Interlocking Walkthrough: JAY

Let's now take a look at the busy JAY Interlocking. Similar to it's counterpart, HALL interlocking, it serves as the second major interlocking for Jamaica Station. I like to say HALL and Jay interlocking are decently similar, both with their own unique set of quirks & characteristics.

Here's a diagram of JAY interlocking, from the handy-dandy New York City trackmap:

As you can see, JAY interlocking is extremely busy, and seams to be much less structured than HALL interlocking is.

It's difficult to understand the interlocking, especially at first, but let me try to explain the key fundamentals of the interlocking so you'll begin to understand the rest of the interlocking. 

The idea, similar to what is seen at HALL interlocking, is to segregate trains so they never cross paths. Ever notice that typically speaking, westbound trains leave from tracks 1, 2, and 3 and eastbound from tracks 5, 6 , 7, and 8? While technically any train can leave from any track at Jamaica, they specifically do this for a reason, as to streamline the flow of trains.

This also explains why a majority of the trains headed towards Brooklyn typically come from the Atlantic Branch, since, the way the station is configured, makes it easier to get those trains over to the tracks headed towards Brooklyn.

You'll also notice that for much of the interlocking, westbound and eastbound traffic is actually segregated from each other, therefore the paths of an eastbound train headed towards Babylon, for example, and a westbound train headed towards Long Island City would never once have to cross paths. This speeds up the interlocking substantially and allows for more capacity.

The way the interlocking is setup also gives JAY interlocking a secret advantage, which allows two westbounds (one headed towards Penn/GCT/HPA and one to Atlantic Terminal to both leave simultaneously and never cross paths. This allowed them to do timed-transfers, which, they abolished after East Side Access, and leads to the greater flexibility of the interlocking.

Anyway, I don't think it makes sense to explain the entire interlocking like I normally do as similar to HALL, there's a lot going on and I don't think you guys want to read an entire explanation of it, but I hope that gave you a better idea of what this interlocking is about.

Transfer at Hicksville

In a much-needed sequel to this post done back in June, today, I'll be talking about the other Port Jefferson Branch transfer, Hicksville. Hicksville is a much-less used transfer, and besides a mid-morning round trip, few Port Jeff diesels terminate here. Instead, it's used quite often for intra-island transferring, particularly during rush hours. However, unlike Huntington, Hicksville is well-equipped to serve as a transfer-point and well should've been already been used as the terminal for most Port Jefferson trains following ESA. 

Hicksville, unlike Huntington, is set up in away that can way better be compared to that of what is seen at Babylon, where a diesel train would arrive on the middle track, discharge passengers onto platform A, where an electric train would be waiting or soon to come onto track 1.

The LIRR Today has a good video showcasing the move, which sums it up perfectly:

This process then happens in reverse as the diesel train normally idles there for a while-around 15 minutes for the current and only round-trip to terminate there, before the electric train arrives on track 3, passengers scurry over to the idling diesel set on track 2, board, and the train goes off on it's way towards Port Jefferson.

Transfers at Hicksville are generally scheduled for only a couple of minutes, which, is half the time transfers at Huntington typically take. By transferring at Hicksville, not only is it more convenient in that you don't have to wait in the elements for the electric train to pull in, but it also saves time since the transfer takes less time, and you typically transfer to an express train, rather than a local that on top of already taking longer to transfer, makes more stops.

(Photo: Avasic1995 on Youtube)

I believe that Hicksville is easily the best place to turn diesel trains on the Port Jefferson Branch, as it's a natural transfer station. Instead of having to do the cumbersome up and over which requires you to stand out in the elements at Huntington, all you have to do is walk over the platform to the other train. 

While I can't say I've ever done the Hicksville transfer before, I have done the Babylon one, and it's normally a very smooth experience, as  the worst that can happen is your train is delayed a minute coming out of the yard requiring you to wait maybe a minute or two. Unfortunately, at Hicksville, trains are more prone to delays since they are coming from Ronkonkoma so there's a higher chance you'll be waiting around, though typically these transfers go well.

Unfortunately, however, prior to East Side Access, the LIRR only ran 3 trips per direction to/from Hicksville, with the rest going to/from Huntington or thru-trips to Jamaica, Hunterspoint Av or Penn Station, and now, after East Side Access, there's only one mid-morning trip that ends there. With the amount of time in the schedules between HUN-PJN trips, there's plenty of time for them to extend many of these trains to Hicksville, and if they were to time them better, which would probably have to be done anyway to connect with Ronkonkoma trains, they could have the potential to provide 20-minute service to Cold Spring and Syosset as well. In the future, as a supplement to electrification,  

In conclusion, I hope to see the LIRR extend at least a couple of trips to Hicksville on weekdays, and I'd like to see them invest in full Hicksville service on weekends. It's basically a zero-cost improvement, as minimal crew hours would have to be added on, and it would at least make up for not providing the same level of service seen on the Montauk Branch. In my upcoming reworked Port Jefferson Branch draft timetable, which has been delayed a bit, I'll be showcasing how this transfer could apply to more trains in the schedule.

Metro-North Renovation at 3 Stations in Northern Bronx

This post is a bit late since the annoucement was a couple weeks ago, but Metro-North recently announced that they'd be renovating the Woodlawn, Williams Bridge, and Botanical Gardens on the Harlem Line in the Bronx, all stations that desperately, quite desperately needed overhauls.

At the Woodlawn & Willams Bridge stations, Metro-North will be replacing the platforms and installing a snow-melting system, something that should be helpful when we get snow in the winter months, a weather types that pairs well with the Harlem Line. They'll also bring the total of elevators up to 4, which is impressive for a 2-car station.

At Botanical Garden, they'll also be replacing the elevators and in addition, they'll be "bringing the station into a state of good repair" by improving the structures at these stations, replacing large sections of the platforms, in addition to replacing the old station canopy and building new shelters on the southbound platform.

In order to maintain service at these stations through this construction, they'll be partially-closing the already short platforms, and in other cases they'll be using temporary-platforms.

The new station renderings look gorgeous, and it will be a nice break from the old, crusty current stations we have sitting there. 

Photos: Central Islip (6/2025)