Comment by twobitshifter | Hacker News Reader

Comment by twobitshifter | Hacker News Reader

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The article doesn’t understand dwell times at Penn Station or the capacity limitations there.

For example:

* Penn Station Dwells are not limited by passenger movement at doors. It’s not a metro, go and watch trains being loaded.

* Escalators constrain the rate at which people can actually reach the platforms

* These escalators need to switch direction when a train arrives, meaning multiple arrivals and departures are not simultaneously supported.

* The tracks do not support all operators and the station design divides Amtrak from LIRR

* Some tracks do not support full train lengths

* Not all tracks in the station are through tracks

* Trains are terminating at NYP which requires a longer process of ensuring no passengers are still on on board before leaving for the yard.

* It’s not only the north and east river tunnels, there is an entrance from the Empire line for Amtrak and separate paths to the WSSY for LIRR, not to mention train storage within Penn in the ACDE yards.

* Engineers walk the entire length of the train when a trip reverses direction. This takes a long time. The OP mentions through-running solution, but doesn’t point out the problems with it, namely incompatible equipment and giving an entirely different agency access to your multimillion dollar trains.

I could go on and on.

> Escalators constrain the rate at which people can actually reach the platforms

Let people wait on the platform as the train arrives. This is something that basically every train operator but Amtrak does.

> The tracks do not support all operators and the station design divides Amtrak from LIRR

This isn't a problem... trains in most stations are already basically scheduled to an individual platform anyways.

> Trains are terminating at NYP which requires a longer process of ensuring no passengers are still on on board before leaving for the yard.

Through-run trains. Yes, this requires cracking some heads at NJT and LIRR (and MTA before much longer). Is it really worth spending billions of dollars to avoid having to resolve agency turf fights?

The platforms are not large enough to support people waiting at the same time as the train is unloading and are full of columns. There are safety concerns in not being able to evacuate passengers quickly enough in the event of an emergency via narrow escalators.

Through running NJ Transit onto LIRR is through running AC trains onto a DC network. That is billions. In addition, nobody from NJ wants to go to Long Island and vice versa, and most NJ Trains run-through the station in the same direction already to be stored at Sunnyside. The same is true of LIRR, they go into the west side yard as a straight move. The NJ trains that don’t run to SSY are usually making use of the stub end tracks at Penn where through running isn’t an option.

> Let people wait on the platform as the train arrives. This is something that basically every train operator but Amtrak does.

I haven't been to penn station in a while but I know the LIRR track numbers aren't available until the train arrives or right before. This dictates which platform to stand on.

Basically you end up standing in a huge open lobby and eventually a big display says to goto track 21, then there's a mad rush of people making their way to track 21 which involves leaving the lobby, going down stairs, and making your way to the track to board the train.

Also known as poor operations which can be fixed through changes to operations.

Los Angeles Union station turns around the Pacific Surfliner because it's a end stop - and they've now been working for 10+ years on adding a through track which would shave 20+ minutes off the trip.

And that one doesn't need anything but a bridge over a freeway.

> Let people wait on the platform as the train arrives. This is something that basically every train operator but Amtrak does.

In no small part because the platforms are too narrow — something that getting rid of several tracks would readily fix. (Just fill in the space between two platforms and you have a nice, very wide platform.)

Not directly in this, but Alon (the author) has consistently harped on how bad US train operations are.

> * Escalators constrain the rate at which people can actually reach the platforms > * These escalators need to switch direction when a train arrives, meaning multiple arrivals and departures are not simultaneously supported.

> * Some tracks do not support full train lengths > * Not all tracks in the station are through tracks

Alon isn't against a station remodel. He is against this one because it is a bad plan. Platforms should be full length for the train that will use them. Platforms should be wide enough for people to wait on them. Penn station needs less platforms that are used better, not more of them that cannot be used very well.

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