During a recent weekend, West Side IRT headways were a bit tighter than they should have been. (Photo by Benjamin Kabak)
Last night, I enjoyed one of those typical nights where the MTA communications network broke down. I was coming back home from the West 4th area to Park Slope and had hoped to take a B train. According to the MTA’s schedule, I had two B trains left to catch before the route shut down for the night, and all things being up to snuff, I would have had no problem.
Of course, things weren’t up to snuff. I wanted a few minutes past the scheduled B train arrival time, and the D showed up. Luckily, to coincide with the D train, an announcement noted that B service had stopped for the evening. The PA voice offered no reason for the shutdown, two trains and ten minutes earlier than it should have been, and it wasn’t until the D was crossing the Manhattan Bridge that I had a chance to learn of a “rail condition” impacting B and Q service.
Ironically, the first notification of a problem came via a tweet from OEM. The city’s Office of Emergency Management claimed that “normal B train service” had been restored following an “earlier rail condition.” That seemed to be at odds with Transit’s in-system announcement that B service had stopped for the evening, and I wasn’t about to wait around for 15 minutes trying to assess which agency was telling the truth. Something had happened, and passengers weren’t informed of the fact.
When I arrived at Pacific St., I just missed an IRT local train that could have taken me to Grand Army Plaza, and the countdown clocks told the story of a wait. The second train out was, properly, 12 minutes away, but the next train was still nine minutes away, approximately three minutes behind schedule. By the MTA’s own internal metrics that give trains five minutes of leeway, that next train was on time. By my own metrics, I was on the verge of waiting nine minutes for a train at 10:45 p.m. with another train just three minutes behind it. That is not good service.
Were this an isolated incident, I would be more willing to overlook it. Rail conditions happen. That’s the price we pay for a 24/7 underfunded system that features significant outdoor mileage. Yet, this is also a matter of information. I had to wait at West 4th St. for too long before any announcement concerning downtown express service filtered into the station, and even then, it conflicted with the most recent information I could access. Transit still hasn’t figured out a way to transmit real-time status alerts to customers who are in their system and have no access to cell service. That’s been a gripe of mine for years.
The headway problem is another issue entirely, and it’s one I see with increasing frequency along the IRT routes. At rush hour, there is often a six-minute gap between East Side express trains before two arrive nearly on top of each other. Late at night, when the downtown 3 makes only two stops before merging with the 2 line, these uneven headways are even less explicable, and yet, they happen all the time. The photo atop this post is an extreme example I observed two weekends ago.
Tiny operational efficiencies — better communication, regular headways, shorter waits — can lead to less agitated customers and a more pleasant commute. It’s often tough to realize that in a complex system, but later, it seems as though these small improvements are just flat-out missing.
16 comments
I was on the 74th st broadway 7 line flushing platform last night. I was pissed that I had to wait 9 monutes for just 1 flushing bound local train to arrive. While 6 manhattan nound and 2 expresses bypassed. Then finally got on thrn had to do a stupid turnaround at mets willents point. Had to wait more again 3 manhattan bound trains went by. It totally silly the 7 have some lousy headways
Believe me, that’s seems to be typical of the Queens IRT. I remember many a time during the summer where I had to wait 10 minutes for a Manhattan-bound local while 2 or 3 Flushing locals (and 1 Manhattan express) passed me by – at the very same station as you!
Maybe the reason you had to wait so long is because you came to the platform when it was the beginning of rush hour. Those Flushing trains that bypassed you perhaps came from the yard on the way to Times Square (in order to meet demand in Manhattan). Of course, I may be wrong, but it’s just a guess.
Try riding the metro at night in DC and you would pray to only wait 9 minutes.
Ideally, when the MTA eventually gets around to equipping all stations for cell phone service you’ll have the rail version of Bus Time — “Train Time”, which will be able to locate you via GPS along with the next trains headed towards you in both directions. It may not solve the problem of backups and bunched trains, but at least it will give you an idea of where the bottlenecks are and, if possible, a chance to make adjustments.
I look forward to enjoying that in 2034.
What we need is: 1) better track maintenance, 2) razor blades and spikes on the doors, 3) orders to shoot litterers on sight.
Then, perhaps, we can get the leeway down to 4 minutes.
Seriously, I’d like to see a breakdown of what the major causes of delays are. All I’ve seen is anecdotes about people holding the doors, track fires, etc. but not any hard numbers.
There is also coordinating train dispatching. If 2 trains are sent down the line to merge on top of one another (without cross platform transfer station prior to track merge), it creates irregular service.
Headway should be 2 minutes min for a maximum of 30 tph. What happens is that trains bunch up due to a variety of factors. Station dwell time is a big peak hr capacity determinant. It takes a 600′ long train roughly 10 seconds to enter and stop at a station, and 21 seconds to vacate the station length. Add a protective buffer of 29 seconds that includes operator reaction time and vehicle system full response. That leaves you with 60 seconds for station dwell and service margin. When dwell time goes beyond 1 min, it adversely affects capacity.
At certain stations, people are still boarding when the train behind the one in the station pulls up to a red signal. This is one of the reasons they shifted the F to the 63rd st tunnel. Having both the E and F at Lexington Ave-53rd St and Queens Plaza creates stations with very high dwell time that cuts into line capacity. Adding an option where people can board (was V now M) for stations between Queens Plaza and Herald Sq was also a boon. As the M runs 8 tph peak, It also added 14 minutes per hour of dell time that both E and M could use at the congested stations where they share track.
Wonder if current labor negotitations factored into the specific situation you witnessed last night, Ben.
The real-time train arrival system is equipped with the ability to communicate emergency service diversions and disruptions directly from the rail control center, yet that is still some time away from rolling out on the IND lines.
This is exactly what infuriates me about countdown clocks. Sure, I like that they’re there. But having that information during a period of normal operations doesn’t really help me make decisions. I’m going to wait for the next train whether it’s 4 minutes away or 10 minutes away. It’s still the fastest way to my destination.
The trouble is, when things get really fouled up — to the point where I would potentially save time by walking to a different line or getting on a bus or cab — there is no information, or woefully insufficient information.
The MTA could rip out all the countdown clocks for all I care, if they could just devise a system to communicate timely and accurate information during service disruptions.
I’m sure you would find the count down clock helpful if it told you the next train was 20 to 30 minutes away as is often the case with late night A train service. At least then you can reconsider taking a cab or if you are fortunate to be at a transfer station, take another train.
Maybe for you, the information isn’t helpful. I’ve found it very helpful.
In the past two months, I’ve done the following (on six separate occasions) in response to what I’ve seen on the countdown clocks:
I’ve taken a local instead of waiting for the express.
I’ve walked to the next express stop.
I’ve walked to a different line.
I’ve taken the bus.
I’ve let a crowded train go by, knowing that there really was another one right behind it.
I’ve called my boss to say I’d be late.
“Rail condition” = union slowdown.
Um, no.
While interning in New York last summer, I would keep an eye on subway/bus service info when I was in the newsroom so I would have basic info If a news story would come up, and the terms “track condition,” “smoke condition,” etc. would irk me on a regular basis, primarily because of how vague they are. It’s all well and good to report a delay, but with no info on length of delay, or the nature, it’s virtually no help to riders.
Since returning to my hometown, I’ve found that my system uses the same vague pronouncements when referring service disruptions. I’ll also mention that we have horribly unhelpful “train time” system that will only announce which line is arriving when it’s 30 seconds out. Nothing helpful like 1, 2, or 5 stations away, or delay info.
Also be glad you’re in New York. Our train runs on 20 min headways during rush, and 30-40 other times, and only between 3:30am-1:30am. We don’t have a 24-hour system.
WAIT. STOP. This is completely incorrect.
On-time performance is where the five-minute leeway comes in. But OTP refers to absolute times, not to headways, and it’s only calculated at the terminal. If that first train is scheduled to arrive at the terminal at 11:09, and it actually arrives at 11:12, it’s considered on time, since it’s within five minutes. Of course, this is information that few riders know or care about – OTP is not rider-focused.
If you’re worried about wait times (as most riders are), what you’re interested in is wait assessment, which has a 25% leeway. Wait assessment is defined as the percentage of actual (observed) headways that are no more than 25% greater than the scheduled headway.
Moving onto your points, I agree that uneven headways are frustrating. I obviously can’t say in this case if they’re the result of messy schedules or of poor dispatching or of an incident up the line that delayed the first train.
OEM must have misunderstood something. The last B train of the evening is scheduled to get to West 4th at 10:33. OEM’s tweet was at 10:24, and there’s no way a suspension in B service will be lifted that late.
Was the D conductor announcing that the B wasn’t running? He should have been making announcements at every station from 59th.
Something you never hear about is the impact of operator performance on train bunching. It seems to the operators/conductors have (or take) a fair amount of leeway in terms of how fast they go, how long they dwell, etc. A difference of just a few seconds or a few mph between stations can really add up over the course of an entire line operating at maximum capacity.