possible for Septa to operate to the New york Penn station??

It is technically possible (Amtrak runs SEPTA equipment up to NYP during the Thanksgiving crush), but very unlikely to ever happen. The big constraint is slots into Penn, which is at capacity during peak hours.

All of this is what's driving the impending NJT takeover of the Clocker service. In order to get the slots for increasing service on their NEC line, they had to effectively buy out the Clockers. NJT can then use its own equipment on these trains and increase capacity.

Now what that means for us is that if Pennsylvania were to pay for the additional mileage, those trains could be extended from Trenton (eventually Morrisville) to 30th Street or even Suburban Station. Unfortunately, this is not a very high priority for SEPTA or PennDOT right now. It was however studied by the DVRPC a year or so ago, and they found a good potential market for a one-seat ride between PHL and NYP that's not at Amtrak's outrageous fare.

njt4200, one day I would definitely want to see a silverliner pull into Penn Station New York. But, with the current budget of SEPTA this is not going to happen at any time. One question I would like to ask, If the SEPTA was extended to NY Penn Station, Would these NY-PHI trains make express or local stops? Would it start out in Center City and make express stops after Trenton or start out in Chestnut Hill East? Final question, Would these trains run hourly, 2 hours, or just peak hour service?

Vacuous thread, this. The NEC was once all the Pennsylvania Railroad, and it was the only company that operated trains from Philadelphia to Penn Station on what is now the R7. What's the matter, Amtrak not good enough...? That's the only agency approved for interstate travel, and they happen to own the R7's route.

BTW, Silverliners under the PRR and Penn Central did operate into New York Penn Station once. Note the picture below, taken in 1965 at Newark Penn Station—I know that sometimes it's hard to distinguish between Newark Penn and Philly 30th Street's upper level, even nowadays, but this is definitely Newark NJ (Track 2; PATH tracks are out of sight to the left of the photo, and Tracks 3, 4 and 5 are to the right).

Wow, it's so shiny and dentless.

Imagine riding in a silverliner rattletrap with 19" wide seats and no toilets for the 2 hour ride to NYP! No thanks. What's wanted is a _comfortable_ one seat ride between 30th and NYP that doesn't cost $40. Is that really so much to ask?

The silverliner 2's had bathrooms or rather still have bathrooms. They are just closets now.

Sean@Temple

What's wanted is a comfortable one seat ride between 30th and NYP that doesn't cost $40. Is that really so much to ask?

Considering that there's no trust fund in place for railroad infrastructure upkeep (unlike the roads), then that's a lot to ask. Certainly, if Amtrak doesn't have the money to support such a journey, SEPTA doesn't either, and in fact has less money to do so.

Shoulda lobbied to keep Reading Terminal open so that the diesel "Crusader" could still run, at least into Hoboken Terminal via the Waterfront Connection, if you really wanted to ride SEPTA from Philly to NYC...

OT/ Irish, are you sure that's Newark Penn? It looks wrong, as there are no open walls or columns along Track 5, only windows.

OT still.....

I was thinking the same thing, JLo, but if it is Newark, I think its down the platform a little bit on the western end, but then where is the dark hulk of a shadow of the CNJ bridge, and the signals down on the western end of 2 track?

Also, track 2 is depressed a little bit, so higher than normal movements can be made through the station, and that pic doesn't look like the track is depressed (you can tell when a train is in the station, the high level floors are a slight bit below teh height of the platform, and this pic doesn't seem to look like that....

The whole Trenton-NY line should be jointly operated by NJT/SEPTA. Setup a revenue/cost sharing program and let the trains run through. Its senseless to make people change at Trenton. Plus, it would be nice to see the R7 operated properly with long trains and better running speeds. SEPTA's trains are so sllloooww. Is it the crews? Or SEPTA Rules? The speeds are pathetic.

For example, SEPTA trains on the R2 Wilmington come flying out of Marcus Hook headed for Wilmington. We always get up to 60 or 70, then hit the brakes and crawl at 20 until we hit Claymont.

JLo wrote:OT/ Irish, are you sure that's Newark Penn? It looks wrong, as there are no open walls or columns along Track 5, only windows.

That's what the caption said, so that's what I'm going by. Here's the page:
http://206.103.49.193/prr/htm/prr114.htm
Caption says "216 at Newark"...so in reality, the person who put up this photo and captioned it thus is responsible for veracity, which does seem questionable:
http://206.103.49.193/prr/htm/prr078.htm
Note that the MUs there are called "Silverliner Is" when they are obviously Arrow Is ("Jersey Arrows") complete with center doors.

The way things are going in Washington, local agencies like SEPTA will be asked to pony up a lot more money for corridors that they share with Amtrak. Think SEPTA's budget crunch is bad now? Try convincing Harrisburg that they should get $$$ to run to New York. If anything I think NJT should annex the RRD.

Did the PRR/PC ever run those SI's or "Arrow's" into Philly? I've never seen one of them before!