How Not to Design a Train Line

That's why we need the Queens link to improve the service in not only the Fulton street line but the Queens Blvd line.

I actually use Beach 105th Street a lot, and it has another use: It is near a popular section of the beach. And Broad Channel should have a busy and dense car-free neighborhood on the other side of it.

Fun Fact: The A Train is shorter than the DC Metro's Silver Line which is roughly 41 Miles long. A trip on the Silver Line can take up to 2 Hours end to end and the stations are spaced much further apart than NYC. Similar to the A Train, the Silver Line serves the Airport and has the longest stretch of track without a station.

this is why we need queens link, it will greatly benefit commuters that want to go to Manhattan and revolutionize transit by removing the problematic shuttle and removing the problems on QBL. like giving forest hills some breathing room.I also live in the rockaways so these improvements will help

4:20 so relatable because the A trains' horrible headways at Broad Channel will literally fry like an egg at that station

There ain't enough people on that side of the rock. Even when I worked the A during a GO the train empties out at B90 st for the shuttle buses. Same thing with the 5 showcases in the afternoon they empty out at Broad Channel. The H goes in front of the A heading north and coming south it follows the A.

Oops, I forgot to mention that not only the Queens link can improve the two lines but hit areas that lack more transit options and providing transfer points to other existing subway and bus lines thus being able to access to other parts of Queens and getting around Brooklyn and Manhattan which benefits. The A cannot serve the three branches by itself as utilizing 15 tph, lefferts Blvd and Far Rockaway would have to be nearly equal while the Rockaway park service is very limited as you suggested 20 minutes which is normally 3 tph. Its dumb to have a particular route to split doing all that work in splitting up just to provide those service to those branches in addition to the shuttle provides insufficient frequency in it's service. Send the M to Rockaway park would shift all A service to Far Rockaway and leaves extending the C to lefferts Blvd where service between lefferts Blvd and Euclid is all times while service between Euclid and 168 would not change leaving the night time service to be use as a shuttle which will be retain while both Rockaway lines will be serve 24/7

The Rockaways have a lot of potential to gain more ridership especially in the summer. However I usually prefer taking the 2/5 to Flatbush and taking the Q35 than wait for the A or Shuttle

Sounds accurate- a guy who goes to the Rockaways a lot more than previously

You have a lot of experience with this stuff and I love seeing the interesting stuff you propose man, lots of support to you 👊👊👊👊

I guess we'll have to go historical, to determine how The Rockaways were when the MTA bought the tracks and converted them to IND use in 1956. Rockaway Beach was still a getaway destination at the time, but when master planned Robert Moses created all of the city highways, people went elsewhere for fun. So the need for a full subway line there decreased.

Queens in general has horrible land use i.e. (cemeteries, sfh, airports, highways, too many big parks and not enough neighborhood parks) realistically it should have a bigger population than Brooklyn but it wastes so much land on nonsense and cancer 😕. Broad Channel residents will probably be forced to leave by the federal government to restore the Jamaica bay wetlands and protect neighborhoods like Howard beach and Marine Park, because Broad Channel prevents dredging and filling the bay for land reclamation.

I've never really understood why Ozone Park is on the A when it leaves JFK on a branch. I would run: C 8tph Washington Heights to Ozone Park. Some peak-hour service would terminate at Euclid Avenue. A 8tph Inwood to both Rockaways formed from a pair of 4-car trains coupled together until Broad Channel, from where the front 4 cars go to Far Rockaway & the rear 4 to Rockaway Park. Some peak-direction service (as ‹A›) would skip 88th Street and Rockaway Boulevard.

BART has 20 minute headways for every line except Yellow (SFIA-PBP) now.

I like to fantasize that New York CAN build new transit, and that the 2nd Avenue subway can extend to Brooklyn and that Queenslink can get build Queenslink Service to Far Rockaway as there is more demand for it, A to Rockaway Park, C to Lefferts, and T to Euclid

We def need Queenslink but we also need the Queens Bypass line from 63rd St to Forest Hills and the Rockaways. That way both services could function on the line properly and get ppl to midtown Manhattan faster. The Bypass line could serve local tracks on the Queenslink while the Queens Blvd local could serve express tracks.

I was staying in Rockaway Beach in February, quite close to Rockaway Park-116 Street. I was taking the subway almost every day to Brooklyn and Manhattan, which from Rockaway Park-116 Street required taking the shuttle to Broad Channel and transferring to the A Train and enduring another 5-15 minute wait. While I enjoyed the ride across Jamaica Bay, it was when waiting between trains at Broad Channel that I truly appreciated the potential benefit of Queenslink routing the M Train to Rockaway Park-116 Street and eliminating the Rockaway Shuttle.

I just used it yesterday to 90th/broad channel for A service. I waited about 10 minutes at each station for the shuttle. It’s fine but could definitely be a bit more frequent. I like that it was the newer trains though. And so were the A back to Manhattan

20 minute headways are perfectly acceptable for a low demand shuttle. I lived in the Rockaways from 2008 to 2011 and never had a problem scheduling my day around the train frequencies.

Love your vids and I'm a Rock Park traveler but low frequencies are justified here. [As other people pointed out] there's a myriad of other alternative methods of getting to Manhattan and the geo-catchment area of residents is too small to justify prioritizing frequency here, not to mention it would feed into Far Rock A frequency. I'm however open to the idea of Queenslink or a cheaper temporary alternative, have some "Q35" busses go to Kings Highway instead as I'd rather take a direct express train further down Brooklyn than take the 2/5 a million stops to the Junction.