Khyber Sen

The track count is so high that it often starts to reduce station capacity because the interlocking becomes the bottleneck.

It's about the same length as REM and the Honolulu Skyline, which have roughly equal and much less ridership. And IBX stations will be a lot cheaper to build.

The PEL had peak crowding between Brighton and Flatbush.

I don't see why that would stop them from fairly evaluating projects, though. They could say it scores highly but is too politically difficult, but instead they sandbag it on technical scores, too.

Since the Program for Action, the only subway expansion plans were forced upon them: SAS (by Lex crowding), Hudson Yards (by NYC/Bloomberg), and now the IBX (by Hochul).

Yeah, the driving force of much of the MTA is to just keep the status quo (like state of good repair), not get sued, and be able to sue other people if things go wrong.

Oh you mean pre Hochul? Well the MTA doesn't really want to expand outside of a few places where capacity forces them to (Lex and SAS).

They've done feasibility studies for a lot of projects they don't intend to do, often to sandbag them, and I think that's what the initial feasibility study was doing until Hochul stepped in and actually made it a priority.

I think it started in 2020. The feasibility study was very different and very bad, though. They wanted to run at grade on a viaduct through every single intersection.

In 2022, though, Hochul ordered them to study it in much more earnest, and the PEL Study came out in 2023.

You mean the Bronx extension? There's just not really room on the Hell Gate with PSA now. If you had full control over freight and ran it efficiently at night, maybe you could fit everything, but it's extremely tough.

It was an RPA proposal called the Triboro RX. The MTA (institutionally as a whole) never wanted to do it until Hochul ordered them to do it.

They do not currently have enough railcars to run it as a subway line without ordering more trains.

Cuomo had nothing to do with the IBX. It was started by Hochul.

We know they're at least studying high platforms and automation. That's much more light metro than traditional light rail.

They have not said they're building American light rail. Jamie Torres Springer, for example, called it light rail metro and others have said it will be much closer to a light metro.

Have you also heard that's a preference? I moreso got the indication that's it's a personal preference, but not a technical, team-wide preference, and that higher intervention would be needed to force it (just like the MTA is only building the IBX because Hochul told them to).

So many people do not understand inflation

Pre-utility relocation for every possible subway!

It could beat it if they do it well. STOPS predicts 200k/day with 2 min peak headways, 3-5 off-peak, and that's with a 42 min runtime, and now it's 32 min.

They did it because they got a bajillion tax credits for hydrogen, so it got pushed very hard. I believe those are going away, though.

They did mention that now that it's grade separated, third rail is back on the table. That said, I still think they're heavily leaving toward catenary.

Yes, PSDs and automation are definitely more important than floor height. I still think high floor is preferable, though.

Yes it totally is. There are 12-9s all the time.

Isn't it more cost competitive than SAS?

It's an issue on the NYC subway, and I don't see why people wouldn't commit suicide in front of the IBX as well. This just makes it easier.

Also, LRVs stopping quickly is what lets them enter the platform faster.

Ah, I didn't realize. What lines use that?

Park St is incredibly slow, though, unlike the IBX averaging 26 mph with 1.25 km stop spacing. It'll likely enter short platform at ~25 mph.

Also, not sure the green line is the best example. They might not crash into riders but they crash into other trains since their signals are unenforced.

Wait, re-run it with a 32 min runtime. I wanna see how high it can get.

I think another study looked at how many trips IBX is faster for assuming 100% mode share switch and it was about 250k. So I would take that as the upper bound for initial ridership (so before TOD, changing travel patterns, etc.).

OTOH, crossing tracks when trains are coming fast every 90 seconds on each side is just asking to get hit by a train.