In a very odd twist of fate, the LIRR announced that on Monday, March 17th, the Oyster Bay Branch will relieve one additional evening eastbound following the peak and one additional evening reverse-peak. Not only is this odd considering it’s very unexpected, but, the railroad rarely updates its schedules so for them to just add an extra train in the middle of nowhere, that’s something you don’t see everyday. You'll notice that I'm trying to make even more, smaller posts in between the timetable releases, to spice things up and add additional content in between the bigger releases, so I hope you'll enjoy this smaller content that is actually covering some bigger things.
These new evening trains, with one being a reverse-peak westbound and the other being a post-peak eastbound, are being added to the schedule in hopes of decreasing gaps. These trains are targeted at those who need to go to or get home from Broadway shows, dining with friends and family, and for those attending concerts and sports events, these trains will help to loosen those gaps and provide more service before and afterwards.
The trains
A brand-new train, titled #567, will depart Oyster Bay at 7:09pm, and will run to Jamaica, arriving there at 8:05pm, under it's connection, it would arrive at Penn Station at 8:35pm
The eastbound, titled #578, will depart Jamaica at 11:43pm, and will arrive at Oyster Bay at 12:44am. In addition, the current 11:25pm departure towards Oyster Bay will now depart at 11:08pm, helping to close the 79-minute gap.
North Shore Riders have assemblyman Charles D. Lavine who has fought to give them more service, and is partly responsible for the second dual-mode getting added to the schedule.
Another odd thing about this weird and unexpected schedule change is that both the LIRR and the news source (there was only one) that covered it said these trains would depart Penn Station (oppose to saying that it was a connection) which it says in the TrainTime app. Originally, I thought maybe these new trains were dual-modes, which actually wouldn't be surprising considering the fact that the senators pushed for the 7:17am train to be a dual-mode. If that's confusing to me, someone who's very familiar with the LIRR's scheduling and service patterns, then it could be very confusing to someone who isn't...
I just found out about this yesterday, which turned out to be the day I released my sample Oyster Bay Branch timetable and when I roll-out the timetable upgrades I've made already for this branch, I'm going to modify it a bit and possibly add these trains in if I can!
In my opinion, I'm very happy to see the LIRR continuing to add trains, esspecilaly considering the westbound was most likely one of the deadheads from Oyster Bay to Jamaica Storage Yard. It's great to see the LIRR answering commuter and senator complaints, while also minimizing deadheading. I strongly believe that the LIRR should continue to reduce deadheading, and continue to find unique ways to utilize equipment. If they do, I'm confident it'll go a long way in the long run.
In conclusion, this shows that if the LIRR tries, they can make improvements, and while I don't think this was the most necessary improvement as of right now, I think this is nice for tthe Oyster Bay Branch which has been long-neglected and I'm ecstatic to see what else is in store for the Oyster Bay Branch and the rest of the railroad... for the May 18th service changes. I feel this will be a big one!