The better part of recent coverage of the G train has not been favorable. The line is often termed the Ghost train, and riders along the IND Crosstown Line, the only major subway route to skirt Manhattan, are used to long waits for small trains. It is the neglected stepchild of New York City Transit. At the start of July, due to work on the Culver Viaduct, the MTA extended the G train to Church Ave. in the heart of Kensington, Brooklyn. All of a sudden, as Bobby Allyn reported for City Room last week, everyone loves the G train. It’s the one-seat ride from Long Island City to Park Slope and beyond. Who could complain?
While it’s easy to dismiss this news as the afterglow of a new marriage, there is something to this latest news. For the next four years, the G train will be running to Church Ave. because Transit has no choice. It’s the only place at which the train can turn around. But if the demand is there, if the ridership is there, Transit will consider making this change a permanent one. Both Brooklyn and Queens would benefit from added G service.
20 comments
Even better was that it went all the way from LIC to Coney Island this weekend.
how about we get rid of the V train and reinstall the G train to Forest Hills? Now that would be a blessing!
A blessing to G-train riders, but not to the broader transing public.
Sorry…meant “traveling public.”
A blessing to the 5 people who need to travel from Queens Blvd to Greenpoint or Williamsburg, you mean.
Hey, that’s good!
But wait, I think you counted one guy twice.
I see it as a first step in the return of the F express (when that’ll happen nobody has any idea).
are they running longer cars on the G because of the extension?
i meant more cars not longer
No, still 4 cars, but during the weekend when the F wasn’t going to Coney Island they had 8-car trains..
“………are used to line waits for short trains.”
You meant LONG waits, right?
I see that it’s been corrected by now.
Adam, you mean when it was going to coney island?
I think he meant that when the F was NOT going to Coney Island,
the G train WAS going to Coney Island,
and so they decided to put longer trains on the G.
I am kind of puzzled that there isn’t more demand for a Bkn/Qns crosstown. Then again, I’ve only taken it once or twice myself. Maybe the connections just aren’t convenient enough that a detour through Manhattan isn’t really a worse option. In my case I often travel from Bay Ridge to Astoria–the G is kinda useless for that.
The connections are not good enough. A good circumferential line, like the Yamanote Line, the Koltsevaya Line, or the Circle Line, will maximize transfer opportunities to other lines as well as to major stations. A bad one, like the G or Shanghai Metro Line 4, will minimize those opportunities.
The G isn’t a bad circumferential line, since it isn’t a circumferential line at all. Obviously, there’s room for improvement – although there was just an improvement at the south end (direct transfer to the M and R) and an improvement is in the works at the north end (enclosed transfer to the 7). But I don’t see why you consider it circumferential. What does it circumfere, if that’s a word?
AHHH None of you know the history of the G train….
Long Island city used to be the Manufacturing hub with all types of businesses everything from stereos TV washers dryers car parts and more were made in LIC, so 20 years ago before everyone shipped out jobs overseas the G train was a very busy train
All those big console stereos you parent had magnovox GE made here…classic stereos Marantz, McIntosh , Fisher, Harmon Kardon
Parts suppliers Lafayette, Radio shack, LIC/sunnyside even had a BRA manufacturer on 39th st right in back of the citybank queens blvd, till they moved out 2-3 years ago and a self-storage facility tore the building down.
Standard auto parts on 36th & northern. almost 500 people worked there till they sold the building
Even Zenith made picture tubes in LIC, so the G train was for the factory workers living in BK or out in Forest hills
As someone who rides from Kensington to Clinton Hill fairly frequently this is a great change. The people who are happiest though, I guarantee, are the workers who used to take the G to Smith/9th, transfer to the F, and then transfer AGAIN to the R/M/? at 4th/9th. Those guys (mostly construction worker types, and many immigrants) probably won’t voice a lot of thanks on Blogs or anywhere else, but I’m sure it’s cutting 10 minutes off their commutes (and the mental anguish of waiting for a stalled/slow F to take you 1 lousy stop).
[…] As Benjamin noted last week, many riders are happy with the new G train extension to Church Avenue in Brooklyn. I live in Williamsburg close to the Metropolitan G stop, and I’ve been a longtime fan of the train – my boyfriend of two years lives in Long Island City, and I’ve told people we might not be together if dating him meant I had to go into Manhattan and switch trains twice. I’ve also had a soft spot for the G train ever since reading Jonathan Lethem’s Motherless Brooklyn, where the protagonist notes that the G is the underdog of the subway system, suffering from insecurity because it’s the only train that doesn’t touch Manhattan. […]