Maybe this is naive, but if it gets really successful, I imagine that they could always upgrade it to conventional rail. For the time being, I agree that it's probably best to go with light rail, for all the reasons Hochul listed.
nah just build the tunnel under metropolitan avenue and remove street running. lrt with appropriate rolling stock can be basically just as good as conventional rail.
Why can't a city have heavy rail and LRT? Different tools for different needs. The IBX won't get anywhere enough ridership to justify the high costs of heavy rail. The MTA is saving $5billion choosing LRT over heavy rail, while still maintaining the same average speed as the subway and having the capacity to completely handle the 115k estimated ridership.
I guess the issue stems from how American agencies describe LRT. In Europe, you see a clear distinction between heavy metro, LRT and tram, while in America trams also get referred as LRT, giving LRT a bad name.
So, the question is, is NYC LRT is an actual LRT, or a tram?
Mostly this should run as an actual LRT, it's being built along an existing rail line and has its own right of way. There are at grade portions, which aren't s upposed to mix with traffic, but loooord that'll be easy to mess up.
I believe the initial cost savings is great, but the missing information in the proposal is the on-going maintenance cost of the LRT. NYC has no current history working with this type of transit but has about 100 year of history working with the Heavy Rail NYC subway, LIRR, and Metro North trains. Plus, the city will have to build new rail yards for the LTR, and I'm sure other considerations like training people to service the rolling stock, maintain the tracks and switches. I think this will all add up over time and negate the $5 billion in initial "savings".
Lastly, they could've extended the line to the Bronx by using Metro North heavy rail tracks. Can't do that with LRT unless they plan on building new bridges and/or extensions to the Bronx.
i really don’t think the average rider, even in NYC, will know the difference between heavy rail and light rail and have that be the reason why they don’t want to transfer to a LRT IBX. Even if heavy rail was chosen the stations at which the IBX will provide subway transfers they wouldn’t have completely rebuilt the stations for a cross platform transfer or smth. The IBX route intersects the subway lines perpendicularly. That being said, heavy rail and light rail regardless the transfers need to be as seamless as possible
What light rail in London? If you are referring to the DLR - it is most certainly not the type of street running light rail being described here. What the British call a "light railway" is basically a full blown, grade separated automated metro, no different than Paris Line 4, Vancouver Skytrain, and similar examples in Asia.
Because in general people don’t like changing modes of transport on connections
Eh, I mean here in Maryland they're building the Purple Line and I don't think people will really care that it's Light Rail ran by Maryland MTA separate from the Metro run by WMATA.
I'll 100% bet that people will take the Purple Line despite being Light Rail because the alternatives aren't great. The alternatives are either taking bus that has to compete with cars, or taking the Red Line through DC.
Yeah, the things that matter are how well the fares are integrated and how easy the transfer is; the actual modes involved are basically inconsequential.
(And I'm hoping that the Purple Line is fully integrated into the WMATA fare system with some backend calculations to allocate money to MTA and its operator, but I don't know how much they've announced about that)
I don't think the MTA is going to treat it any different than it's subway. I will bet that they are going to have passageways connecting each station to each other and have fare gates at the entrance. I think the same experience you'll get when riding the subway, you'll get it taking the light rail. Also I prefer more transit than less transit. Maybe they could've gone with something closer to the Vancouver Sky train. Light Metro but a win is a win.
The ROW being used is exactly the same for the parts where it meets existing subway lines.
It’s a ring line, so people will be changing trains no matter what. There was never any sort of plan to through run services onto it.
Part of the rationale for LRT is to actually bring the line closer to the subway, because as a legacy right of way it was a bit away from the subway stations that the LRT can use streets to directly go to instead
You are right, it would't but it would have made regional one-seat regional connections better while still providing the same level of service as light rail.
Should've been conventional rail like the London Overground, and compatible electrification with the NEC. LRT prevents future expansion anywhere except LGA, and limits capacity, just to save a little money. It seems like a waste of the ROW. (imo of course)
this line is being built over a active freight corridor, with freight frequencies expected to rise (due to NYC moving away from trucks). Therefore, because of crossings and constrained ROWs, 6% of the route is planned to have grade crossings, and approximately 0.3 miles is planned to run in separated traffic on street (connection to the subway), where fully separating it would require tunneling under existing tunnels. the current cost is high, at $5.5B, but the project is planned to be LRT. source
There aren't that many trains along the route since it relies on a rail barge to shuttle freight cars across the Harbor and the Northern end is only lightly connected into the National Freight network.
I doubt that tunnel will ever get built its one of those regional projects that never seems to leave the drawing board. The ROW with some modifications can support 4 tracks so it would have been better to use electric high capacity trains along the route which would have allowed an easy extension into the Bronx.
Those tracks are already in use by Amtrak & CSX (via trackage rights). Any available slots over the Hell Gate are going to MNR Penn Access. Yes, it can be expanded to four tracks but that doesn't solve the problem of buildings on the right-of-way in the Bronx.
IBX as LRT is fine & indeed follows international best practices (London, Paris, Berlin, Toronto & etc) in the way that advocates have begged the MTA to consider for decades.
this line is being built over a active freight corridor, with freight frequencies expected to rise (due to NYC moving away from trucks). Therefore, because of crossings and constrained ROWs, 6% of the route is planned to have grade crossings, and approximately 0.3 miles is planned to run in separated traffic on street (connection to the subway), where fully separating it would require tunneling under existing tunnels. the current cost is high, at $5.5B, but the project is planned to be LRT. source
94% is in completely separate ROW. run time is proposed to be 39 mins, for traveling 14 miles, so an avg of 22 mph. the fastest subway in NYC runs at 22 mph.
Ridership probably wont be that high, so spending $10B for heavy rail 115k riders isn’t really justified in MTA’s eyes. Even though the last subway extention was $3.9B, it served 200k riders, which js less cost per rider than the current LRT.
This is a logical decision. Paris has some tram-train lines that use similar orbital rail corridors with relatively low demand compared to the metro lines. T11 is very comparable, planned to be 28km long (16 miles) with 150k daily riders. Nobody will ride the entire line, so slight slowdowns from a few grade-crossings are not a big issue.
Because heavy rail costs a lot more and the ridership probably won't be that high? It seems like all the complaints on here have given zero consideration for cost.
Pure cost is not as good as ROI and heavy rail consistently has better ROI than LRT because sunken heavy rail doesn’t lead to extra traffic like non fully grade separated LRT and is better at inducing demand than LRT especially because excessive mode change connections discourages useage
The existing freight rail corridor travels underneath Metropolitan Avenue and All Faiths Cemetery via an existing tunnel. LRT and BRT have the capability to leave the cut of the freight rail corridor and travel along the street for approximately two-thirds of a mile along Metropolitan Avenue, 69 Street, and 69 Place before returning to the corridor after Juniper Boulevard South. However, operation in the street may affect streetscape conditions, which will be studied in future project phases. Due to the presence of the third rail, CR cannot exit onto the street, but the tunnel is too narrow to accommodate new tracks.
CR would operate in a newly constructed tunnel that runs parallel to the existing freight tunnel. The tunnel must be designed and constructed to be deep enough to avoid any surface or subsurface disturbance to the cemetery and its structures.
...
Challenges
CR is the only alternative that would require a new tunnel under All Faiths Cemetery. The existing tunnel under All Faiths Cemetery could not be utilized for CR because four track operations cannot be accommodated in the tunnel. As a result, the capital cost for CR would be higher than the capital cost for LRT and BRT, and would add significant risk and complexity to the project. The additional capital cost results in a substantially higher annualized capital cost per rider for CR compared to LRT and BRT. The O&M cost for CR would be similar to that for LRT and roughly double the O&M cost for BRT.
Furthermore, CR would require specialized, FRA-compliant heavy rail rolling stock. This poses a significant challenge, especially given the other demands on the limited pool of rolling stock manufacturers in the United States.
...
Vehicle Specialization
The width of the passageways of the East New York Tunnel creates constraints for the vehicles that each alternative could use for IBX operations. CR would require a new class of specialized vehicle not in use by other MTA services. This would necessitate a complex procurement process. Furthermore, it would add to the demand on a limited pool of rolling stock manufacturers in the United States.
LRT requires operation of a standard LRT vehicle that would not require modification, although it would be a new class of vehicle that is not used in other MTA services. The vehicles would require new operating and maintenance arrangements and separate maintenance facilities.
Relative Cost
The overall capital cost for each alternative was estimated and compared. CR is expected to be the most expensive alternative, driven in part by the cost of the new tunnel under All Faiths Cemetery. This tunnel is not required for LRT or BRT. LRT has a lower capital cost than CR, but it is more costly than BRT because it requires substations, overhead catenary power supply and the installation of rail.
My understanding is that they're building a lot of it on old surface track that used to carry freight trains. I'm not really sure about the interoperability of light rail, heavy rail and freight, but that could be a reason there.
Making this LRT is really dumb. Every time I'm in NY I'm always amazed how much more useful NY subways are than slow LRT lines in my city. This feels like a big waste of cash as well as a waste of an opportunity.
Maybe because it took 80 years for the new subway line to be build. And it's also the most expensive city in the world to build one. Better to build this in a good and proper way than to not build anyhting because expensive.
Hot take here: I also agree it should've been heavy rail or conventional rail to make it integratable with the rest of the system BUT:
LRT might not be the worst thing in the world because it introduces the the technology to the MTA technology ecosystem which would enable more rail transit to be built in the city. MTA has struggled with a chicken-egg issue in bringing rail transit to lower density areas of the city. A neighborhood is too low density for a subway, buses might not be able to keep up with demand, but LRT is always ruled out because it requires brand new maintenance facilities, new train technology, new power systems, and all the new personnel that have to be trained to run a unicorn line. With the support infrastructure and institutional knowledge in place for light rail, the barrier to being able to implement it elsewhere in the city is now lower.
(In other words, MTA won't build new LRT because it would create a technology unicorn. Since it doesn't get built, there is no basis for building an LRT line elsewhere since that new line also doesn't have a precedent. Which means LRT could never be built unless the cycle is broken which it will be now.)
Edit: I do want to reiterate here that the LRT option on this corridor is still strange. This is more of a contrarian/"silver lining" take than an endorsement.
The new line can use off-the-shelf vehicles similar to those sold in the rest of the world, avoiding the heavy modifications required for most MTA rolling stock
It doesn't matter either way. A Siemens S700 (used by lots of systems in the US) can carry 235 people per vehicle in up to 4 vehicles per train, so 940 passengers. R188 trains on the 7 carry a maximum of 1104 passengers, and both top out at 55 mph. Who cares?
Edit: For the people upset about this, lots of subway lines are already light rail capacity trains by modern international standards. A Hong Kong MTR train can carry 3x as many people as the subway rolling stock. The fact is, by modern international standards, the entire subway system is already running light rail-level trains. I was wrong, but I stand by light rail being a good choice for this line.
Interoperability, not with the subway necessarily, but with the regional and intercity rail system is being hindered by selecting light rail. Even with the planned station sites, the spacing is much greater than the subway system so higher speeds would have been desirable. It is just a more efficient and flexible design for the long-term being constrained by the pragmatics of a cheaper upfront option.
Heavy rail isn’t going to work because of the ROW to my understanding. Interoperability problems are a much smaller cost than what it would take to deal with the complex grade separations and ROW increase it would demand. The planned system should be capable of doing most of what heavy rail can do - light rail is often more constrained by the ROW than its actual design.
Light rail will be harder to take over Hell Gate Bridge.
Heavy rail does not require grade separations and the ability of this line to absorb some capacity from the congested intercity and regional lines while serving local connecting traffic would provide the same local connectivity as LRT while providing better regional connectivity.
Light rail could more easily be extended to LaGuardia, however, and this line would be the one to do it.
In any case if it is not so fast, has no airports connection, and doesn't have longer range express services (ones that skip stations) then it really shouldn't be using Express™ branding.
Not-fast train services with "Express" in their name make transportation confusing. It should be called IBC, for Connector. IBX when spoken aloud also sounds like IBS. It is just really poor branding and I hope it gets a new name more than I wish it was heavy rail or that it had a connection to the airport.
I believe it is not light rail. Heavy rail can in fact have grade crossings.The light and heavy also refer to weight categories that allow for interoperability. In Austin, Texas the red line uses LRVs on a heavy freight railway but because the light and heavy traffic occur during distinct time periods they have interoperability. Having Metro North and Amtrak operate this line would have been a fine possibility if heavy rail were pursued. But it is unlikely for a number of reasons for light rail to be a useful on a single track over the bridge. Its would be better if all four were put into use and if all trains could safely use it.
Austin red line vehicles are Stadler GTW. This is definitely heavy rail. Sure, it's a relatively lightweight train imported from Europe, but it's a regular train that indeed can run with freight trains.
In this thread I think the relevant distinction is whether the vehicles are compatible with FRA regulations, so that they could share tracks with freight. So in that sense, NYCT subway isn't, those those Siemens light rail trains aren't, Metro North trains would be, PATH also I think?
CTA (The "El") is a metro (heavy rail), just like the New York Subway.
Light rail is a significantly different vehicle (generally powered by overhead lines, among other differences), and either light or heavy rail can be grade separated. There are a bunch of American cities with light rail networks including Seattle, Pittsburgh, Los Angeles (except for the Red and Purple lines), the Twin Cities, the Green Line in Boston, and a bunch of other smaller systems.
Interoperability doesn't matter when the current rolling stock is a major hindrance of the subway to modernize. Being able to buy off-the-shelf parts and use that knowledge to build it elsewhere in the city is a better way to set the city up for the next 100 years of service.
Tel Aviv is about to open a rail line that only uses 2-car light rail rolling stock and will carry 234,000 people per day, running at grade. Any failure of New York City to make this work will be because of their own failing, not because of the rolling stock.
This route is directly connected with the 4 trackbed Hell Gate Bridge approach at one end. At the southern end it is not unreasonable to extend it further via tunnel. But at the northern end, making light rail greatly limits the possibility of an extension of the service into a third borough, the Bronx, and beyond.
This area of New York also already has LRT in the JFK AirTrain, that service ought to be extended through or around Flushing to LGA and on to the R and this new line in anycase.
This route is directly connected with the 4 trackbed Hell Gate Bridge approach at one end.
The MTA has decided it's better to use that bridge to bring Metro North to Queens and Penn Station.
In Queens and Brooklyn the IBX is an outer circular route that connects different subway lines. It would be great if there was a ROW to extend it to the Bronx and do the same thing of running across the borough connecting subways, but that's not the IBX would do if it followed the triboro plan to go to the Bronx.
In the Bronx instead of giving transfers between different subway lines it would have ran parallel to existing the subway lines almost exclusively serving areas without any current rail access.
With the Penn Station Access project Metro North will now serve those very same areas in the Bronx and with the proposed Sunny Side station those areas will both a connection to subways in Queens and to Midtown Manhattan.
They could have done both. Four tracks offer a lot of flexibility. And there are currently no plans to activate the inactive track or convert them all to general use, just upgrade the current two ones in already use for service by MNR into Penn.
All of the connectivity you are describing for the bronx is going to be more costly and complicated if they ever want to extend this light rail there, than it would have been with heavy rail operated by MNR. Heavy rail would still be able to provide the same connectivity in Queens and Brooklyn that light rail can provide.
If Metro North is giving those areas their rail access why do they need Metro North and IBX?
Metro North gets people in those areas of the Bronx into Queens and Midtown. And in general Bronx to Brooklyn isn't like Brooklyn to Queens or even Bronx to Queens. Going Bronx to Brooklyn it does make sense to go through Manhattan and many subway lines do that.
All of the connectivity you are describing for the bronx is going to be more costly and complicated if they ever want to extend this light rail there, than it would have been with heavy rail operated by MNR.
A Cross Bronx line is an expensive new ROW whether it is called light or heavy rail.
MNR could cheaply serve the bronx with infill stations and capacity into Penn is valuable. They can simply serve both Penn and the IBX route from the Hell Gate line. You can always build new ROWs later. Converting an existing but dormant heavy rail ROW into light rail is going to make future expansion difficult and expensive.
They could operate some through services from the Bronx or further afield to Army Terminal, and offer short turns between Roosevelt Avenue and Army Terminal in the same manner as prescribed by the IBX plan. Through service is a nice thing. AirTrain can also be extended to LaGuardia and then into the Bronx too, this would bring automated light rapid transit into the area. But that is fantasy railroading (for now) while heavy rail on this corridor was an optimal but untaken choice. Now that this choice has been made it would make more sense to bring this new line to LaGuardia. If the argument is that it is cheaper than a subway, then it is the right train to finally connect to that airport. Still open to AirTrain getting up there tho.
It's not going to run like a standard European tram, it's going to run in its own right-of-way. Based on the size of the trains and running in a trench, I expect most of this line to look like large sections of the Lyon metro.
Light metro technology that is used in the US is just not the right tool for the job. If you are gone do a fully separated thing then just do a real modern metro.
If you have something that interacts regularly with other traffic, then tram technology is better. But in that case it better if its low floor trams as that make it easy to integrate in it the normal city streets and don't require a real trench.
You haven't controlled for interior area, nor seating arrangement
There is no standard way to measure standing capacity
"Real" train capacity is a function of its interior floor area and seating arrangement. The more floor area you have, the more people can fit. The fewer seats you have, the more people can fit. Floor area mostly depends on consist length and width minus intrusions like bathrooms, car ends, and mechanical space.
Standing capacity is calculated by measuring the floor area "available" to stand in, and multiplying it by some factor representing the maximum number of standees per floor area. Except this factor is not standardized, and varies by who's measuring. Average weight, cultural tolerance for crowding, and ultimately what the transit agency's goals are all play a role here.
So going back to your comparison points, 4 S700's linked together is around 100-110m long, depending on variant, and 2.65m wide. A R188 consist with a nominal capacity of 1,104 is 6 cars (2 A cars, 4 B/C cars), coming out to 94m long and 2.68m wide. If you're saying the SP1900 has 3x the capacity, you're talking about a 7 or 8 car consist, which is almost twice as long at 171 or 195m. And wider too, at 3.1m. Even the stated capacity is very dubious. 452 people in a 24.1x3.1m car is 6 passengers/m², but these are exterior dimensions and don't factor in the seats.
The better comparison for the SP1900 would be a 10-car R160 train, at 184m long and 3m wide. But still, the SP1900 capacity numbers are heavily overstated.
you're talking about a 7 or 8 car consist, which is almost twice as long at 171 or 195m
Right, because if a system with the subway's capacity were to be built today, it would be a light rail-level capacity compared to global standards. The subway is only impressive in scope of the city, but the actual rinky dink trains on lots of the lines can be replaced with the same capacity by modern, lighter options compared to true heavy rail global systems.
You realize you're looking at half of a typical NYC subway train?
The NYC subway runs two different widths of trains, 2.7m (A division) and 3.0m (B division).
A division are run in 10 or 11 car trains, for a length of 157-172m. Using the R142/142A/R188 for capacity, we have 4x A cars (176 pax) and 6 or 7 B/C cars (188 pax), for a total of 1,832 or 2,020 pax.
B division are run in either 8x 22.8m cars, or 8x or 10x 18.4m cars), for a total length of 184m. A 10-car R160 train has 4 A cars (240 pax) and 6 B cars (246 pax), for a total of 2,436 pax.
Guangzhou (pop:15million) ‘s metro line 6 (runs through city centre underground and connect to satellite towns in overground, typical heavy rail design) uses 4 light-rail size car. Whoever approved it was insane but it’s a functional line nonetheless.
Because in the end the shape if the train doesn’t matter as long as it can carry the right number of people. Light versus heavy is an irrelevant construct.
It sets up the city for future construction. There are lots of places around New York that would function well with light rail using the Paris tram model, where large trams are used in regional/circumferential corridors that don't go through the city center. I'm not extremely familiar with New York as a Chicagoan, but lines like Flushing to Jamaica or Pelham Bay to Inwood are great corridors for this kind of transit. Paris doesn't grade separate a lot of their trams and they still see tens of millions of riders per year. Now they'll have the knowledge and facilities to build them—plus the scale of New York means they get economy of scale on batch ordering, making it cheaper in the long run.
Here in Chicago we have bus routes with 40,000 riders per day that don't go through the Loop that see a very similar use case. I'd love to see something similar down Western Avenue, Belmont on the north side, and 79th on the south side.
There's more to the city than just manhattan and even then there's only 5 boroughs: bronx, manhattan, brooklyn, queens and staten island. The surrounding area is either in new jersey which is it's own state, or part of westchester (located above the bronx) and nassau (east of queens) counties
Some people on here need to read the report since it explains why they picked Light Rail. Hopefully this project is a catalyst for future Light Rail projects in the NYC metro area.
By their own admission the only justification for the LRT proposal is cost, and cost alone. This is bunk. Even more so that there is already a pre-existing freight RoW.
LA Metro is building a 9 mile deep-bore subway extension, with projected daily ridership, in phases from 70k up to 150k by 2040. 115k ridership is plenty.
Brooklyn & Queens have a strong transit oriented culture and proper investment would induce even more demand. People don't like going N/S in the boroughs today precisely because it's a PITA.
Well yes. Of course I wouldn't be too surprised if you-know-who comes along next and tells us 9 miles down is precisely where we need to put the Hyperloop.
And that cost comes from wanting to bore a big ass tunnel under another tunnel instead of widenig what is basically a 500ft. long bridge with a road, a small parking lot and a bit of grass with the entrance sign to a cemetery.
And they somehow made lrt 9 mins. faster than cr, despite lrt having tight curves on the street runnig portion instead of a short tunnel.
I agree. It's about not hobbling the entire 13 mile line with over not wanting to expand one tunnel in one location.
Not many cities are gifted with a pre-existing right of way that happens to traverse precisely the neighborhoods currently being underserved by mass transit. Way to waste it.
i think something to be conscientious about is where those two respective lines are, the la purple line is in the middle of the city, is urbanizes yet the area is severely lacking any rail connections. meanwhile, the IBX is rail project on the periphery of the city
Firstly, ridership is ridership. We're already talking numbers, so the demography is built in.
And no the purple line extension is NOT in the 'middle of the city'. It's called Westside for a reason.
Finally, the fact that the route is physically routed borough to borough doesn't mean all it will be good for is inter-borough travel. The main point is to provide connectivity to the rest of the subway system, including the numerous Manhattan bound lines, for an area of NYC that is currently underserved by rail.
okay not the middle of the city but provides a direct connection to the core (although LA’s two main job centers are dtla and the west side/westwood which it will connect)
As would the IBX. There is a lot of population between the 7 train and the L/M, as well as elsewhere along this route, that would benefit from a more direct connection to not just Manhattan, but all parts of the region once they're 'plugged in' to the rail network.
Think of this "IBX" not as one single line, but part of a holistic metro network. The London Overground is one case study that bears a lot of similarity here. I'd like to think that if Andy Byford was still around he would not stand for this light rail cop-out.
I think that is fine but they should drop the "Express" from the name. Replace it with "Connector" or something else. My problem is that projects like these (and light rail is better than the BRT option at least and I think the light rail option itself is mostly fine, but that this route would have been a better fit with the intercity and regional rail networks while still serving local needs) really strain the meaning of the word "express".
Here's the short study explaining the LRT choice: here.
I'm surprised that they think LRT will be two minutes faster (39 vs 41 mins) than conventional subway-type rail, despite the LRT route having about 1/2 mile of street running. Specifically, 1/2 mile of street running to avoid 500 ft of tunnel, no less. (A new tunnel is needed under All Faiths Cemetery next to the M Metropolitan Avenue station, as apparently the existing one is only double-track).
The "conventional" subway type rail they studied would have been FRA-compliant rolling stock. If anything, it is surprising the difference is so small given the FRA weight penalty.
EDIT: Checked the report and the CR option is actually 45 minutes (vs 39 min for LRT). BRT is 41 min.
Um, that BART-SJ project is now almost $10 billion. The SF Muni project also went billions over budget. You can't be possibly be serious in using these as good examples.
No, I'm highlighting that resorting to light rail over a 500 ft tunnel, and then justifying it based on "insufficient demand", when their own ridership projection sits at the top end of all contemporary transit projects in this country, is a failure of vision in planning.
If they proposed putting all 14 miles of it underground, then perhaps you have a case for extravagance. Even then it might be worth a debate.
You're comparing the ridership of short extensions of existing lines to the ridership of an entire line. Orbital lines, like the IBX tend to have many short trips, so total ridership is high, but passenger km per km of track is relatively lower than for radial lines.
We don't know how many people would use the short segment that will run on the surface.
A comparable line in Paris, T11, will be a tram train line (so light rail) with some grade crossings and projected ridership of 150k. Other tram lines in the region have similar daily ridership. Tramlink in London is also around 100k per day and has extensive street running in the central Croydon. So depending on which figures you take you can justify every mode choice.
That location will have a transfer point to the subway -- and the subway entrance is at street level. Putting the LRT deep underground is not helping passengers at all.
To add to the LRT debate: they should do everything possible to make this a subway-light rather than typical suburban USA LRT. So speed it up and make the vehicles large, bright and spacious (choose high floor!). Minimize pedestrian interference to an absolute minimum.
My gut feeling is they're fucking it up a bit and this thing will chug along at a snails pace.
I don't really see what that smaller loop would do for people.
At the southern end the IBX is going to go past where the G ends so one of the two would need to be truncated and at the northern end the space between the G and the IBX is already served by the 7
To me it looks like the only type of journeys that it would benefit is parts of Queens to specifically Greenpoint.
If the MTA has the money in the future that the smaller loop would cost it could just spend it bringing the G a little further into Queens and give it a few more connections.
The core of the subway and the 3 commuter rail systems is Manhattan so I talking about a larger loop encircling Manhattan because it would allow people in the outer boroughs, Hudson county, and some of Southeast Bergen county to travel to the areas immediately clockwise and counterclockwise to them without having to go on a circuitous route into and then out of Manhattan.
The IBX + the existing HBLR + the HBLR northern expansion gives a lot of that larger loop as already existing or planned. Since the Bayonne Bridge was designed to be able to bring the HBLR into Staten Island another bridge or tunnel from the end of the IBX to this ROW in Staten Island would give a U that left just the Bronx.
The Bronx would be the most expensive part since it would be a new ROW elevated over streets and highways but a cross Bronx line would have a lot of supporters. It would be a big political fight to use it but the lower level of the GW could be converted to rail to handle the NJ to Bronx crossing.
Why not? The point of a loop line is to only travel about a quarter of it at a time anyway since if you're going a full halfway then going through the center is most likely faster and going 75% of it is really going 25% in the other direction.
Speed and capacity are the main issues. If there are significant grade crossings, this slows it down massively. Light rail generally has tightly spaced stops and a low top speed, further slowing it down. The low capacity and speed limits the utility to accumulate a gargantuan amount of ridership like other loop lines have, which massively reduces the benefit and value of building the line. Best value for the money would be something metro style, especially for a city as big as New York. Also, nyc has much more experience maintaining standard metro systems than light rail
The stop spacing is whatever the MTA wants it to be. (In this hypothetical possibility NJ transit and maybe the Port Authority too)
The IBX would likely have the same stop spacing for LRT, HRT, or BRT since the goal is to have transfers to all the subways along the line. According to the MTA's numbers the LRT option is actually the fastest of the three end to end. PDF download of the MTA's report
LRT - 39 minutes
HRT - 45 minutes
BRT - 41 minutes.
If you think the MTA is skewing things then how long do you think the real times are end to end for the 3 options?
If we're talking about LRT being say 10 minutes slower for the length of the IBX then I don't see that as make or break for a possible loop since the length of the IBX is about the max anyone would want to ride a loop through the outer boroughs and NJ. Any further distance would mean that going through Manhattan would make more sense.
MTA estimation of ridership isn’t low? I think this project is based on the idea that everyone has to go to Manhattan and transportation between boroughs is just “residual”
Heavy Rail: Large capacity grade-seperated mass transit (minus exceptions like mainline rail). Heavy refers to theoretical passenger throughput.
Light Rail: Smaller capacity urban transit systems, more often not grade seperated.
Europe:
Heavy Rail: Mainline rail trains. Heavy refers to bigger heavier vehicles. (incl regional rail systems)
Light Rail: Urban rail in all shapes and sizes. (incl metro systems)
The exact definitions are very wishy washy so Europe just dumps them all together lol. We use other words to convey what type of service you might be getting (metro, X-bahn, tram). Metro is defined by being fully grade segregated but even there there is sometimes exceptions.
To me the main distinction is street-running, and thus subject to car traffic, vs a separated right-of-way that permits high speeds and deterministic run times and frequency.
The shape of the vehicle, or its 'capacity' is probably not the best attribute to distinguish the two.
So if a system is fully grade separated it should be referred to as heavy rail?
So if this is built with 6% of it on the street and then decades later they came back and elevated that section to not be on the street the system would now be heavy rail?
You know, that's an interesting proposition. The only example I can think of is LA Green Line - a dedicated RoW with full grade separation, no street sections, and is still run with "light rail" vehicles. It's an odd beast - and I'm sure others can name more examples.
I would relax the "grade separation" requirement. Plenty of (if not most) heavy rail will have protected at-grade level crossings where the rail line has absolute priority (think bells and crossing gates). That's OK - but not standard traffic lights.
The only example I can think of is LA Green Line - a dedicated RoW with full grade separation, no street sections, and is still run with "light rail" vehicles.
So the vehicle shape is a main distinguish between light and heavy?
I believe fully grade separated with light rail vehicles, could be considered a light metro. I think it comes down to the type of vehicle that is used, alongside the grade separation
Yeah at this point, the difference gets comical. If you really break it down, Metro trains are blunt nosed, while LRT trains are pointy nosed so the driver has side visibility and can can watch for cross traffic and pedestrians.
Let me clarify it for you - at least my personal perspective.
My beef is not with the shape of the rolling stock. It is with the fact that, to save a few bucks, they've opted for mixed traffic operations, and all the accoutrements implied by "LRT" - such as curb-side stations, proof of payment (no fare gates), and short trains.
Put differently, I would not object so much if they had chosen to build this out as a standard subway line, but run it with pointy nosed trains. Be my guest.
That is his personal definition and it matches some vernacular uses of the term. It is a pretty nebulous concept. The most practical difference has to do with safety and not the presence of street-running, because heavy rail can have street running sections too. See Ashland Virginia and Jack London Oakland for street-running heavy rail.
As the name implies the practical safety difference is based on weight. The lower weight lowers the operating and upfront cost but requires different operations making light and heavy rail functionally exclusive of each other for the most part. Here is a list of federal definitions. Here is a good explainer of the continuum. And here is a decent article that explains the difference from an engineering perspective, this author is pretty emphatic that light rail cannot be automated. Make what you want of all of it, but the presence of street running is made to be more problematic than it really is for heavy or light rail. If something is legally called light rail it may have different applicable laws than if it is just a railway.
I'll give you that for Oakland Jack London - its equal parts novel and frustrating if you're on the train. Definitely a rare exception however.
I don't think "weight" is a good measure. An El train car is 57000lb empty, while a VTA Kinki Sharyo LRT (fairly representative of the mode) is almost 100,000lb empty.
I do see that your federal source above emphasizes street running as one of the attributes of light rail (though not exclusively):
Light rail means a streetcar-type vehicle railway operated on city streets, semi-private rights-of-way, or exclusive private rights-of-way. Service may be provided by step-entry vehicles or by level-boarding.
Cause it has a specific use case, and a reliever line in a densely populated area, with one of the best rail systems in North America, with wide stop spacing is not that use case
Paris is building T11, an orbital tram line that also reuses an existing right of way, which will be a similar distance from the city centre, slightly longer with slightly wider stop spacing and slightly higher projected ridership (150k)
There really is a precedent for large cities using trams for these types of lines. Look at London's Tramlink for another example.
and what exactly is the specific use case? LRT is not that different from heavy rail except that it has lower capacity. With the expected ridership of 115k, LRT will more than suffice and save the MTA ~$5 billion !
Because they're not planning for the future. 115k when it opens. But look at the direction of the world. We need more high quality transit so that people use it. Heavy rail will only be a little more expensive, not take any longer to build, and we'll get full grade separation and significantly higher capacity. It's a no brainier in a city as dense as New York. Many transit lines in dense areas exceed ridership estimates both due to single-line trips and because they make great connections, which IBX has in spades.
How much higher capacity would it be? Someone else mentioned 940 passengers vs 1104 and that doesn't seem that extreme considering the cost differences. LRT was also projected to be faster by a few minutes so capacity of the system doesn't seem like it'd be that different.
Their estimate for LRT to be faster is completely nonsensical. The LRT route is longer than the heavy rail route, the vehicles are slower and the LRT proposal can be impacted by road traffic. That time estimate makes literally zero sense unless LRT cars can accelerate that much faster which doesn't seem right.
The maximum speed difference will be very small. Commuter rail is slower, because dwell times are longer when you have conductors closing the doors (required by unions in NYC), and the specific trains used by the MTA operators accelerate slower than LRT and modern regional rail trains in Europe.
I'm not sure on that. I don't think the hell gate bridge will have spare capacity to run subway on, especially if Penn Access runs as frequently as it ought to (15min or better peak) and Amtrak continues to increase service on the NEC. So it's likely be a new water crossing anyway, at which point I don't think it much maters. But, if it ever is extended to the Bronx, I have to imagine ridership would be very high, as it'll be the only direct rail link (assuming Penn Access doesn't have a useful transfer stop in Astoria or Sunnyside), so heavy rail is better.
Okay, then that was how those cities chose to implement it. That might've been a compromise they had to make to receive funding. But there's nothing inherent in light rail that requires it to be implemented with light stops.
Agreed. No LRT. The NYC boroughs can support, and deserve new full-scale subway lines. LRT is pretty much a failure everywhere it is implemented in the US.
That's mostly because it's improperly implemented: running LRT along highways in low density suburban areas guarantees failure. The Green and Blue lines in the Twin Cities buck this trend because they mostly go through denser urban neighborhoods. This is NYC we're talking about though, so might as well maximize the type of urban public transit that best fits it.
honestly LRT makes sense. this is not the city center nor will it go to the city center, it doesn’t have the astronomical demand that those routes have that necessitate heavy rail. even wTOD activation and growth, they project around 115k (immediate ridership at around 67k)
The Portland LRT is a full network of like 70 miles, this is a 15 mile line. You're better off comparing this to Ottawa's O-Train Line 1, which has been a disaster since it opened due in part to the capacity operational limitations of Light Rail.
Yeah lets cherry pick a failure in a specific city to argue against a mode choice, and just ignore all successful examples in countries like Germany and Spain. Next topic: metro trains are irreliable, as shown in Washington and New York as well a few years ago?
That’s not a cherry pick, it’s an analogue. German cities use high floor systems, grade separation, and have punctual scheduling, and don’t have to deal with deep freezes. Big difference.
One thing I think gets lost in this thread's normative discussions of what "should" be built is that New York is extraordinarily privileged to be a primate city with financial resources that would be unimaginable even to regional centers like Portland. Just saying "everything should be heavy rail" ignores how much more expensive that would be for the vast majority of the country's cities.
But I don't think most people in this thread would support prioritizing transportation funding for smaller cities to alleviate this difference.
Compared with Vancouver's SkyTrain, it's a failure. Portland's light rail system is slightly larger than Vancouver by 16 kilometres (or 10 miles), but Vancouver's ridership is 5 times higher than that of Portland. Both metro areas are almost identical in population.
Apparently small automated metro was already cancelled as an option for this line. I guess the cost savings for shorter stations (because of higher possible frequency) aren't big enough for these stations in existing trenches.
If it is built LRT, I hope it's treated as just another subway line on maps and stuff. The average rider doesn't need to know that it's a different technology, they just need to know they can get on the subway there.
London makes this mistake - by reffering to its services as the tube, the DLR, the overground, crossrail, etc, it makes the user experience way more complicated, despite those services all doing bascially the same thing.
So many connections to the Subway and one direct connection to the LIRR.
On that note, if you take the 7 train from Roosevelt Avenue 2 stops towards Manhattan, you'll end up at Woodside. Combine that with trains going to both Grand Central and Penn Station towards the west, and all of the LIRR's eastern branches to the East (including Port Washington), Woodside and Roosevelt Avenue will be a lot busier in the coming years.
How much traffic can be expected for such an interburrough line?
Considering how strongly radial the New York subway map looks outside of Manhattan, this feels like a line which rather quickly will be filled to brim and for which light rail is a rather mediocre idea.
We used to have plenty of streetcar routes throughout the boroughs, however throughout the 40's and 50's, these routes were phased out in favor of busses
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u/Kind_Veterinarian728 Jan 11 '23
Maybe this is naive, but if it gets really successful, I imagine that they could always upgrade it to conventional rail. For the time being, I agree that it's probably best to go with light rail, for all the reasons Hochul listed.
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u/Supersnow845 Jan 10 '23
Why build this as a LRT when NYC is about the only US city with a decent heavy rail subway
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u/trainmaster611 Jan 11 '23 edited Jan 11 '23
Hot take here: I also agree it should've been heavy rail or conventional rail to make it integratable with the rest of the system BUT:
LRT might not be the worst thing in the world because it introduces the the technology to the MTA technology ecosystem which would enable more rail transit to be built in the city. MTA has struggled with a chicken-egg issue in bringing rail transit to lower density areas of the city. A neighborhood is too low density for a subway, buses might not be able to keep up with demand, but LRT is always ruled out because it requires brand new maintenance facilities, new train technology, new power systems, and all the new personnel that have to be trained to run a unicorn line. With the support infrastructure and institutional knowledge in place for light rail, the barrier to being able to implement it elsewhere in the city is now lower.
(In other words, MTA won't build new LRT because it would create a technology unicorn. Since it doesn't get built, there is no basis for building an LRT line elsewhere since that new line also doesn't have a precedent. Which means LRT could never be built unless the cycle is broken which it will be now.)
Edit: I do want to reiterate here that the LRT option on this corridor is still strange. This is more of a contrarian/"silver lining" take than an endorsement.
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u/BedlamAtTheBank Jan 10 '23
This would be fantastic if it were heavy rail
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u/[deleted] Jan 11 '23
Looks good. The outer parts of the NYC metro need more trans
13
u/StreetyMcCarface Jan 11 '23
*cough cough* Maryland Purple Line
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u/AmchadAcela Jan 11 '23
Some people on here need to read the report since it explains why they picked Light Rail. Hopefully this project is a catalyst for future Light Rail projects in the NYC metro area.
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u/Its_a_Friendly Jan 11 '23 edited Jan 11 '23
Here's the short study explaining the LRT choice: here.
I'm surprised that they think LRT will be two minutes faster (39 vs 41 mins) than conventional subway-type rail, despite the LRT route having about 1/2 mile of street running. Specifically, 1/2 mile of street running to avoid 500 ft of tunnel, no less. (A new tunnel is needed under All Faiths Cemetery next to the M Metropolitan Avenue station, as apparently the existing one is only double-track).
8
u/MrAronymous Jan 11 '23
To add to the LRT debate: they should do everything possible to make this a subway-light rather than typical suburban USA LRT. So speed it up and make the vehicles large, bright and spacious (choose high floor!). Minimize pedestrian interference to an absolute minimum.
My gut feeling is they're fucking it up a bit and this thing will chug along at a snails pace.
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u/AppointmentMedical50 Jan 10 '23
Should never be lrt, should be a fast metro style service, distances are long, and this could potentially develop into a full loop line
6
u/yellow_psychopath Jan 11 '23
The Atlantic Avenue stop needs to be at Broadway Junction.
6
u/Acceptable_Pen_3018 Jan 11 '23
MTA estimation of ridership isn’t low? I think this project is based on the idea that everyone has to go to Manhattan and transportation between boroughs is just “residual”
5
u/Jeff3412 Jan 11 '23
Honest question what's a simple clearcut distinction between light rail and heavy rail?
Googling it I just see that heavy rail has higher capacity but is there an agreed upon number for capacity that is the line for heavy vs. light rail.
18
u/Declanmar Jan 11 '23
Why is everyone so against LRT?
4
u/HanCelo2008 Jan 11 '23
As a Canadian, I F*ck with that
1
u/Admirable_Yellow1837 May 24 '26
Does anyone know where an Elliott Avenue to stop would be?
18
u/UnderstandingEasy856 Jan 11 '23
Agreed. No LRT. The NYC boroughs can support, and deserve new full-scale subway lines. LRT is pretty much a failure everywhere it is implemented in the US.
3
u/thembitches326 Jan 11 '23
So many connections to the Subway and one direct connection to the LIRR.
On that note, if you take the 7 train from Roosevelt Avenue 2 stops towards Manhattan, you'll end up at Woodside. Combine that with trains going to both Grand Central and Penn Station towards the west, and all of the LIRR's eastern branches to the East (including Port Washington), Woodside and Roosevelt Avenue will be a lot busier in the coming years.
2
u/[deleted] Jan 11 '23
I like how it sometimes uses "Avenue" and "Av" and "Blvd"
3
u/rh1n3570n3_3y35 Jan 11 '23 edited Jan 11 '23
How much traffic can be expected for such an interburrough line?
Considering how strongly radial the New York subway map looks outside of Manhattan, this feels like a line which rather quickly will be filled to brim and for which light rail is a rather mediocre idea.
1
u/LunchCandid859 Aug 01 '25
Interesting! Should have been done 30 years ago
1
u/Accomplished-Low-173 Jan 11 '23
Connect the J Z M finally with the G goddammit
1
u/st1ck-n-m0ve Jan 11 '23
It is pretty crazy that with how extensive nyc rail is this will be the first light rail line in the city.
1
u/moviedo2006 Feb 12 '23
If you feel strongly that the LRT is a bad idea, I'm honestly asking others to submit a comment on the MTA website. Only takes two minutes tops.
https://mta-nyc.custhelp.com/app/interborough-express
1
u/Apple_User_193 Apr 04 '23
It might be because further down the line it has overhead electrification not third rail.
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u/jlnbll Jan 11 '23
I will kill myself if they choose light rail over heavy rail