[HN Gopher] Penn Station Can Handle the Load: New York Is Ready ...
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Penn Station Can Handle the Load: New York Is Ready for Through-
Running
Author : Ericson2314
Score : 63 points
Date : 2025-01-16 16:43 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.etany.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.etany.org)
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Since it's midway through the article, note that
| https://github.com/effective-transit-alliance/platform-crowd...
| is the underlying model we used for passenger circulation.
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Also for reference, https://www.etany.org/modernizing-new-york-
| commuter-rail is our previous report that describes what through-
| running actually is, why it would be good, etc.
|
| This report is more narrowly tailored on refuting Amtrak's
| grossly mistaken reasoning in their recent study.
| pcl wrote:
| _"Through-running involves operating trains across Manhattan
| and through to the other side of the city, instead of
| immediately turning them back to the suburb they came from, as
| is done today."_
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Imagine how nice it would be to take a single train from
| Flushing to Newark!
| bobthepanda wrote:
| Having recently ridden Amtrak, easily the worst thing about it is
| the fact that they've decided to go with an airline style
| boarding process where the platforms are treated as a secure area
| and everybody has to single-file get their ticket checked to get
| onto a platform.
|
| The whole advantage of a train vs a plane is that a train has
| many doors, allowing a lot of simultaneous boarding to happen;
| and they also already have conductors who check your ticket to
| make sure you are getting into the correct car, and another
| ticket check once the train is in motion. It would be
| significantly better at major stations to just have conductors at
| every train car on the platform in parallel doing ticket checks,
| rather than just have one funnel.
| jjice wrote:
| I haven't been on an Amtrak in about six months, so it may have
| changed, but where were you boarding? Was it New York? Boarding
| in NY is slow and structured, but when I've boarded in Back Bay
| (Boston), Portland (Maine), and Providence, it's the better way
| that you've mentioned.
|
| They make everyone rescan tickets for the North East regional
| in NY also, if you're just passing through. It's a bit
| annoying, but I wonder if the traffic getting on and off is too
| great in NY to be able to do that. I have no clue, though.
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Yes their practice elsewhere is better. Amtrak seems to think
| that lazzaiz-faire platform ingress/egress doesn't scale to
| NY Penn, but that's exactly backwards -- it's not letting
| people circulate freely which doesn't scale.
|
| Also, fun fact, if you don't go in the main hall Amtrak
| waiting area at NY Penn, you _can_ board the platform
| whenever you want. But it 's hard to figure out what
| platform/track to go to in advance -- hiding that information
| is how they discourage this.
| craftkiller wrote:
| laissez-faire
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| :) Evidently I previously convinced Android to add my
| misspelling to the dictionary. Yikes!
| nicwolff wrote:
| Semi-secretly you can skip the lines at the escalators in
| Moynahan's big train hall and just go down to the mezzanine
| and right to the platforms.
| dyauspitr wrote:
| That must be new or station specific because my experience has
| been to buy the tickets, stand on the platform, put away your
| bags yourself and take a seat. Tickets are checked on board.
| Very seamless and stress free.
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Yes the bad airline mentality goes a long way to denying these
| things are possible.
|
| Once one accepts that people are going to constantly leaving
| and entering the platform, that all ticket checking must happen
| on the train to not impeed circulation, running way more trains
| needing fewer platforms is revealed as (a) possible, and (b)
| the right way to do things.
| crenwick wrote:
| I ride Amtrak monthly, this is not true. Like every other
| train, ticket checking always happens while moving.
| rayiner wrote:
| Not at NYP or DC Union Station. Also not at Philadelphia 30th
| street station.
| mplanchard wrote:
| I did a trip to NYC and back on Amtrak at the end of
| November, and the boarding process at Moynihan was the same
| as it had always been, with tickets checked once you're on
| board. Didn't know it was different boarding from Penn.
| spokaneplumb wrote:
| Is boarding at Moynihan what another poster is alluding
| to with the possibility of avoiding the choke-point
| boarding by simply not using the main waiting area? Or is
| that considered a separate stop, possibly requiring a
| different ticket (and, worse still, maybe being bypassed
| by certain trains)?
|
| I have minimal familiarity with NY and none with Penn,
| but will be Amtraking in and out in a couple weeks.
| anyonecancode wrote:
| I'm not sure about Amtrak boarding processes, but
| regarding Moynihan vs Penn:
|
| - Penn Station is directly under Madison Square Garden.
| There used to be a large building similar in scale to
| Grand Central Terminal, but it was rather controversially
| torn down in the 60s [1], and MSG built on its site and
| the train station portion becoming a bunch of tunnels
| beneath it.
|
| - Across the street from Penn was a big post office
| building, with a grand Neo-classical design. As an
| attempt to somewhat remedy the destruction of Penn
| decades earlier, NY state decided to turn that into a
| train hall, which opened in 2020 [2]. It's the same
| station stop as Penn, so you can really think of it more
| as just an expansion of it. Take the stairs on the
| western (toward the Hudson river) end of the platform and
| you'll emerge into a big open space with an atrium that
| looks like an actual train station, instead of the
| basement of MSG. (They've also been doing good work
| raising the ceiling and widening corridors in Penn, so
| there's more light and air, but you're still basically in
| the MSG basement even if it's less cramped now).
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Penn_Station#O
| riginal... [2]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moynihan_Train_Hall
| Projectiboga wrote:
| Those three stations have mentally ill homeless plaguing
| the stations. Penn Station NYC has a large maze of
| underground areas over two levels. For those in NYC using
| Antrak use the Moynihan station across 8th ave between 31st
| & 33rd, it is better laid out, unless you need the waiting
| seating area.
| drewbeck wrote:
| I've traveled through NYP a few times recently but
| somehow missed this plague. Is it like, a lil baby
| plague? Or maybe there's a quarantine area I overlooked?
| Projectiboga wrote:
| Might be worse and night. Plague wasn't the right word
| but I suspect even if it is a small cohort Amtrack Police
| likely don't want to have to interact with any making it
| onto a train after they depart.
| craftkiller wrote:
| NJ Transit is also at NYP and they do not do any sort of
| pre-boarding ticket check.
| apawloski wrote:
| I use these three stations professionally and haven't had a
| pre-train ticket check in maybe 5 or 6 years.
| bpye wrote:
| This certainly depends on the station, King Street in Seattle
| has ticket checks at the door for travellers in either
| direction.
| drewbeck wrote:
| I think there's two things being conflated here - 1. the pre-
| queueing in the station vs going directly to the platform and
| 2. if they also check tickets during that stage.
|
| In my experience 1 is very consistent - NYC and Philly at
| least. 2 I'm not sure about. But 1 is imo the big issue. The
| pre-queue wastes time and clogs up the station and we hate
| it.
| rayiner wrote:
| Amtrak is run by the dumbest people in the country. Another
| gem:
|
| > Today, Amtrak schedules the Acela, which travels express
| between Washington and Boston, to overtake the slower, local
| Northeast Regional at Penn Station. The organization claims
| that this requires scheduled dwells of 30 minutes for Northeast
| Regional trains
|
| But why would anyone competent want to work for an organization
| like this?
| emchammer wrote:
| Amtrak train crews are gems though.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| Total price segmentation, slowing down the northeast regional
| so people pay out extra for the Acela, nevermind that the
| northeast regional trains can run just as fast as acela for
| the vast majority of the route.
| thinkingtoilet wrote:
| Do you have any idea of the history of why Amtrak was
| created? What limitations both funding and regulations are
| put on it? It's a god damn miracle it runs so well with what
| it's given. The dumbest thing is that we the people don't
| fund it and invest in rail, not people doing their best with
| what limited resource they are given in a country that is
| half a century behind when it comes to trains.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| the freight companies lobbied for passenger travel to
| become the government's responsibility, IMO the american
| people were robbed of the value they were entitled to when
| the right of ways were granted to the railroads back in the
| 19th century, but in the 60s and 70s railroads were going
| bankrupt left and right, establishment of Amtrak was little
| more than a bailout for the railroads. The government could
| be asking a lot more of the railroads to run shorter trains
| so they could fit on their sidings and allow passengers to
| pass and remain on time. IME the #1 issue with Amtrak
| outside of north east corridor is most stations are served
| by long haul routes that cannot be relied upon to show up
| within 6 hours of their schedule, because any delay causes
| them to lose their slot and freight companies can tell
| Amtrak to pound sand, their trains are too long to pull
| over.
| screye wrote:
| That's how the TGV and subways do it. You scan in.
|
| It's unconvienent if a human needs to read a ticket. But tap-in
| or scan-in systems are pretty fast.
| jackcarter wrote:
| It's been this way for over a decade:
| https://www.vox.com/2014/3/31/5563600/everything-you-need-to...
| renewiltord wrote:
| This method of boarding at DC famously resulted in 100+
| passengers waiting upstairs as the train left without them
| https://wtop.com/travel/2024/12/passengers-frustrated-as-
| amt...
| Gibbon1 wrote:
| I remember reading with horror that the California high speed
| rail will have the TSA doing security. That's absolutely last
| thing the systems needs.
| Aperocky wrote:
| Huh? I ride amtrak every week and there are no ticket check
| until train has moved. And if you always come about 5-10
| minutes before departure no lines either.
| oasisbob wrote:
| Amtrak practices vary by region and station.
|
| Here on Amtrak Cascades, Seattle and Portland both do
| "airplane style" entry with ticket checks and sometimes seat
| assignment in the station, but at more minor stops (eg
| Longview, Bellingham) you hop aboard one of the open cars and
| get checked by the conductor.
| tdeck wrote:
| I recently took Amtrak across the country. In both Seattle and
| Chicago I showed up about 10 minutes before my train departed.
| Sure, they checked my ticket before I got onto the platform,
| but the experience was absolutely nothing like taking a flight.
| I wonder if it was something about the particular day or
| station you were at that made this worse.
| MisterTea wrote:
| I take it once or twice a year to visit friends in the
| Baltimore area. Penn NY is guilty of that airline single file
| BS and find it completely annoying. At Baltimore Penn you just
| go to the platform and wait.
| crazygringo wrote:
| It's been that way for decade(s?) in New York. Presumably
| because otherwise too many people try to take it a stop or two
| for free before the conductor comes around to check tickets.
|
| It's not a thing at any other Amtrak station I've been to,
| where the next stop often isn't for 45 minutes or more.
|
| And no you can't have conductors in every train car. That's way
| too expensive and not needed for the rest of the 12 hour
| journey or whatever it is.
| CSMastermind wrote:
| This seems to be part of a debate I'm unfamiliar with.
|
| I am however familiar with this style of argument. The page reads
| like a lot of motivated reasoning, where they have a conclusion
| set and they're selecting data, massaging statistics, etc. to fit
| into their narrative.
|
| They might be right in the points they're making, I have no idea,
| but the style of the article definitely makes me skeptical.
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| I mean... it's a rebuttal. See my comment below: we already put
| out a report saying we thought through running was the right
| approach, and now we're responding to Amtrak's report on the
| topic.
|
| Even if there were passenger circulation issues problems (and
| our passenger model was half-written when we did the first
| report), there are other solutions like decking over tracks to
| join adjacent platforms into a wider platform. We're happy that
| do not appear necessary, but if it did it doesn't fatally
| imperil through running as being the best option.
|
| Finally, the number of outright errors and dubious claims in
| the Amtrak study makes us think _they_ are doing their own
| reasoning. If you really don 't believe my previous two
| paragraphs, just think ask yourself motivated reasoning seems
| less suspect! :)
|
| Through-running, unlike 10s billions for a station expansion,
| is a cheap experiment. We can just try it! If there are more
| passengers than expected (yay! Though) and safe circulation
| does become and issue, that's great new info and very little
| money wasted.
| crote wrote:
| Why not do the same with Amtrak's reports?
|
| From a European perspective a 15-22 minute dwell time sounds
| _ludicrous_. My local train station is pretty large and
| designed around through trains, and a 7-minute followup between
| departures (so between train 1 departing on track X to train 2
| departing on track X) is routine here.
|
| If it can be done over here, what makes Penn Station so special
| that they need 3x as much time? Why can't Amtrak do what other
| railway companies have been doing for years? Amtrak is already
| lying about other countries using headway-based scheduling, so
| can they really be trusted about the rest?
|
| I have no idea if this ETA article is 100% trustworthy, but
| Amtrak _definitely_ isn 't.
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Thank you! We need a lot more Europeans berating us, truly!
| :)
| TuringNYC wrote:
| I ride into NYC 3x/wk via Penn Station. I realize ETANY is not
| affiliated with NJTransit, but I dont see how a system with the
| level of incompetence that NJTransit has could possibly handle
| more complexity.
|
| NJ Transit can barely seem to handle service w/o Through-Running,
| so any discussion of expanding service seems premature. Here are
| some highlights:
|
| - Inability to tell consumers ahead of time that trains will be
| stopped (even though they know well in advance.) Now, entire
| private WhatsApp groups have been set up where commuters warn
| each other of stopped trains and clogged stations. This leads to
| people coming to Penn Station only to find out trains are not
| running/cancelled/delayed. This is with a hub/spoke -- imagine if
| they expand beyond Penn Station into CT/LI.
|
| - Inability/Unwillingness to communicate sources of blockages.
| There are ways to bypass NYPenn/Secaucus and go directly to
| Newark (PATH train). But NJTransit wont tell you where the
| blockage is, so its impossible to work around delays
|
| - Inability/Unwillingness to communicate which trains will depart
| first, when multiple trains are backed up and queued up. People
| guess and hope they choose the "next" train.
|
| - Regularly cancelled trains, esp after 7pm. They randomly cancel
| scheduled trains. No point in a schedule if you wont follow the
| schedule.
|
| I'd want to contain the chaos of NJTransit to NYPenn Station and
| not beyond. At most, a 2nd stop at GC (like with LIRR did). The
| system isnt currently mature enough to be granted more
| responsibility.
|
| Mind you -- this would be valuable. Folks who move to NJ
| necessarily cut themselves off CT jobs (esp hedge funds, etc.) So
| of course, having thru traffic from NJ all the way to CT would
| open up huge pools of job applicants and job opportunities.
| Projectiboga wrote:
| These arguements are also good to suggest they should not get
| the planned expansion of terminus tracks.
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| > I realize ETANY is not affiliated with NJTransit
|
| We are equally unaffiliated with all the railroads and transit
| agencies :)
|
| We do have membership in NJ are very much as in the transit
| going-ons through the tri-state area. A big unifying idea is
| that the economic geography doesn't care about political
| boundaries, and so the transportation planning shouldn't
| either.
|
| ------
|
| > NJ Transit can barely seem to handle service w/o Through-
| Running, so any discussion of expanding service seems
| premature. Here are some highlights:
|
| You do raise a good point that through-running does require
| some amount of competence --- simply have a more interconnected
| rail network (revenue service on both sides) inherently means
| there is more potential for failures to propagate throughout
| the network. But, we'd like to believe this is surmountable.
|
| ------
|
| 1. First of all, NJT and the MTA have done it before! See
| "train to the game". See:
|
| -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Haven_Line#Meadowlands_gam...
| - https://www.njtransit.com/press-releases/take-train-game-
| met...
|
| Of course, running some special event service is not the same
| as doing through running day-in and day-out, but it is
| something to build on.
|
| ------
|
| 2. What's the alternative?
|
| - If there is no new expansion _and_ no through-running, than
| the billions spent on Gateway way be rather wasted. That would
| be a huge embarrassment to the agencies, and politicians that
| stuck their neck out for the funding, alike.
|
| - If Penn Expansion is not pursued for bullshit reasons, but
| the kayfabe is dropped and its done for the _honest_ reason
| that no one believes agency competency can be improved, that is
| also embarrassing. Would the station actually be funded at that
| point?
|
| We therefore think even just changing the conversation to
| acknowledge that ops competency, and not station geometry, is
| the binding constraint, would be a major improvement.
|
| ------
|
| 3. We have time
|
| In line with the above counter-factuals, the rubber only hits
| the road ( _excuse me_ , steel hits the tracks :)) once Gateway
| is done. For better or worse, that is a long way off. This
| gives the agencies time to get ready.
|
| - The money that would be been spent on station improvements
| can be spent on NJT "tech debt" instead --- all the behind the
| scenes infra that enables higher reliability.
|
| - Congestion pricing should be raised, and hopefully the next
| crop of NJ politicians will be more open-minded and accept some
| money for NJT.
|
| - Penn Station Access sending Metro North trains to Penn
| station makes for a good opportunity to "train" the agencies
| through-running, prior to Gateway being finished. And don't
| forget "train to the game".
|
| ------
|
| > Mind you -- this would be valuable. Folks who move to NJ
| necessarily cut themselves off CT jobs (esp hedge funds, etc.)
| So of course, having thru traffic from NJ all the way to CT
| would open up huge pools of job applicants and job
| opportunities.
|
| Yes, it is a huge opportunity! Our main report
| (https://www.etany.org/modernizing-new-york-commuter-rail)
| talked quite a lot about that. I wish our politicians were less
| provincial about state boundaries, and better able to visualize
| just how impactful expanding commute sheds is.
|
| ------
|
| A final disclaimer: I am far less knowledgable on train things
| than the other ETA members, so take this all with a bit more
| grain of salt.
| Projectiboga wrote:
| Through running is to avoid an upcoming real estate grab /
| bodogale where Stephen Ross's Vonado wants to let the state of NY
| use emmenent domain, skip city land use review and demolish an
| entire block 8th ave to 7th fromst 31st to 30th street. This is
| for him to build mega office towers and build more terminus rail
| platforms.
|
| The idea of through-running is to not have trains parked like
| that in an over crouded midtown. That way they can reduce the
| number of tracks and widen the platforms. It has beem done with
| great success in many big cities already. The idea would be to
| have NJ Transit trains run to platforms at their rail yard in
| Queens. This is a large ripe for development area between Long
| Island City and Sunnyside Queens. It could also go farther to
| Port Morris in the Bronx and link with Metro North and the
| further North East rail corridor. Long Island Rail could go to a
| new terminus rail yard in NJ which could have a bus terminal to
| reduce the amount of busses into NYC. The main issue I can see is
| some of those commuter runs are too long for crew rotations and
| may require crew shifts who just do last stop in NJ through to
| the outer boro NYC rail yards.
|
| Here is the group advocating this idea. Rethink Penn Station NYC
| https://www.rethinkpennstationnyc.org/
| mncharity wrote:
| > Through running is to avoid an upcoming real estate grab
| [...] and build more terminus rail platforms
|
| Could one craft a gold-plated through-running transit hub
| proposal which supports the grab? Then transit improves, grab
| or no grab. Given the dominant power of real estate in NYC, the
| TFA had for me the feel of a proposal from engineering to a
| c-suite with big divergent incentives. Could one tease apart
| the "don't build badly" from the "don't need to build"
| arguments? "There are better alternatives to that, but if that
| gets done anyway for whatever reasons, at least get it right by
| ...".
| renewiltord wrote:
| This is clearly written for an audience that already knows what's
| going on. I don't, so I'm curious. Is the difference between:
| outer terminus------>ny penn|alight|board new train|----->later
| station
|
| vs. outer terminus------>ny penn|stay on
| train|---->later station
|
| Why does the latter need more tracks? This seems intuitively
| obvious that it shouldn't, but maybe I don't understand this.
|
| EDIT: Thank you to the commenters (who I can't answer because I'm
| rate-limited).
| jccooper wrote:
| The former (terminating lines) needs more tracks/platforms at
| the station, because turning the train around takes more time
| than stopping and continuing (through running) and turning
| around at the end of the line.
| crote wrote:
| It's about how trains are running.
|
| Consider a rail network connected like A-B-C . With terminating
| trains you'd have one train run A-B-A, and another train run
| C-B-C. With through trains you'd have one train run A-B-C and
| another train run C-B-A. Terminating trains have to stop and
| reverse, which takes quite a lot of time because the driver has
| to go to the other end of the train. Through trains can just
| continue in the same direction, so it is a lot faster.
|
| Because a through train occupies the track for less time you
| don't need as many tracks to serve the same number of trains
| per hour.
| librasteve wrote:
| through running is a highly effective mass transit approach as
| exemplified in Munich & Berlin (S-Bahn), Paris (RER), and now
| London (Lizzy Line)
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