Drawing only 187 riders a day, St. Albans exhibits the lowest ridership of a full-time station in electric territory, the lowest ridership of a full-time station within the city limits, the lowest ridership of all the stations along the Babylon Branch, and the lowest ridership of all the stations on the West Hempstead Branch (now that's saying something). In the grand scheme of things, stopping at St. Albans is only letting the AC out.
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| St. Albans Station. Note the completely empty platform. |
Why is ridership so poor? It's not because of poor service. On the average weekday, 36 trains waste their time stopping there and it has direct service to both Penn Station and Atlantic Terminal during rush hours. Stations that see even less trains than St. Albans manage to draw more riders.
Another bothersome trait about St. Albans is the fact that the station can't seem to pick a branch. Technically it is shown as a West Hempstead Branch station, as it's colored light blue on the map and its trains are shown in the West Hempstead Branch timetable, but in reality, the station is in the middle of the Montauk Branch, and of those 36 trains, only 4 stop at both the actual West Hempstead Branch stations and St. Albans.
The 32 other trains that stop at St. Albans come from someplace other than West Hempstead. For the most part, a St. Albans stop is tacked onto a Babylon local, much to the dismay of its passengers. Think about it, an off-peak Babylon local is already making over fourteen stops, the one stretch of railroad where the train can actually get up to speed and stretch its legs it has to slow down and stop at St. Albans for no good reason at all.
Then there is St. Alban's representation in the West Hempstead timetable. Since the vast majority of train that stop at St. Albans do not stop at West Hempstead Branch stations, the timetable gets all thrown out of whack and there is a ridiculous amount of open space.
So what should we do with St. Albans? As much as I would like to just have it boarded up and the MTA's money wasted elsewhere, closing stations isn't a good thing. St. Albans is in the city and there should be decent potential for ridership at this station, but nobody seems to show up.
In yesterday's post we talked about the West Hempstead Branch as a whole. In that post, I mentioned that the LIRR absolutely must overhaul the schedules on the branch and get rid of that annoying and useless transfer at Valley Stream. If they decided to run the trains from West Hempstead through to Jamaica, Atlantic Teminal, or Hunterspoint Avenue, the LIRR can schedule these West Hempstead Branch trains, and these trains alone, (on 90 minute headways) to stop at St. Albans and all other Babylon trains will no longer stop here.
You could actually end up simplifying things here on a pretty congested part of the railroad. West Hempstead shuttles will no longer have to make a clumsy move across the plant at VALLEY interlocking, as you could almost remove Valley Stream from the West Hempstead Branch schedule entirely, St. Albans will once again become a real West Hempstead Branch station served by trains to or from that branch, and Babylon locals will no longer have to waste their time stopping at such a lightly used station. Furthermore, since most West Hempstead Branch trains aren't longer than six cars, the world will forever be freed from having to hear "only the first six cars will platform at St. Albans" repeated four hundred times in the minutes leading up to the stop there.
So in conclusion, the fitting solution to the St. Albans conundrum would be to make extended West Hempstead Branch trains, and only West Hempstead Branch trains, make stops at St. Albans on their 90 minute headways to/from Jamaica or Hunterspoint Avenue. All other trains would continue to pass right by St. Albans and proceed to stations where the ridership warrants their stopping. In future years if ridership increases, presumably it will do so hand-in-hand with the other West Hempstead Branch stations, and service can be beefed up along the entire branch simultaneously.
But until then, St. Albans is just that awkward station in the middle of the Montauk Branch that doesn't really have a ridership base or a real branch to call home.
In the 1970's, it was down to one train a day, like Springfield Gardens, and targeted for abandonment as well. Public outcry from the Elmhurst abandonment, which actually did have some usage, called political attention ( Laura Blackburn) to LIRR's bad attitude regarding Queens, it was east of Jamaica, predated Metrocard in a "double fare zone", and the Federal government, via the VA Hospital, may have made it an issue.
ReplyDeleteSo we are stuck with it. As long as the LIRR has as bad an attitude with the West Hempstead Branch as with the Greenport Scoot, it should be placed in the Babylon Branch schedule.
I think the real reason why St Albans isn't well used is because it lacks parking. There doesn't look like there is a lot of space for it unless they build a parking lot on the VA hospital grounds. There is few options when it comes to transit out here, there is a few bus lines and the closest subway station is in Jamaica Center quite a distance from St Albans. While the station certainly has potential (particularly during a transit strike) it suffers from being in a area with relatively low population density. Most people in the area drive to where they want to go or don't go to Manhattan.
ReplyDeleteIn the mornings, considering we only have a few (three) sensible peak trains, there are a good amount of people on the platform. In the afternoons, there are many eastbound options with few people exiting a train.
ReplyDeleteAlso, on weekends, the two hour gap between trains and the first westbound train departing at 7:44, it just doesn't make sense to go through the hassle of using St. Albans.
Throw in a parking lot, and a more sensible schedule (not more trains, just trains that make sense) and you'll see an increase in ridership.