But needless to say, the completion of this project is going to have BIG effects on the LIRR. A press release from the MTA this morning said that the new signaling system practically allows the LIRR to double the amount of trains it can run into Penn Station during rush hours! That means that we'll be seeing more and more super-expresses and less and less standees on trains.
The MTA did not publicly disclose exactly what their plans were for taking advantage of this huge increase in the amount of trains the LIRR would be able to run. It did say, however, that LIRR schedule workers are working feverishly to adjust schedules to take every advantage from this new system as possible. The LIRR said that riders could even see as many as 50 new scheduled trains begging with the very next schedule change on May 20th and even more trains as we move throughout the rest of the year.
The press release said that LIRR customers can expect commute times slashed by 20-30 minutes in many cases! Gone are those superloacls that make every single stop along the way. Soon we'll be seeing many more off-peak expresses and shorter, more frequent services to every station on the railroad.
The MTA did announce that one of the first new express trains that would be looked into is a Ronkonkoma to Penn Station super-express that would not make any stops in between. The LIRR proudly estimated that this super-express run could make the 50 mile Ronkonkoma-Penn Station run is as fast as 53 minutes!
And that's not the half of it. The LIRR is going to be taking some serious looks into how their branches are set up, and in a year's time we might be looking at a very different LIRR map.
The LIRR also said that in just a couple short months we could be seeing things like weekend expresses that skip Jamiaca, direct service to Penn Station for all electric branches at all times of the day, many more off-peak expresses.
The MTA also said that this new ultra-capacity signal system would allow trains to move through the tunnels and station far more quickly then they do now. The press release said that as many as 6-7 minutes could come off of every single train that operates into Penn Station (which is fantastic news!)
Needless to say, this project is a huge accomplishment by both the MTA and Amtrak, and it should be very interesting to see what they are going to do with train schedules going forward. I'm not holding out for any Montauk-NYP express runs, but we'll see what happens.
At this point in reading the post, I'm sure you are just as excited as I am about this huge project. But, I'd like to call attention to the date at the very top of this post--April 1st. April 1 is commonly known as April Fool's Day, and I must, at this point, say:
April Fools!
*ducks for cover*
But seriously, a so-called "high capacity" signal system is currently being though about by Amtrak for the East River Tunnels, however, a project of that kind is nowhere near actually being completed, and even if it was, it'd be very unlikely that we'd be seeing things like weekend expresses and 53 minute Ronkonkoma runs.
But one can dream!
April Fools!
