LIRR & MNR running on weekend schedule on Monday, 1/26

Unlike what I expected, the MTA announced yesterday afternoon that they would be operating on a weekend schedule today. Metro-North will operate on a holiday schedule with baseline weekend service but a couple of extra trains for those unfortunate enough to make the trek into work. They are doing this because they still have quite a bit of cleanup to do after last night’s snowstorm. 

As a quick heads up, there will be no service east of Ronkonkoma today as that branch is buried deep in foot of snow.

**Edit: As of 10:15am EST, it seams they have either resumed service east of Ronkonkoma or never stopped it in the first place**

The LIRR and MNR will both likely transition back to regular weekday service for the Tuesday morning rush hour tomorrow, after snowfighting operations pretty much conclude.

If you do must travel today, take caution out there. Not only is it very cold but it's also very slippery so go extra slow and don't run for your train. 

Stay safe and warm everybody!

Snow, Snow, Snow: Winter Storm Fern

Since we are now in the midst of a relatively large snowstorm, at least the largest in years, I decided why not take a look at something very important during a snowstorm. When to curtail transit service?

Over the last couple decades, transit agencies like the LIRR and even MNR have the adopted the practice of halting train service if snowfall exceeds a certain amount. Typically, once snow reaches above 10-13 inches, they will suspend service systemwide. In the old days, snow would never halt the trains, and if need be, they'd put a snow plow on the head end.

Why? One would think a 65-ton M7 or a 140-ton DM would easily be able to power through a couple inches of fluffy snow, and that very well is the case. The only problem could occur if snowfall exceeds the height of the third-rail, but even in that case preventive methods could occur before, and worst case they could just use the DMs.

But, that's not the issue here. The real problem isn't found in the LIRR's operating department, but instead in the public affairs department. In late December 2009, a huge snowstorm hit Long Island to close out the year, and a early morning Main Line train running with diesel equipment destined for Ronkonkoma became stranded just east of Wyandanch. Because the conditions were so bad, it wasn't safe to unload the passengers and were told to just sit tight. The passengers were then stuck on the train for hours, waiting for some train to come along and rescue them. 

The Standard Operating Procedure suggests that a rescue train should be brought up just along side the disabled one and the passengers should be transferred over to the new train so they could be on their merry way. However, at that point, it was single-tracked around Wyandanch and a spare DE/DM set wasn't possible. Therefore, the passengers had to sit there until they could either get a DE/DM going or send a rescue engine. Eventually, a MP15 got out there, dragged the passengers to Farmingdale where the passengers were set on a spare set. The protect set stationed in Hicksville was unable to reach the train due to frozen switches east of Hicksville, so they used an engine that was supposed to run on a snow extra to Greenport.

While it may not seam like a reason to halt snowstorm service, the news coverage on the incident was huge. Numerous news agencies covered the ordeal, and it wasn't good press for the railroad. The know-it-all Monday morning quarter-backing politicians were up in arms over the alleged "mishandling" of the situation. Ever since, the LIRR has been very skittish about operations in snow storms.

Nowadays, if snow totals exceed a certain amount they'll suspend service, therefore, if conditions do become bad, there won't be anyone on the trains to get stranded. Luckily, (well, for them), we don't get that much snow anymore, therefore, it's increasingly rare that this would be an issue. And, even if, they have lot's of snow fighting equipment.

Well, if we do actually get a decent amount of snow, which I hope, I'll definitely be shoveling tomorrow, and maybe even railfanning too, but I do have a nice post coming out tomorrow morning. 

Please Swipe Again: The Problems with OMNY

OMNY, which if your not familiar with the subway system is the fare card that is used to gain access to the system has had a troubled rollout and since the full switch from Metrocard has faced numerous scrunity from riders

A troubled rollout

The start of the rollout to OMNY was rigged with issues and inconsistencies, with many riders complaining of various issues including issues with the readers not accepting taps from an OMNY card, requring riders to tap repeatby until it worked, delayed or extra charges, and fare cap confusion. This had lead to heavy mixed opinions by riders, with some favoring the fresh rollout of MTA's fare system while others plea and morn the loss of Metrocard.

Never-ending problems 

One issue that has been worryingly common with the OMNY, and is likely common complaint, is that the fare gate failed to read their OMNY payments. This has actually happened to me multiple times in the city and I can tell you firsthand that it is obnoxious and almost made me miss a train home. A whopping 42 percent of survey respondents said this was an issue for them. This is something that needs 

Another reoccuring problem is delayed charges; and apparently this is due to backend processing and it leads to multiple fares showing up in batches later on. While it's not the end all be all as there's rarely extra charges, it's a quite annoying problem that should look to be fixed.

In conclusion, the fact that in the 21st century the MTA cannot rollout a fare system that isn't rigged with issues shows the incompetence going on there. While the MTA calls it "growing pains", and I feel it's understandable that there will be glitches here and there when transitioning to a entirely new system, something that hasn't been done in many years, I think it should be made crystal clear that the MTA wasn't ready for this.

LIRR to operate on weekday schedule for Martin Luther King Day, rest of MTA not following suit

As many of you know, tomorrow is Martin Luther King Day and the MTA has a very complicated way of running service.

The LIRR will operate on a full weekday schedule, something that while unnecessary, has become a yearly practice for a at least a decade now. Meanwhile Metro-North will operate on a modified weekend schedule (with some added trains aligning during peak hours. If your wondering why the LIRR would run on a weekday schedule and Metro-North would not, I have no clue. The subway is also running on a weekend schedule. 

I personally feel it's very unnecessary for the LIRR to run a full weekday schedule. Much fewer people travel during traditional peak hours on this day and it will probably lead to some very low crowding levels, and coupled while charging off-peak fares it just seams very overkill. While I don't feel They could follow Metro-North's route and 

The LIRR seams to be very hesitant about running "modified" schedules and instead opts to either run a full weekday schedule or a full weekend schedule. Metro-North on the other hand chooses to run a base weekend schedule then add some extras here and there to provide additional capacity. A good example of this issue can be seen on Christmas Eve when the LIRR chooses to run a full weekday schedule. Not only is this ridiculously overkill but its simply a waste of equipment and crew hours. There is absolutely no reason why a full weekday schedule could be warranted on the day before the biggest holiday of the year.

I personally feel the LIRR could be fine by just running a regular weekend schedule without any extras on Christmas Day, but on days like Martin Luther King Day for those who are unlucky enough to go into the office, they should really just go back to their old method of running a weekend schedule with a couple of extras heading westbound during the traditional peak hours and then heading back out in the evening. This would better align with the travel patterns on this holiday.

Before I go, I'd like to emphasize that off-peak fares will be accepted for all of Monday on both the LIRR and Metro-North.

New subway gate rollout rigged with issues

Photo: AMNY

The NYC Subway's new fare gates- a pilot program which started being unveiled in December 2025 at a select couple of subway stations have recently been getting bad press after a 5 year old girls head got stuck in the fare gate at the Broadway-Lafeyette station. 

That wasn't the first time either that a situation similar to that happened with these new fare gates, as various kids had the gates closed on them, separating them from their caregivers and putting them in a potentially very scary situation for both the parent and child. 

Janno Lieber, in an interview conducted by PIX11 news, said that "the gates are being tested at select locations and that the officials are learning about them". He also said "the one thing I'm concerned about is making sure the parents know how to proceed safely through with a child", you got to have a child in front or close by to you; the system is designed to child, small person. What it’s not designed to do is if the child wanders behind, five feet behind you, then the doors close and that’s not great.”

The thing that bothers me about this whole situation is that it's 2026 and we are still having issues designing a fare gate, something that should be, in terms of the MTA's scale, relatively straightforward. While I understand it's not easy to test every little situation, like where a kid is a couple feet behind their parents, but in a world of modern technology, I can't imagine there isn't some sort of sensor they could implement that would be able to determine whether it's a young child behind their parents or person trying to get a free ride. 

I feel like this situation should represent a larger issue at the MTA- failing to perform adequate tests. The real problem lies in the timing for the gates; either you close them to early and it creates the potential for a situation where the gates would close on a child's face, but, if you keep them open for too long after the fare is paid, then it creates the potential for people to follow others behind and get a free ride. Similarly, I prefer the model of gates that isn't the tall one, as this will prevent the unlucky scenario where the gate would slam close right in your face-quite a good way to start your morning. However, this creates the potential for the more athletic crowd to simply turn into a hurdle and hop over it.

Photo: ABC7

 The fare gates are aimed to replace the current turnstyles at over 200 subway stations by 2029, in an attempt to crackdown on the cities fare evasion problem. Whether or not these new "fare gates" are going to make a difference is another question, one that can be debated given the fact that many say the MTA is making it "easier" for fare evasion by allowing people to potentially follow behind others through the gate. 

Interlocking Walkthrough: LOCUST

It's actually been quite a while since I've done an interlocking walkthrough, so today, I decided to come back and finish 

Photo: Edward Hand

LOCUST interlocking is one of those very straightforward interlockings, as it's simply where the Oyster Bay Branch becomes single track for the culminating stretch to Oyster Bay.

LOCUST interlocking was originally put into service in 1912 as OY, but later got changed to it's current name. There was formally an in service control tower that controlled the interlocking, but on November 17, 1975, control of the interlocking got moved over to NASSAU tower. However, LOCUST tower still stands to this day and is actually used as a police booth for the NCPD. 

LOCUST interlocking consists of the old "pensy-style" position-light signals. Eventually, these will be replaced with the more modern signals as the LIRR looks to move control of everything to Jamaica.

The speed limit through the eastern end of the interlocking onto the final curvy stretch to Oyster Bay is 40 m.p.h.

And that shall conclude the simple but important LOCUST interlocking.

LIRR vs MNR schedule padding

The LIRR and MNR, as both separate railroads, have relatively different ways of doing things. While they both share similar equipment to one another, as separate companies if you will, they both have different ways of doing things. One of those many ways involves a practice adopted by railroads known as "schedule padding."

The term "schedule padding " refers to the addition of additional travel time added to railroad schedules beyond what's needed to complete the run with the goal of accounting for potential delays such as congestion, this is done to beef up OTP numbers

While adding a little schedule padding is always a good measure as it allows for trains to recover from minor delays for things such as minor congestion, slow loading, etc, too much schedule padding is exactly the opposite. It

I personally favor endpoint schedule padding. This is because this will allow the train to operate normally and arrive early to it's final destination without waiting around at stations unnecessarily ,

This is what Metro-North does, and while I feel they take it a step too far as for example New Haven Line that terminate at Harrison an average running time of 13 minutes between Mamaroneck and Harrison, while only giving through trains 3 minutes. I definitely feel this is a bit excessive and just looks bad on the schedules, but, at least it won't require the engineer to either one hold in every station, or, 

And while endpoint schedule padding isn't great, as it's usually very excessive and leads to unrealistic OTP numbers, it's better than excessive intermediate schedule padding.

The LIRR, on the other hand, generally prefers intermediate schedule padding. This is when they pad the actual running times between each station, and I feel this is generally more intrusive to the actual run. Let's take for example the running time between Westbury and Carle Place. It can easily be done in 2 minutes, however, most of the trains are allotted 3 minutes, and this is done purposely to While I will admit it's not the worst idea to give that extra minute on the Main Line. While that extra minute isn't a terrible thing on the busy Main Line where delays can build up easily, it means that if the train is running on time that chances are the engineer will go at a lower speed between Westbury and Carle Place so they won't have to wait around, and this builds up travel time. 

I want to clarify that my point isn't that they should eliminate all intermediate schedule padding rather just look to see whether or not it's really worth it or not. There are definitely examples where intermediate schedule padding is a good thing, and a good example is between Jamaica and Kew Gardens. While in technically the run could be done in 4 minutes,  like the LIRR schedules for, rarely can trains actually get there in four minutes, 

As far as running times themselves go, thew LIRR definitely tends to be more aggressive and ambitious at times, while Metro-North tends to be more realistic, however the LIRR also tends to throw in little bits of schedule padding here and there into intermediate run times.

I plan to talk further about schedule padding more in the future, and I plan to go in-depth on exactly how the LIRR and MNR calculate there schedule padding in an attempt to look at ways to reduce the fat in both railroads' schedules.