Massapequa Pocket Track

In today's post, we'll take a look at one of the most vital pieces of infrastructure on one of the LIRR's busiest lines- the Massapequa Pocket Track. Following the start of the Massapequa Station Rehabilitation project, the LIRR also began a project to build a 12-car "pocket track" just east of the Massapequa Station. In railroad terms, a pocket track is basically a storage track where trains can short-turn, so that they can more easily run trains that start mid-branch. 

This project was one of the many projects the MTA misjudged how long it would take to complete, therefore, it came out 4 years late. But hey, in my opinion, for a "megaproject" like this that only required total of three switches, five signals, and 1,000 feet of track, 4 years late can't be too bad! It ended up taking 8 years and over $19.6 million to complete. The project was constantly disregarded as construction for ESA was prioritized, making it difficult to get it done.

 (Photo: The LIRR Today)

Since the 1970s, the LIRR has operated "zone service" on the electrified portion of the South Shore. This broke the south shore up into four "zones".

• Babylon, Lindenhurst, Copiague and Amityville
• Massapequa Park, Massapequa, and Seaford
• Wantagh, Bellmore, and Merrick
• Freeport, Baldwin, and Rockville Centre.

Generally, during peak periods, express trains would make stops in one or two of these zones (ex. an express train making Babylon, Lindenhurst, Copiague, Amityville then stopping at Wantagh, Bellmore, and Merrick before going to Jamaica). And, during the peak of the peak where service is needed most frequently, many of these trains would run express after there intial zone (ex. the old #1013, which was the 7:11am out of Massapequa Park making Massapequa and Seaford only.) 

Since all four of these station groups had similar ridership levels, it made it very easy to provide a reliable skip-stop service and this made it easy to provide reliable service to everyone while still providing an assortment of express runs to all customers along the different segments along the branch.

However, there was one problem that made it a pain to short-turn trains, no place to store them. Given that there was no "pocket track" on the line, and only a pair of crossovers just east of the terminal of the line plus an extra set between Rockville Centre and Baldwin, it  made it a real pain to turn them, and unless they wanted to turn them on the Main tracks which is something they rarely did as it held up the entire line, this meant that they had to run all the Babylon zones trains all the way to Babylon Yard to turn them, and this meant for it being even more difficult to run trains during rush hours. Besides two trains (the old 1001 out of Massapequa Park and the old 1021 out of Wantagh), which both turned on crossovers along the branch. The only other exceptions to this were Freeport, which has a little yard, but under the current schedule, most trains don't start there anyway.

While it may not seam to bad to run an extra 10-15 minutes to the yard facility, during rush hours when equipment is constrained, that may make the difference between being able to make a second useful run back into the city or from the city or not, and either way, it is much better use of crew resources then to have them be paid an extra 20 minutes to deadhead to Babylon. In addition, during service disruptions that impact the line east of Wantagh, without the pocket track, rush hour operations as a whole would be jeopardized. By feeding the entire South Shore from one yard, it creates the potential for backups and congestion at the station, something that could impact revenue service as well as equipment trains.

However, with the elimination of zone service on the branch, this simplified service patterns to include two portions during rush hours:

• Rockville Centre, Baldwin, Freeport, Merrick, Bellmore, and Wantagh
• Wantagh, Seaford, Massapequa Park, Massapequa, Amityville, Copiague, Lindenhurst, and Babylon 

And while this was good in some ways, and offered good load distribution during a good portion of the rush hour, I don't totally agree with zoning it this way for the entire rush hour,  but that's a topic for another post.  

See how tracks are platform-length apart? 

While if I were running the railroad, I would've personally chose Wantagh as it's the actual startpoint of most of the trains that use the pocket track, I do see why the LIRR chose Massapequa instead given that the tracks were platform-width apart, making it easily the most convenient as they can basically just "stick" the new track in there. It also does allow the LIRR more flexibility in where it can start trains, and since ridership tends to build up west of this point, it is a great place to start some off-peak trains, like the ones seen headed towards/from Grand Central on  weekends, and since the trip is only 6 minutes I think between the pocket track and Wantagh, it doesn't add too much time.

Great photo of the pocket track by The LIRR Today

You may think that pretty much every LIRR train that ends in Merrick, Wantagh, or Massapequa uses the pocket track, however that's actually not the case, as there's actually more than enough instances where this isn't the case. You'd be pretty surprised to hear that of the Babylon zone trains, in the morning, only 6 out of the 10 of them turn off the Massapequa Pocket Track, and things really aren't much better in the evening as only 

As you can see, another disappointing aspect of these ESA timetables have been the lack of reverse-peak opportunities on the South Shore. One advantage of a pocket track is the reverse-peak potential. In Babylon, many of the trains there have been stored there overnight, therefore, they aren't running in the reverse-peak direction, but, since any train that turns on the pocket track must come from somewhere west, it adds the potential to provide steady reverse-peak service, allowing for improvements, especially earlier in the rush hour.

In my opinion, Massapequa is a perfect place to turn reverse-peak trains, as it ends the main portion of reverse-peak travel along the branch. It's really not that difficult, on a two track branch, to run a train that is already running anyway add a couple of stops to it. And, they don't even have to run it local; they can have it pick up a couple of stops with another train making a couple more to speed up it's travel time, and this could even allow some of the reverse-peak Babylon-bound trains to skip some of these stops, speeding up travel times for those going to the more eastern zone.

While the service plan did offer a modest increase overall in reverse-peak service, for the busiest line, there is still lot's of improvements that can be seen, and I think this pocket track has much more potential with reverse-peak service.

In conclusion, while I think the Massapequa Pocket Track offers a lot of benefits, the LIRR needs to step up and provide even more robust peak service and a better more reliable line of reverse-peak trains to serve the riders growing needs on the busiest portion of the busiest branch of North America's busiest commuter railroad the Long Island Rail Road.

What The Montauk Branch Timetable Could Look Like

Next up is the Montauk Branch. I decided to do this one today, because Sunday is well, my birthday, and today is well the last day of school before my birthday so why not do such a special post on such a special day! Anyways, we’ve now entered uncharted territory. Up until now, we’ve mainly been covering branches with rather simple service patterns and simple peak service, but today, ladies and gentlemen, we’ll dive into the rather complex Montauk Branch! Weekday service is complicated enough, but once you throw in seasonal service, things start to become extremely difficult.

It’s often overlooked, but the Long Island Rail Road’s Montauk Branch sees quite a few riders along its length, especially during the summer. The branch is known for its summer services, and the famous “Cannonball” that runs nonstop from New York’s Penn Station all the way out to the Hamptons and Montauk. Ridership has been growing, especially along the segment between Babylon and Patchogue, but also out in The Hamptons and Montauk. Even Mastic-Shirley and Speonk, despite service challenges, are slowly growing. The achilles heal of the branch is on Summer Sundays when the LIRR can’t keep up with the extreme demand being put on the Summer Hamptons trains causing extreme crowding and delays. My hope is that the LIRR will continue to adjust the schedule until they finally get it right. I’ve definitely made many changes to how the Summer Sunday service is run in an effort to even the loads and shift service a bit.

As you may or may not know through my various posts overtime or by knowing me, my home branch is the Montauk Branch and I ride it relatively frequently. I’m very familiar with it and therefore, I believe I’m able to help it even more and I’ve put in “extra effort” in an attempt to really try to get it right and excuse me if I go a little “over” with  service on this branch. 

One of the most important observations I’ve noticed is the increase in intra-island travel. In general, the further east you go, the less and less people who will actually go as far as Manhattan. People in the Hamptons and Montauk are tired of trekking all the way to the city all day, therefore, they seek jobs in locations in Suffolk or even Nassau Counties. However, since train times to their jobs aren’t favorable, they just drive instead. The introduction of the South Fork Commuter Connection (SFCC) definitely made a difference, but there’s still more to be done with both LIRR and SFCC service out there. My timetables specifically pay extra attention to intra-island travelers, as there’s so much room for growth in that department especially on this branch, and I did my best to make sure they were well looked after.

In general, my sample Montauk Branch timetable represents a noticeable increase in trains, especially during the reverse and off-peak periods. However, this also represents a smarter use of equipment. A good example of this is balancing the amount of trains to Montauk. The timetables below show sample service patterns for weekday and weekend Montauk Branch service, east of Babylon. It’s important to note that at this time, connecting trains aren’t shown, and they may or may not be once all the timetables have been created and published. 

Included in the linked PDF file below is full Sample Weekday and Weekend Montauk Branch Timetable. Peak, off-peak, extra, and special event trains are all included. Note that this is a new and improved timetable design. 

The timetables have yet to include deadhead/non-revenue moves, which will be planned out using AI to align with crew and equipment moves and will be written down on paper. They’ll be included on a separate page in the attached PDF. I tried to mostly minimize deadheading as it’s essentially wasted time, crew, and equipment hours but in some cases it’s unavoidable to make the most out of the resources available.

Before we can dive into the actual excel timetables, let’s quickly go over Key Assumptions and Service Guidelines:

Key Assumptions

• The current infrastructure on the branch will remain the same or similar to what it is today.

Service Guidelines

• Rush hour service should be increased to meet current ridership demands, especially in The Hamptons and on the Babylon - Patchogue segment.
• During the morning rush hour, service mainly consists of a mix of trains out of Speonk and Patchogue. Trains from Speonk and Mastic-Shirley typically originate out of Speonk Yard while trains from Patchogue usually turn off eastbound trains at Patchogue. Service definitely resembles what’s currently on the timetable, but there’s the addition of more trains. The branch keeps the current westbound dual-modes with both following the same schedule as today. Two trains originate out of Montauk in the morning rush to match the two that terminate there in the evening rush. In addition, I was able to schedule an additional early-morning run out of Patchogue. 
• Service during the evening rush hour is much less structured (not that it is during the morning rush) but I think I did a good job of balancing equipment over the course of the rush hour. The two current dual-modes in the evening run on the same schedule as currently and I’ve introduced new trains to fill in the various gaps over the course of the rush hour, and most of those trains leave from Hunterspoint Avenue/LIC or Jamaica. 
• An important thing to note that SFCC Services/East End Scoots have not been included. Those will be included in the South Fork timetable which will come out in a couple of months once I’ve made it. 
• During the midday off-peak period, hourly service at a minimum has been sustained to Patchogue, and while much more “wild” I was able to give Speonk and Mastic-Shirley a rough average of bi-hourly service. This meets the current service standards as far as Patchogue, and there’s a huge improvement in midday service to Speonk. There’s currently some very nasty gaps including a large gap during the entire morning between 7:14am and 12:46pm, and I was able to completely eradicate that. 
• Another addition is expanded reverse-peak service. Currently, during the mornings, there’s a 2 hour gap between trains to Patchogue and I was able to lessen that gap by exactly an hour with the inclusion of a brand-new reverse-peak train to Speonk for the first time ever! Trains that would otherwise be equipment trains will now accept passengers along their way. For example, there are now several “revenue deadheads” out of Jamaica Storage Yard in the early morning hours, and I had these trains make stops along the Mainline or Babylon Branch to supplement service there too. Westbound reverse-peak service in the afternoon has also been improved, esspecially along my home section with trips being added from Sayville, Patchogue, and Speonk. 
• On weekends, hourly service has been sustained at a minimum to Patchogue and bi-hourly to Speonk. I’ve also added additional trains during the busier weekend periods in the morning going westbound and in the evening going eastbound, especially by completely eradicating the ridiculous two-hour 6 minute gap along the Patchogue-Babylon segment. I will discuss Summer Hamptons service below. 

Link to Montauk Branch Timetable

To start, we need to note that the LIRR has very limited diesel equipment. Therefore, it was difficult to provide good service on the diesel branches. The current fleet is in no way capable by any means of handling the overwhelming ridership, especially during the Summer, and with the current equipment, there’s little room for growth. That being said, I’ve written these timetables with the intent of them being utilized by current equipment. Luckily and also sadly (Railfan part of me), the LIRR has ordered more equipment so I will do my best to provide even better service once they come.

On the weekday westbound panel, a new early morning train has been added out of Patchogue, therefore closing the 50 minute gap between the 4:47 and 5:37am, as commutes are growing earlier. 

Morning peak service is structured similar as it is today, and many of the morning rush hour favorites have resumed similar or the same schedules as their real-life counterparts. Most of the through-trains on the branch terminate at Hunterspoint Avenue or Long Island City, however, the first through-train from Patchogue terminates at Jamaica for better use of equipment (train #51 turns in Jamaica to make up the first morning departure to Oyster Bay.) The first dual-mode train which is out of Southampton continues to follow its schedule, while the other dual-mode from Speonk also continues to depart Speonk at 6:18am. Currently, there’s only one morning train from Montauk. One of the biggest additions to this timetable is the addition of a new express DM from Montauk at 4:37am. This train makes all stops to Speonk, then runs express from Speonk to Patchogue, before running nonstop to Jamaica, all the while doing this in as little time as humanely possible. This train provides an earlier departure from Montauk, something I’d desperately like to see, while providing an express run and getting people in in city in time for 8am jobs. This train runs ahead of my favorite train, train #37, therefore, people who need the local stops can just drop-back at either Speonk or Patchogue. 

I’ve done my very best to built up service on the branch in hopes of drawing riders of the busy Ronkonkoma trains, and by increasing Montauk Branch service, during the peak of the peak, especially west of Patchogue, I hope to make the Montauk Branch a much more attractive option. Currently, there’s a large westbound gap between 6:56am and 7:35am on the Patchogue-Babylon section, therefore you can get to New York at 8:18am or 8:52am. I personally think this is very annoying that they don’t run another train in between, therefore, I’ve added in an additional train in departing Southampton at 6:11am at to eliminate that gap and provide another train during the peak-of-the-peak that I think is perfectly timed and I think this will be worthwhile in getting people to stop driving from communities along the Montauk Branch up to Mainline stations since Montauk Branch service stinks compared to what they can get at Ronkonkoma, for example. 

During the morning rush, there’s a funny-looking train I think I better mention, train #57. This train originates in Patchogue and closely follows the same schedule as its counterpart as far as Babylon, however, instead of terminating in Babylon, it continues up the Central Branch, making all local stops on the Main Line between Bethpage and Floral Park, before going to Belmont Park via the eye there. While this train isn’t perfectly timed for the average intra-island traveller, this train is perfectly timed for people who need to get to Nassau County earlier, such as teachers or construction workers. This train is perfectly timed to encourage intra-island travel to places on Long Island such as Bethpage, Westbury, Floral Park, and Belmont, while also providing additional opportunities for Hicksville and Mineola. I had this train run to Belmont Park  so it doesn’t get overrun with by making all the local stops from Patchogue to Floral Park. Manhattan commuters, however, aren’t left-out as they can transfer at Babylon to an electric express train to Grand Central. My hope for this train is to encourage intra-island travel along the South Shore. The equipment would then turn for to become #1823 from Belmont Park to Long Island City where it would be mixed back into the diesel pool, therefore it would be theoretically possible to ride the train all the way to the city if you wanted to go all the way out of your way! 

One of the most beautiful things of this timetable is the improved service east of Speonk. 2 new westbound trains #13 and #19, departing Montauk at 9:30am and 6:23pm have been added to the schedule along with the dual-mode. All 3 of these trains fill huge gaps left by other trains, and coupled with the South Fork Scoots, will really help encourage midday travel on the East End. I’ve also added many more trains to/from places in the Hamptons such as East Hampton, Bridgehampton, and Southhampton, and especially during Rush and reverse-peak hours, these really help make the frequencies east of Speonk attractive.

Midday service on The Montauk Branch is mainly comprised of  typical hourly-scoots to Patchogue, along with the occasional Speonk train, however, additional westbound trains have been added throughout the day from Mastic-Shirley and Speonk to encourage ridership. In addition, there’s a new weekday off-peak eastbound train from Jamaica to Southampton. One thing you’ll notice as a trend through this timetable project is that there’s many more off-peak and reverse-peak trains start/end in Hunterspoint Avenue or Long Island City, I believe that with the development going on in the area, there’s definitely room to grow and I also believe it’s much easier to just turn trains there. I’ve tried to convert all trains that run empty equipment moves there over to revenue runs, and I’ve sent additional trains to turn there as well as an alternative to Oyster Bay service. Certain off-peak trains add stops at Hicksville and Mineola and this was done specifically to supplement service there.

To give a word on weekday reverse-peak service, there are a number of “revenue deadheads” that will start out of Jamaica Storage Yard early in the morning in order to get equipment out to Speonk and Patchogue to makeup westbound runs. These trains will make additional stops along the Babylon Branch or Mainline to supplement service there, too.

The weekday eastbound timetable includes most of the current eastbound runs, however, several trains have been eliminated and repurposed to provide better service. I’ve been able to add additional trains into the excel timetable, especially during the peak-

Weekend service mainly resembles current weekend service, however, additional trains have been added to the schedule during the busier weekend periods (specifically 8:30am WB to 11:30am WB and 4:00pm EB to 7:30pm EB). One additional train has been added out of Montauk on weekends leaving Montauk at 9:23am in hopes of eradicating that nasty gap between 7:01am and 3:16pm during the winter, and to take some load off of #6005 in the summer. A new early-bird fisherman’s train departs Hunterspoint Avenue at 5:00am sharp on summer weekends, allowing travelers to maximize their time out on the East End. In addition, multiple additional eastbound trains have been added to the schedule in order to provide additional weekend East End travel opportunities all year long. Additionally, two eastbound trains have actually been fitted it in the afternoons, to patch the unacceptable 7 hour gap in eastbound service out there.

Once we slither over to the weekend westbound panel, we notice that all of the Summer Sunday Hamptons trains pretty much take over the timetables. Be sure to read the reference notes in the columns carefully in order to determine which trains run on which days!

From my observations on how the Montauk Branch survives functions during weekends in the summer, the vast majority of delays are first caused by slow loading. These delays are some of the worst type of delays as they can quickly amplify into huge delays that we therefore have to suffer through the entire afternoon. What happens is, the platforms at stations in the Hamptons are short, therefore, trains have to spend lots of time taking on passengers at every stop and while the train may have enough cars to accommodate the loads (rarely), the short platforms slow things down CONSIDERABLY! If a train has to sit there for a couple of  extra minutes at each stop, that time can add up to 20 minutes by the time you finally reach Speonk. Minor delays can throw off even the most heavily padded of them all, and one late train (#6005 I’m looking at you!) can put a chokehold on the entire branch. 

Summer Sundays are some of the worst days to ride this branch as trains OTP’s are atrocious, and while I wish I could say I had a solution, I really don’t. There’s really not much I can do to help things, you see, the LIRR is an extremely capacity-restricted system, and there’s not enough equipment to provide the level of service needed on these days. I tried to patch the worst of the gaps, but the most I could do was add a train here or there from Southampton, to hopefully dull some of the loads, but most of the loads are from stations east of here anyway.

One thing you may notice is the addition of a couple of Patchogue-Hicksville scoots on summer weekends. As we know, the most of the crowding and lateness comes from the East End, however, there's also crowding at stations such as my home station of Sayville for people going to the fire island ferries. These trains are timed to run before the their typical counterparts to provide additional options in hopes of reducing crowding.

I’ve noticed that the trains that typically rack up the worst of the crowds are trains 6001 (the 7:01a from Montauk to Jamaica), 6005 (the 11:37a from Montauk to Jamaica) and 6007 (the 1:47p from Montauk to Jamaica). If you know the schedules, you may notice a trend, all 3 of these trains have huge gaps accompanying and preceding them. #6005 is easily the worst of these problems as it’s so popular due to the fact that there’s a 4-hour+ gap  before it. Therefore, it constantly runs extremely late due to overcrowding and during the worst summer weekends gets extended to Penn Station since it typically runs with dual-mode equipment and because there really isn’t room on any poor connection to be bombarded with 12 cars worth of people! I’ve decided to just extend it to Penn Station since it obviously goes there normally anyway.

One thing I’ve done is add Hicksville and Mineola stops to some Montauk, Speonk and Southampton trains in both directions, allowing for Nassau County residents to more easily get out to Fire Island and the East End more easily.

The Cannonball and its westbound counterpart, The Cannonball West both run on the same schedule as they currently do, and many other famous Hamptons trains continue their legacy. In the future once I dive even deeper into East End Service Patterns, I hope to bring back famous named-trains such “The Sunrise Special”, “The South Shore Express”, “The Montauk Special”, and “The Patchogue Express”!

I also want to quickly touch upon the brand-new train 6008. Currently, the current 6008 is an all-year train to Montauk, leaving Jamaica at 8:13am, and is the most popular of the weekend Jamaica-Montauk trains. However, in my schedule, that will run on it's same schedule, but under #6010 to make room for the new #6008, a 7:14am express from Penn Station to Montauk. This new train will depart New York at 7:14am, stop at Jamaica before running non-stop to Patchogue, Speonk, and all stops to Montauk. This train runs unsettlingly close to train #6006, however, on Summer Saturdays, it provides a one-seat ride and much needed capacity. I originally planned to include Bay Shore and Sayville stops on this trains to provide a one-seat to the fire-island ferries, however, I decided by doing that that would get rid of the "express" nature I wanted for this train. In addition, later on in the afternoon, I added an a

 

In conclusion, I think I’ve given a good run-down on the major points of these service patterns. You’ll definitely notice oddities in this schedule, and I almost always have explanations for them, so if you’re interested in more elaboration, please don’t  hesitate to leave a comment. It's a huge branch and time did not permit me to cover nearly close to all the material there was to cover. It's way more likely then not that I made a mistake, especially with the single-track east of Sayville, and if you catch any mistakes please let me know. As always, if you have any comments, thoughts, suggestions, corrections, etc, you can leave a comment below. 

View an index of all the other sample timetables, the post about those timetables, and revision history, right here.

Additional Trains for St. Patrick's Day

Tomorrow is Saint Patrick's Day, a religious "celebration" day. Each year, the annual St. Patrick's Day Parade is held in Manhattan and draws crowds from all over the world. This New York City attraction, like many, draws tons of Long Islanders into the city to see or even participate in the parade.

The parade is an "alcoholic celebration" meaning that many people that go will go to restaurants and bars and become drunk afterward, and as more and more people decide to drink and take public transportation home afterward, trains have become more crowded. The sheer volume of extra travelers not only causes loading delays, but clashed with the last of the peak travelers heading in for a day of work, can cause serious delays throughout the system.

Last year, the parade fell on a Saturday, so, the additional trains the LIRR ran allowed them to get through the day pretty well, but this year it falls on a Monday, meaning that not only do you have the rush hour travelers, but now you've got these passengers to worry about as well.

All of this has caused train crews to absolutely despise St. Patrick's Day, as there's nothing worse then having a train full of drunks coming home on a Monday night, multiplied with all the rush hour commuters and you've got jampacked trains full of intoxicated passengers. Often times belingerent drunks would cause problems over not paying fares, arguing with other passengers, dropping food on the floor of already dirty railcars, and drinking even more on the trains! One year, there were over 22 seperate incidents on the LIRR that required police assistance.

As you can tell, this is an overwhelming and not fun day for crews. It's important to be advised that conductors typically have much less patience for unruly passengers, so be aware if your looking to have a good time.

NYC St. Patrick's Day Added Service:

In order to minimize loading delays, the Long Island Rail Road will be providing four additional westbound trains between 8:41 and 9:53. Two of those trains will come from Ronkonkoma while two others will come from Babylon.

• 8:41am from Ronkonkoma, making local stops through Wyandanch, then Farmingdale, Bethpage, Hicksville, Mineola, Jamaica, and Grand Central.
• 9:06am from Babylon, making local stops through Rockville Centre, Jamaica, and Grand Central.
• 9:40am from Ronkonkoma, making local stops through Wyandanch, then Farmingdale, Bethpage, Hicksville, Mineola, Jamaica, and Grand Central.
• 9:53am from Babylon, making local stops through Rockville Centre, Jamaica, and Grand Central.

Last year, the LIRR ran 15 additional westbound trains and 16 additional eastbound trains. I will admit that last year, it was a weekend, so you've got the peak trains and generally good post-peak service to help get people there, but I expect there will be some issues. However, I really would've liked to see them provide at least a bit more additional service. This year we'll be missing out on the dual-modes, which are the only extra service my branch gets, along with the other extra trains. I would've at least liked to see them add at least one additional westbound/eastbound train to Grand Central on the Long Beach, Port Jefferson, and Port Washington Branches, but I guess not. They also aren't running any additional eastbounds, which while I can kinda understand considering travel back from the parade is usually scattered throughout the evening, I'm a bit suprised that they went all out last year and did nothing this year.

In an effort to signficantly reduce the number of incidents and keep trains as orderly as possible, the LIRR will be banning all alcoholic beverages on trains, platforms, and waiting areas from 5:00am Monday 3/17 to 5:00am Tuesday 3/18. MTA Police will enforce this! If you try, they will confiscate it.

Apparantly Metro-North will be providing five additional trains to and from the parade, however, I cannot seam to find any information on them so if anyone knows or can find out please comment below!

Montauk St. Patrick's Day Parade Added Service:

The Annual Montauk St. Patrick's Day Parade will take place on Sunday, March 30th this year and will begin at 12:00 p.m. Quite a few people take the train out east for the parade, and since it's not yet summer, the LIRR will provide additional trains to provide for added capacity.

The exact details for these trains have not been announced as of now, however, you can expect an additional eastbound train about an hour earlier then train 6008, that departs Jamaica at 8:13 and arrives Montauk at 10:55am. You can also expect an additional eastbound that will originate in Babylon, trailing after train 6008.  

Coming back westbound, they typically run a train that emulates summer-only 6007, that departs Montauk in the 1:00pm hour. This train is normally a local to Babylon before terminating in Jamaica. I remember there were delays last year on the Montauk Branch on this date, so hopefully things will do better this year.

It's supposed to rain on Monday during the entire length of the parade, so while many will still go and participate, the loads shouldn't be as bad for this reason. 

So, if your going to ride the train on the "worst day to ride the LIRR", make sure to follow the rules so you have a good time! I'm looking forward to seeing how St. Patrick's Day turns out this year. 

Fun Fact: Did you know that NJTransit's fleet of Single-level coaches, known as Comets are known for their reoccurring odor of vomit as "vomits" or "vomit comets". Thank goodness my beloved C3s aren't stinky!

Interlocking Walkthrough: BABYLON

In today’s interlocking walkthrough we’ll be taking a look at the large BABYLON interlocking. Unlike many of the other interlockings we’ve looked at recently such as WANTAGH and AMITYVILLE, this interlocking is actually extremely busy.

Not only is BABYLON much more busy, but it’s also much bigger, too. In fact, it stretches 2 miles from end to end.

Switches

First, let’s focus on what’s west of the station platform. The first crossover that trains encounter when heading eastbound is a crossover right inside the interlocking that is going from the westbound track (Montauk 1) to the eastbound track (Montauk 2).

Then, after a couple hundred feet, The Central Branch merges onto Montauk 1 (Montauk trains that use the Mainline will branch off here in order to head towards Hicksville, Mineola, and Jamaica.)

After that, we have another crossover, with this one also going between Montauk 1 and Montauk 2.

Then, after going a bit further down the line, there’s another crossover this time going between Montauk 2 back to Montauk 1. Then there’s another one that does the exact same thing a couple hundred feet later.

Now, both tracks now approach the platforms. While Montauk 1 and Montauk 2 are curving to form the platform, a third track is created that also comes into Babylon smack in the middle. Montauk 1 splits into 2 tracks, with the north one becoming station track 1 and the center 1 becoming station track 2. Station track 1 is next to platform A, and station track 2 can open its doors on both platforms A and B.

Many electric trains that end their runs at Babylon will go east on Montauk 2, then continue onto Station track 3 to terminate before heading east towards the yard. Station track 1 is primarily used by trains that are starting at Babylon and just came from the yard. The middle track (station track 2) is typically used for Montauk branch scoot trains that will terminate at Babylon and then turn around, load, and head out east. This allows for a cross platform transfer for both sides. 

Now, once we get east of the station, things get much more complicated. First, there is a crossover (just east of the station) that goes from station track 3 to station track 2. Then station track 3 becomes known as the “LEAD track” (as it goes to the yard).

After that, there are a couple of crossovers that are used to get trains from the different station tracks over to LEAD so they can be yarded. First, there’s one from station track 3 to station track 2, followed by another back to station track 3. Then to add to the mix, a freight siding merges into station track 3.

Then, station track 3 passes thru the famous Babylon Car Wash. The Babylon Car Wash is kinda a big deal because there aren’t many car washes on the LIRR, with the only other locations being Ronkonkoma and Richmond Hill. Basically, all trains that are going to/from the yard will pass through the car wash to get all clean for their next run. But, for trains that aren’t afraid of the water or aren’t due for cleaning, they’ll go to/from the yard on station track 2, then crossover to LEAD just before the yard.

Now, we’re finally approaching the gigantic Babylon Yard. Compared to many of the LIRR’s yards, it’s quite big. It can store 17 trains, plus another if you use the LEAD track.

The yard is basically separated into 3 clusters of tracks. The first cluster, houses tracks 1 through 10, plus the LEAD and HOUSE tracks. There’s also two other clusters, yard tracks 11-14 and 15-17. Many of these tracks either combine or end in a bumper block at their very eastern end.

Another oddity of Babylon Yard is that the switches are automatically controlled, therefore allowing the employees to not have to hand-throw all of the switches themselves, and leaving the machines to do the dirty work for them.

Once you finally pass the yard, it goes back to the big three: Montauk 1, Montauk 2, and LEAD. These tracks go over Highbie lane crossing then proceed east a bit further before LEAD merges onto Montauk 1, before the final crossover from Montauk 1 to Montauk 2 commences signaling the end of the interlocking. It’s worth nothing that just east of this, third rail ends.

Signals

The signals at BABYLON are all old-style Pensy Postion-Light signals. There’s a good combination of places with those round things on gantries overlooking the tracks, and others on pedestals.

Babylon is slated to get an overall at some point in the upcoming years. It’s likely they’ll repeat what they’ve done at many of the other interlockings, by replacing all the switches with new ones, and sadly ripping out the switch handles. So, instead of a big handle being thrown to switch your train on the right track, it’ll all be done simply by a click of the mouse.

Towers

BABYLON is lucky to still have an operating tower onsite. Babylon tower sits just east of Babylon station.

Photo Credit: Joe Gregory/Trains Are Fun

BABYLON tower controls all the signals at Y, PD, and SK interlockings, too.

Neighbors

BABYLON interlocking is neighbored by AMITYVILLE to the west and by Y interlocking (just E. of Sayville) to the east.

The central speed limit thru all of BABYLON interlocking is 60 mph, though trains switching tracks often go slower. Just to the west of the interlocking, the speed limit is upgraded to 80 mph for trains continuing along the Babylon Branch towards Jamaica. If the train is going along the Central Branch, the speed limit changes to 65 (which is the maximum in diesel territory).

This concludes BABYLON interlocking. If I missed anything, please leave a comment below and let me know.