MTA Twenty-Year Capital Needs Assessment (October 2013)

EM2000 wrote:Hopefully it stays like that as well.

Why? Third mainline track aside, the Port Jeff Branch desperately needs a mid-branch yard somewhere.

Good luck attempting to build that. Off peak service on the branch could be increased to at least hourly without building anything.

The old yard at Port Jeff east and west of route 112 (which is rarely used except for work equip) is still there.It has room for 8 or 9 trains.No third rail.If they electrified to port jeff and im guessing it would cost the same as a complete new yard,notwithstanding they would have to electrify to this new "midbranch yard"

Once again there's a paywall with only a small amount of preview text, but the title speaks for itself:

"Port Jefferson backs electrification of LIRR line"

http://www.newsday.com/long-island/suff ... -1.9941052" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

NH2060 wrote:Once again there's a paywall with only a small amount of preview text, but the title speaks for itself:

"Port Jefferson backs electrification of LIRR line"

http://www.newsday.com/long-island/suff ... -1.9941052" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So does the only quoteable text before running into the paywall:

A Suffolk County village board hopes a recently adopted resolution will spark the Long Island Rail Road to finally electrify its Port Jefferson Line.

The Village of Port Jefferson board on Feb. 4 unanimously approved a sense resolution expressing its support for "the immediate electrification of all tracks east of the Huntington Train Station on the LIRR's Port Jefferson Branch."

Doesn't change the feasibility hurdles, but it is a hell of a statement.



Now...isn't the bigger limiter to this the fact that the double-tracking doesn't extend quite far enough past Huntington to provide the necessary capacity, and they've got to do something about that before the upside of electrification or yard somewhere in the middle can be realistically tapped to full benefit?

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:Now...isn't the bigger limit to this the fact that the double-tracking doesn't extend quite far enough past Huntington and they've got to do something about that before the upside of electrification or yard somewhere in the middle can be realistically tapped?

You could likely add a notable number of trains with electrification, it's just going to depend on how willing you are to sacrifice reverse-peak service (and the LIRR seems very willing to do that for some reason). Just in the existing yards at Port Jefferson you could likely store three 12-car trains, seven 10-car trains, two 8-car trains, and six 6-car trains. That's a total of 18 trains or 158 railcars, which can move a fair amount of people. Add that to what you can store in Huntington, and that can provide a measurable increase in peak service without laying any additional track or acquiring additional land. Additionally, it would allow riders along those stations to have more than a handful of trains that go direct to New York each day.

Even preserving some reverse-peak service wouldn't be impossible, as most stations have passing sidings there to permit trains to overtake each other.

In terms of finding places on the Main Line between Hicksville and Queens Village for all of these additional trains (as well as all of the additional trains from the new Mid-Suffolk Electric Yard), well, that's another issue altogether that any amount of improvements along the branch itself won't necessarily be able to help.

lirr42 wrote:In terms of finding places on the Main Line between Hicksville and Queens Village for all of these additional trains (as well as all of the additional trains from the new Mid-Suffolk Electric Yard), well, that's another issue altogether that any amount of improvements along the branch itself won't necessarily be able to help.

There's no need to add any additional trains on the Main Line portion of the branch for full electric service to Port Jeff to happen. In fact there wouldn't be any "new" trains per se, but simply extensions of existing Huntington (and perhaps Hicksville?) MU runs to Port Jeff along with -I presume- full replacement of diesel service. And since there's currently service in the middle of the night between midnight and 3-4am to/from Hicksville and Huntington not all trains would necessarily go into the yard after their run but could head back on another run to NYC. At least a handful of them already do according to the timetable.

Just in the existing yards at Port Jefferson you could likely store three 12-car trains, seven 10-car trains, two 8-car trains, and six 6-car trains.

If more through service to/from NYC can't be achieved due to lack of storage capacity for more 8, 10, 12 car trains those 6-car sets would be perfect for handling Hicksville/Huntington-Port Jeff shuttles.

That isn't how equipment cycling works, bud.

SwingMan wrote:That isn't how equipment cycling works, bud.

Well, gee, if they were to spend all that money to electrify out to Port Jefferson, I would hope they would take another look at the equipment cycles...

Now Suffolk leaders want the Montauk line electrified to Patchogue.

"Officials have announced a new push to electrify more Long Island Rail Road train lines in Suffolk County.

Local lawmakers are urging the LIRR to electrify the train lines eastward into Patchogue on the South Shore and into Port Jefferson on the North Shore."

http://longisland.news12.com/news/offic ... -1.9971123" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Also, "Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today announced the final design for a new Long Island Rail Road station in Hicksville."

Isn't there some kind of bottleneck where all 3 tracks can't be accessed from both lines?

http://www.longisland.com/news/02-24-15 ... ation.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

BM6569 wrote:Also, "Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today announced the final design for a new Long Island Rail Road station in Hicksville."

Isn't there some kind of bottleneck where all 3 tracks can't be accessed from both lines?

http://www.longisland.com/news/02-24-15 ... ation.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Nope. You can get from any of the four tracks that feed into the interlocking from the east to the three station tracks and vice versa. It's not the most fluid of movements depending on which path you want to take, but there's no obstacles like you described.

I know one thing if they electrify or when they do if it goes through is that every station East of Bay Shore is going to have to be lengthened to accommodate at least 10 cars. All the Port Jefferson/Huntington Branch stations are equipped to platform 10-12 cars, while Bay Shore is the only station East of Babylon that can platform 12 cars.

Wouldn't be surprised to see that no grade crossings are eliminated East of Babylon, and why don't they just electrify to Speonk since the yard there is bigger. Since they only use "Babylon Branch" as the section of the Montauk that is electrified, does this mean it will be known as the Patchogue/Montauk Branch?

MattAmity90 wrote:Wouldn't be surprised to see that no grade crossings are eliminated East of Babylon,

Grade crossings are not a significant issue, especially since there's not an extraordinary number of them...

MattAmity90 wrote:and why don't they just electrify to Speonk since the yard there is bigger.

You do know that the distance between Patchogue and Speonk (17.7 miles) is actually more than the distance between Babylon and Patchogue (17.3 miles)? "Just" electrifying to Speonk is quite literally doubling the amount of route miles you would have to electrify.

lirr42 wrote:

MattAmity90 wrote:Wouldn't be surprised to see that no grade crossings are eliminated East of Babylon,

Grade crossings are not a significant issue, especially since there's not an extraordinary number of them...

MattAmity90 wrote:and why don't they just electrify to Speonk since the yard there is bigger.

You do know that the distance between Patchogue and Speonk (17.7 miles) is actually more than the distance between Babylon and Patchogue (17.3 miles)? "Just" electrifying to Speonk is quite literally doubling the amount of route miles you would have to electrify.

Only thing is there's really no yard at Patchogue, so everything would have to be reconfigured, though I guess Babylon would be used for MU storage.
Also, with electrification to Patchogue, how would Montauk trains be run, as scoots from Patchogue or as they are now.
Electrification is VERY expensive, I would rather see the LIRR improve the Main Line (3rd track), complete KO Double Track, and get a reliable diesel fleet. In the end, they will have to weigh the cost of replacing the current diesel fleet (which has been doing terrible lately) with the cost of electrification.
Of course in my fantasy the electrification would also include the Central Branch along a 3 track Main Line, so Babylon can be served from both branches providing much needed north-south connections beside the small handful of diesels that do now.
I have a feeling electrification would be abit easier for the Port Jeff branch as the platforms were already rebuilt for it, and PJ has an actual yard to store the trains whereas there is none in Huntington.
And with the winding track and hilly terrain, the cost savings of electrification could be more enticing.