There are cities in other parts of the world (particularly Europe), who have successfully managed to integrate their suburban commuter rail systems into their urban transit network. They don't view their commuter railroads as big heavy railroads that are nothing but a tiny, thin blue line on their maps and have nothing to do with the city's transportation system, they are essentially viewed as extensions of the city's transportation system.
There are Queens communities who live past the final terminals of the Subways and would love to have some sort of connection to the city that didn't involve a long bus ride and and even longer subway ride. They could take the LIRR in from places like Bayside, Douglaston, Queens Village, Laurelton, but they don't.
In recent years, the LIRR has done a good job of driving off all but a small bunch of intra-city travelers. The fares are much more expensive than just taking the bus and/or subway, and even the steeper express bus fare. The LIRR's current fare structure for Intra-City travel does an excellent job at convincing travelers who might want to take the train to run to catch the bus instead.
Currently, to get from Queens Village to Midtwon Manhattan, one can either hop on the LIRR and pay between $7 and $9.50 depending on the time of day. Or they could catch a bus, transfer to a subway, and spend a little more time traveling but only pay $2.50. They can save by either pitching in for a $210 LIRR zone 3 monthly or a $112 30-day MetroCard. When you break down the financials of it, it's easy to see why there's only roughly 750 riders at Queens Village (and only 110 at Hollis) take the LIRR.
The common response to any discussion about intra-city travel on the LIRR is that the passengers coming in from Nassau and Suffolk Counties (and paying fares appropriate to the distances they're traveling), don't want to be overrun by the city "riff-raff" who will pile on and take up all of their seats once they cross the city line. Thus, the only way the LIRR can please the Long Islanders is to provide paltry service and charge steep fares so only the dumbest of travelers dare to take the trains and withhold seats from the Long Islanders.
In a way, these concerns are not entirely unreasonable. Imagine an F-train loads worth of people trying to cram onto an already standee-laden Ronkonkoma Branch train in Jamaica. All hell would break loose. You can't exactly charge $2.50 for travel on the LIRR since it is a capacity-restricted system that can't run service levels anywhere close to what systems like Paris' RER can (for various reasons which is a topic for another day) and they do have to try to serve their primary market as much as possible (or at least not overwhelm them with swarms of people). I personally don't really have to worry about it in my case since none of my branch's trains stop at anything other than Jamaica and the western terminals within New York City, but the trains that do currently stop at the city stations can be well-traveled, despite the LIRR's best efforts.
Ideally, there should be a way for the LIRR to incentivise intra-city travel, but in a way that doesn't suffocate the riders who are traveling for much longer distances. But at the same time, service to the outer Queens stations is kinda crummy during the off-peak periods (bi-hourly to St. Albans, hourly at most other places). Expanding service to these stations would do more to attract intra-city riders, but you can run 3-minute headways and still not attract riders with the "difficult" fare structure.
In an attempt to find a workable solution that would meet the above criteria, I have worked to keep the intra-city riders from getting cut off in the sample East Side Access timetables I have been working on.
First, to address the issue of service levels, I have worked to provide more service to the stations within the city limits by having additional trains that originate or terminate at places like Great Neck and Valley Stream. While those two stations are not within the city limits themselves, they are just across the border and are convenient places to turn trains. (These trains are shown on the sample Far Rockaway Branch and Port Washington Branch timetables, for starters). This allows for more service to these city stations. While I have not provided 10 minute headways all day long, manageable headways between trains have been established during the daytime with expanded service during the peak period and the busiest travel times on the weekends. Additional trains are also coming to the Queens Hempstead Branch stations (which will rather be handed over to a new Belmont Park Branch that can operate exclusively within the city limits) as well as the West of Jamaica stations, but those will be coming in future posts.
In a way, these trains will serve as an extension of the subway system. The trains will take on the local stops within Brooklyn and Queens and run straight to one of the western terminals. These trains are not going to necessarily operate with huge 12-car consists, but rather shorter, more manageable length trains with more manageable sized crews.
Next, to address the issue of fares, something will need to be done to bring those down to more manageable rates. I can't necessarily suggest lowering fares (since heaven forbid we even think of lowering fares), but I think it would be workable to freeze current fares for travel within and between zones 1 and 3 (the two fare zones that lie within the city limits). In terms of when the LIRR will be able to do all of this in
I think it would also be good to introduce a new "City Fare." Like today's CityTicket, it would encourage intra-city travel. The "City Fare" would expand upon CityTicket as it would be valid during all off-peak times, not just Saturdays and Sundays. However, unlike CityTicket, which is currently valid on all trains that run on weekends, the City Fare would only be valid on certain trains.
The City Fare, which will be priced at approximately 40% more than whatever the current single-ride MetroCard fare is (so if it's $2.75, the City Fare would be approximately $3.75, if it's $3, it would be roughly$4, $3.25 it would be $4.50), will be valid on trains that run completely within New York City (or just across the border into Nassau County). Trains that originate/terminate at Great Neck and Valley Stream will be included in the City Fare program because those are just across the border into Nassau County and are convenient places to turn trains.
The trains which the City Fare would be valid on are shown in the timetables with the note CITY at the top of the column (right underneath the train number). This City Fare would encourage riders within the city limits to gravitate to these new, shorter trains that run entirely within New York City (which would otherwise be somewhat empty during the off-peak times today). The fact that the lower City Fare would be valid only on these trains will also naturally work to keep the city hoards off of the trains that go out to the eastern terminals on Long Island. Passengers will still be able to hop on or off Ronkonkoma and Babylon trains within the city, that won't be prohibited, but they would have to pay the regular off-peak fare to do so (which would be frozen, so it wouldn't be substantially more, remember). This doesn't force people to take any particular train, but it does "encourage" riders to take the specifically targeted intra-city trains and stay off the busier Long Island trains.
So, in summation, the general lowering of fares for travel between and within zones 1 and 3, coupled with the introduction of a new "City Fare" and new intra-city trains will encourage and help the LIRR build up it's Intra-City ridership. The LIRR will be getting a lot of extra slots and capacity at their western terminals. They're not going to be able to fill all of those with 10-minute headways to Ronkonkoma, so they would be better off using some of that extra breathing room in the tunnels to split up some long locals into trains that operate wholly within New York City (or just across the border) and trains that bypass all of the city stops and head straight into Nassau County.
So instead of spending millions, billions, or even trillions to extend all of the subways out to the Queens Borders to serve everyone, why not take advantage of the billions we're already spending on East Side Access and the capacity that will afford us during the off-peak times to integrate the LIRR's existing infrastructure and the extra room it will soon get into New York City's transit network? Funding these trains and subsidizing the lower City Fares for the next century will probably be much cheaper than extending the all of the subway lines out into Queens to serve anyone.
The following document summarizes the City Fare prices and policies associated with the ticket. More elaboration on the specifics of the City Fare are given there, and I'll be happy to answer any questions about what's unclear:
View an index of all of the sample East Side Access timetables, the posts about those timetables, and revision history, right here.
