Today’s Headlines

  • Lawmakers Grill NJ Transit Chief About Cronyism, Safety Violations Under Christie (NYT, Record)
  • It’s All About the Primaries in NYC — There Are No Competitive General Election Races Here (Politico)
  • The W Train Is Back, a Sign of the Impending Launch of 2nd Avenue Subway (AMNY, 2AS, News, NY1)
  • Driver Who Killed Mohammed Akkas Ali Sentenced to 20 Years to Life (Post, Gothamist)
  • Hit-and-Run Driver Kills Man in Queens Crosswalk, Cops Blame Victim (Post)
  • Van Driver Plows Into Mill Basin Toys R Us (Post)
  • DOT Tweaks Van Duzer Bike Project (DNA)
  • Like Queens CB 9, CB 14 Doesn’t Care About Woodhaven Blvd Bus Riders (QChron)
  • Families for Safe Streets’ Sofia Russo Ran the Marathon in Memory of Her Daughter Ariel (News)
  • 10 Lucky Park Slope Car Owners to Get Thousands of Dollars Worth of Guaranteed Parking for Free (DNA)
  • There’s a New Broadway Musical About Life on the NYC Subway (NYT)

More headlines at Streetsblog USA

  • Kevin Love

    From the Politico article:

    “Each of the four Republicans who hold legislative seats in the city is running unopposed…”

    Kevin’s comment:
    I am used to major political parties showing their credibility by putting up candidates for all seats. One never knows. Even the safest seat has been lost when the voters turn against the candidate or the party.

  • HamTech87

    I always read how the Democrats aren’t a national party. It looks like they’re not even a City party.

  • bolwerk

    They certainly aren’t democratic and they arguably aren’t a party in anything other than name. They have no coherent ideology, and too often decide the grab their ankles and support the other party if they think it will help them win other elections.

    It has yuuuuuuggge implications too: Republikan scandals and incompetence often, maybe almost always, come with oodles of tacit Democratic support. Bloomberg won his third term because the Dem power brokers liked him. The Iraq war was supported by the current Dem nominee fpr POTUS in the same way.

    And Bridgegate? It happened to punish a Democrat who actually actually did what he was supposed to do: oppose the other party.

  • ohnonononono

    The meaning of the parties are further complicated in New York State ’cause of the screwy electoral “fusion” thing where we have candidates endorsed by multiple parties.

  • ohnonononono

    It’s so weird and hilarious that 10 random drivers will get free garage parking during that hospital construction, and kind of a great example of how weird it is that we give away free street parking to random drivers in the first place.

    I also like the detail that “Entrants must show [] proof they own a car.” Wouldn’t want someone who doesn’t even own a car to enter and sell their spot, or simply deprive a car owner from having one!

  • Brian Howald

    Can someone explain this quote from the AMNY article to me?:

    “Peak service will remain the same, with 7 southbound and 6 northbound W trains running per rush hour. The service change does mean that about 20 fewer trains will head to and from Astoria each day, but since the length of the W line is significantly shorter than the Q, the MTA doesn’t expect service to dip.”

    How does the length of the line have anything to do with the amount of service? Isn’t service determined by some combination of frequency of departures and length of trains?

  • fdtutf

    That reminds me of a place in the DC area where I used to work. The company provided free garage parking to professional employees only, of which I was one. But I didn’t have a car. So I basically “sold” my spot to an administrative assistant who commuted in from Maryland and wasn’t entitled to a spot.

    We never got caught. I have no idea what the penalties would have been if we had, but isn’t it ridiculous that we even had to worry about something so dumb?

  • sbauman

    How does the length of the line have anything to do with the amount of service?

    The trip duration of the Q from Coney Island to Astoria was approximately 70 minutes or 140 minutes round trip. To maintain 7 trains per hour running to Astoria on a sustained basis requires 140/7 = 20 different trainsets.

    The running time for the W between Whitehall and Astoria is approximately 40 minutes or 80 minutes round trip. To maintain the same service level of 7 trains per hour running to Astoria requires 80/7 or 12 different trainsets. That’s a reduction of 8 trainsets going to Astoria for the same service level.

    This has been simplified because recovery time at the terminals is not included. The recovery time is the interval between when a train arrives and it departs. It is supposed to be sufficient to compensate for late arrival at the terminal. Let’s stay with the 8 trainset reduction to provide peak hour service.

    It generally takes separate crews for the morning and evening rush hours. Thus 16 fewer train crews will not be going to Astoria.

    What has not been mentioned are the trainsets still required to operate the Q between Coney Island its new temporary terminal at 57th St. The service change means more trainsets than previously, when the entire picture is included.

  • Brian Howald

    Mr. Bauman, I understand how the length of the line is related to the number of trains needed to maintain a certain headway. However, the quote in the article states “20 fewer trains will go to Astoria.” I didn’t think they meant 20 fewer trainsets would be used for W service to Astoria versus Q service to Astoria, and rather that they meant that there were 20 fewer W departures compared to previous Q service from Ditmars.

    From http://web.mta.info/nyct/service/pdf/twcur.pdf, I counted 94 S/B departures from Ditmars.

    From https://web.archive.org/web/20161012014240/http://web.mta.info/nyct/service/pdf/tqcur.pdf, the previous schedule I could find, I counted 118 S/B departures from Ditmars.

    Service has dipped by 24 departures. The TA’s claim is that service won’t suffer since the W is shorter. However, the length of a line isn’t related to its headway. It is related to the number of trainsets required to maintain a given headway. Most of the reduced departures comes from the fact that the span of hours has been reduced. The Q ran S/B from Ditmars from 6-11 PM, but the W’s hours are only 7-10 PM. I checked the current and previous N schedules, and there may be a few more N departures, but just a handful.

  • AMH

    I didn’t understand that either.

  • Alicia

    From Maryland? Dang. That administrative assistant must have been paid pretty well to make a five hour round trip every day.

  • fdtutf

    Yeah, and to Rosslyn.

    Traffic back then wasn’t quite what it is now. I don’t think she was spending 2 1/2 hours each way.