4 ms·

yeah I'm referring to stations, not miles of track. nyc has a ridiculous number of stations that causes the whole system to be a lot more complicated and expen

yeah I'm referring to stations, not miles of track. nyc has a ridiculous number of stations that causes the whole system to be a lot more complicated and expensive than just running miles of track with nothing in between.

barrkel 7y ago
Where in the world are there subways with miles of track and nothing in between?
- VWWHFSfQ 7y ago
  Well, all the cities with more miles of track but fewer stations than NYC.
bobthepanda 7y ago
The expensive part is not really the stations, the expensive part is that the design prioritizes one seat rides over transfer connections. The station spacing is not really an issue in New York since the subway has express overlays and the commuter rail system for even faster travel. This is compared to Beijing or Shanghai, which have no/poor regional rail to speak of.
- kccqzy 7y ago
  > This is compared to Beijing or Shanghai, which have no/poor regional rail to speak of. This is really curious. Cities like Beijing and Shanghai have subways optimized for short-distance travels, and high speed trains for long-distance travels, but not much for medium-distance trips like from one edge of the city to another. How so? Is it just because the demand isn't there?
  - bobthepanda 7y ago
    Most governments, when building out subways, will choose to build two lines out and get twice the coverage rather than build one local and one express line that serve the same location. New York was able to avoid this choice starting out, because its CBD and densest areas (Manhattan) are built out in a long, narrow fashion, and you can only thread so many lines through such a narrow space before you start having to make choices between missing transfers and building stops way too close, so the decision was made early on to concentrate tracks for easier transfer facilities. It's also worth noting that New York's subway was built in an era where buses and streetcars were slow (and in some cases still pulled by horses), so the local lines have stop spacing optimized for walking to a station and the express lines are the actual commuting heavyweights that people transfer to. More modern subways are designed with medium-speed last mile transfers in mind, either via cars that park and ride (BART, DC) or lots of bus transfers (Asian systems.) Eventually a city becomes too big and belatedly realizes that it needs to have regional express service running through the city, because transferring rail+subway+rail is way too slow. Cities that developed first during the Industrial Revolution can depend on the dense legacy rail networks that were developed during that time (Paris RER, Berlin S-Bahn, London Crossrail) and this mostly consists of building connecting tunnels through the city center with stops at major activity centers. Those cities that developed during the 20th century mostly don't have dense legacy rail networks, and have to new build after the fact, which can be hard and difficult. Seoul is building a similar network to the above cities, but it's a massively expensive project that they have to build 50-60m underground because no provisions were made to accommodate it before hand. I suppose Beijing and Shanghai will get around to building such a network when they reach a similar level of wealth and can afford it.
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
  Shanghai has started building regional rail recently, and there are quite a few 50+ km subway lines that act like regional rail in practice. Map: http://www.urbanrail.net/as/cn/shan/shanghai-future.htm http://www.urbanrail.net/as/cn/shan/shanghai-future.htm But the undisputed king of subway/regional integration is Tokyo, where virtually every subway line runs directly onto regional rail, often at both ends. http://www.urbanrail.net/as/jp/tokyo/tokyo-metro-map.htm http://www.urbanrail.net/as/jp/tokyo/tokyo-metro-map.htm
  - bobthepanda 7y ago
    When I say regional, I mean something like the RER with sparse inner city stop spacing. Tokyo, for example, has the Chuo Rapid as an express overlay through the center of Tokyo. Which one of those new Shanghai lines matches that description?
amoitnga 7y ago
On the Q train in Brooklyn, in the beginning, the distance between stations is very puzzling. There is what appears to be a block distance between Sheepshead Bay and Neck Road, and Brighton Beach and Ocean Parkway. Why...
- jrockway 7y ago
  I think that's just how the system was designed. The local stations feed express stations, and the express trains are what you ride to minimize travel time. I think it all broke down when the city took over, didn't have any money, and cut the frequency of trains. You stopped being able to rely on a timed transfer, and so you often find yourself stuck on a local train because stopping every 5 seconds is still better than waiting 20 minutes for the express train. The official policy of the MTA that I read a couple years ago is for trains to always try to make the timed transfer outside of rush hour. But my experience is that they stopped doing this when people started writing newspaper articles about on-time performance. Better to have an empty train arrive at the terminal on time than for it to be a minute late because it waited for the express. The customers got exactly what they asked for ;)

barrkel 7y ago

Where in the world are there subways with miles of track and nothing in between?

VWWHFSfQ 7y ago
Well, all the cities with more miles of track but fewer stations than NYC.

bobthepanda 7y ago

The expensive part is not really the stations, the expensive part is that the design prioritizes one seat rides over transfer connections. The station spacing is not really an issue in New York since the subway has express overlays and the commuter rail system for even faster travel. This is compared to Beijing or Shanghai, which have no/poor regional rail to speak of.

kccqzy 7y ago
> This is compared to Beijing or Shanghai, which have no/poor regional rail to speak of. This is really curious. Cities like Beijing and Shanghai have subways optimized for short-distance travels, and high speed trains for long-distance travels, but not much for medium-distance trips like from one edge of the city to another. How so? Is it just because the demand isn't there?
- bobthepanda 7y ago
  Most governments, when building out subways, will choose to build two lines out and get twice the coverage rather than build one local and one express line that serve the same location. New York was able to avoid this choice starting out, because its CBD and densest areas (Manhattan) are built out in a long, narrow fashion, and you can only thread so many lines through such a narrow space before you start having to make choices between missing transfers and building stops way too close, so the decision was made early on to concentrate tracks for easier transfer facilities. It's also worth noting that New York's subway was built in an era where buses and streetcars were slow (and in some cases still pulled by horses), so the local lines have stop spacing optimized for walking to a station and the express lines are the actual commuting heavyweights that people transfer to. More modern subways are designed with medium-speed last mile transfers in mind, either via cars that park and ride (BART, DC) or lots of bus transfers (Asian systems.) Eventually a city becomes too big and belatedly realizes that it needs to have regional express service running through the city, because transferring rail+subway+rail is way too slow. Cities that developed first during the Industrial Revolution can depend on the dense legacy rail networks that were developed during that time (Paris RER, Berlin S-Bahn, London Crossrail) and this mostly consists of building connecting tunnels through the city center with stops at major activity centers. Those cities that developed during the 20th century mostly don't have dense legacy rail networks, and have to new build after the fact, which can be hard and difficult. Seoul is building a similar network to the above cities, but it's a massively expensive project that they have to build 50-60m underground because no provisions were made to accommodate it before hand. I suppose Beijing and Shanghai will get around to building such a network when they reach a similar level of wealth and can afford it.
9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
Shanghai has started building regional rail recently, and there are quite a few 50+ km subway lines that act like regional rail in practice. Map: http://www.urbanrail.net/as/cn/shan/shanghai-future.htm http://www.urbanrail.net/as/cn/shan/shanghai-future.htm But the undisputed king of subway/regional integration is Tokyo, where virtually every subway line runs directly onto regional rail, often at both ends. http://www.urbanrail.net/as/jp/tokyo/tokyo-metro-map.htm http://www.urbanrail.net/as/jp/tokyo/tokyo-metro-map.htm
- bobthepanda 7y ago
  When I say regional, I mean something like the RER with sparse inner city stop spacing. Tokyo, for example, has the Chuo Rapid as an express overlay through the center of Tokyo. Which one of those new Shanghai lines matches that description?

amoitnga 7y ago

On the Q train in Brooklyn, in the beginning, the distance between stations is very puzzling. There is what appears to be a block distance between Sheepshead Bay and Neck Road, and Brighton Beach and Ocean Parkway. Why...

jrockway 7y ago
I think that's just how the system was designed. The local stations feed express stations, and the express trains are what you ride to minimize travel time. I think it all broke down when the city took over, didn't have any money, and cut the frequency of trains. You stopped being able to rely on a timed transfer, and so you often find yourself stuck on a local train because stopping every 5 seconds is still better than waiting 20 minutes for the express train. The official policy of the MTA that I read a couple years ago is for trains to always try to make the timed transfer outside of rush hour. But my experience is that they stopped doing this when people started writing newspaper articles about on-time performance. Better to have an empty train arrive at the terminal on time than for it to be a minute late because it waited for the express. The customers got exactly what they asked for ;)