First, a bit of history: the Mets-Willets Point Station was first opened in 1939 to serve the thousands and thousands of people who came out to see 1939 New York World's Fair which was held at Flushing Meadows. When the United Nations came to be in 1946 the station was known as United Nations Station, as Flushing Meadows was the temporary base camp of the UN for its first couple years (with shuttle busses running to the temporary UN headquarters in Lake Success).
When the UN moved to its permanent home in Midtown Manhattan in 1952, the station was closed up again. However, the LIRR reopened this station in January of 1964 (with the name World's Fair) to serve the World's Fair that was ongoing at that time.
Also in 1964, the LIRR extended the wooden ramp/boardwalk from where it had originally gone after the 1939 World's Fair all the way to the site of the then-newly built Shea Stadium.
After the World's Fair closed in 1965, the station was thence renamed to Shea Stadium where it served Mets fans every year all the way up to the stadium's closing in 2008.
After the stadium was demolished in 2008 and the new Citi Field was opened in 2009, the LIRR renamed the station to Mets-Willets Point as we know it today. The MTA tried its hardest to get Citibank (the company whose name would appear on the new stadium) to give them money to put their company's name on the station (so the station would've been called Citi Field if they ponied up some cash). But Citibank didn't want to pay, so the MTA chose the name Mets-Willets Point, as not to give Citi any free advertising.
Mets-Willets Point station is very unique as well. First of all, it has three island platforms and 6 tracks, making it one of only two stations in the system to have a setup of that kind (Atlantic Terminal is the other). I guess the station's original developers assumed that with the large crowds expected at the stadium, having 6 different tracks to load and unload trains trains on would afford them increased flexibility.
So you can see in the diagram above that the station still has its six different tracks, however the LIRR uses only tracks 1 and 2. Tracks 3 through 6 are never used for passenger trains, though one might see an occasional freight car every now and then pop up there. There aren't even staircases from the big passenger mezzanine down to those platforms. At the station, tacks 1 through 4 are all eight cars long, while tracks 5 and 6 can only hold 6 car trains.
Tracks 3 through 6 at this station split off the Port Washington Branch's eastbound track and merge back in after the station. Only the very westernmost switch in this station complex is a part of SHEA interlocking, everything else would have to be hand thrown to get trains in there.
All of the tracks have third rail, though the third rails on tracks 3-6 are rarely used (not to mention looking at that diagram there would probably some pretty nasty third rail gaps as you tried to get over to tracks 5-6!)
And because tracks 1-2 are the only ones the LIRR currently uses in event service, they're the only ones the LIRR really takes care of. The other two platforms are in pretty crummy condition after years of not being used or cared about, so they would need an awful lot of work to get in service (something the LIRR is thinking about doing: see below).
Back to Shea Stadium's (er--Mets-Willets Point's) uniqueness. It is also one of the two LIRR stations only served on event days (Belmont Park being the other) and one of only three part time stations (Belmont Park and Pinelawn being the others).
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So now, on event days the LIRR sends a team of conductors over to Mets-Willets Point to get it all ready to receive crowds. At Mets-Willets Point, the LIRR sets up a fare control system at the station. So if you are traveling to/from Mets-Willets Point on a Port Washington Branch train, you'll get your ticket looked at at the actual station, not on the train. Why? With many, many people crammed onto these trains, realistically, conductors probably won't be able to get a look at everybody's ticket, so its just easier to handle everybody's in one place. There is also a separate line for those fools who don't buy a ticket ahead of time, so they could be all sorted out without holding everybody else up.
So basically if you're looking to get to Mets-Willets Point on a game day, you're going to have to transfer at Woodside. Since Mets-Willets Point is on the Port Washington Branch, those trains are not going to Jamaica and are realativley sealed off from the rest of the railroad, so the only practical way to get there is to take a train from your home station to Woodside, then hop on another train for the quick ride over to Mets-Willets Point.
The main problem with switching in Woodside is that not a whole lot of trains stop directly at Woodside. Ronkonkoma and Long Beach ones usually do, but Huntington and Babylon trains usually make Forest Hills and Kew Gardens and skip over Woodside. So those people would have to change at Jamaica first. But the LIRR does sort of help people out a little bit by having some trains make extra stops at Woodside. Which ones actually do make the extra stops aren't publicly disclosed in one neat place like any normal public agency would do, so you just have to look out for track information monitors and listen for station announcements and hope for the best.
The LIRR's tariff (fare) policy also makes a kind concession to Mets-Willets Point customers. Normally, if you are traveling in one direction and want to change trains to go back in the other direction, you would have to pay what's called the "via" fare (which is the most expensive of the two legs + $1.00). But for customers going to Mets-Willets Point they only have to pay the normal zone 1 from the station they're traveling. The extra leg to Mets-Willets Point is on the house.
When you get a ticket via Woodside to Mets-Willets point it also prints another second strip of boxes for the conductors to punch. This one ticket I found in my drawer from when I took my nephew to a game doesn't seem to have anything punched in that second set of boxes, oddly enough.
Now as far as traveling via Woodisde works with the peak vs. off peak fares I'm not quite sure how that works out. I know the eastbound trains TO the game on weekday evenings are considered peak trains, and for via fares the whole trip is considered peak if any one segment requires a peak ticket, but my initial assumption is that if you're coming from a place like Mineola for an evening weekday game, an off-peak ticket would be good enough (even though you are spending a couple minutes on a peak train). I'll check on that, though.
There is also one more thing I'd like to talk about in respect to Mets game day service, but I'm just about to run out of time. It has to do with a scheduling oddity. If you think you know what it is, post it in the comments and we'll see if anyone else picked up on it, but I'll make a separate post on that later in the week (probably Tuesday). I also have some photos of Mets-Willets Point station, but I don't have enough time to look through my computer for them. I'll look for them later too.
For now, you can find a pdf file of this year's Mets game day schedule for your purusal. Let's hope we're using it all the way into the postseason this year! (hahaha)
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