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Since the start of 2020, my commute has felt like being packed in a sardine can. When I look at other trains I see the same thing. Everyone is jampacked in. What's going on?
I missed my train home Monday because there was literally no room. Not only packed like a sardine can but lots of people standing around on the platform. What it amounts to is New Jersey Transit has no idea how to run a railroad. They can't hire engineers, they can't keep their equipment working (leaving it on tidal flats during Sandy was an especially nice touch, I think they only caught up with that last year), and they can't keep their trackage in good condition or signals working. If it was better at the end of 2019, it's because people were off for the holidays. Add to that that they can't run enough trains because there's no less than three bottlenecks (North River Tunnels, Penn Station platform space, and the Portal Bridge), and you've a problem.
Since the system is at capacity, one little thing going wrong causes cascading problems. And things always go wrong, because NJT is incompetent.
So far this week three of my trains have been cancelled and doubled up with another train making extra stops. While I've had that happen more often than it should happening three times in two days was certainly something beyond what I expect from even NJT.
We keep passing milestones where it should have gotten better (after summer of hell, after recent engineer graduations) but it only gets worse. I'm riding in from one of the top 10 stations by ridership so it's not like I'm riding in from somewhere strange.
I'm sure NJT has plans, but I haven't seen any signs that there's any reason to trust that their plans have the intended affect.
I don't like the way they've scheduled trains. Somebody who does scheduling should be fired. In the morning there are some schedule like around 6:50am and 7am trains that are within 10 min from the next train. The 7am train is not packed usually 1/2 empty. Then at the peak time such as 7:30am they have a huge 25min gap for the next at 7:55am. Most people take the 730am and not the 755am. Because they should run another damn train around 7:45am and then 7:55am. The huge gap causes people to crowd up during the peak times.
I don't like the way they've scheduled trains. Somebody who does scheduling should be fired. In the morning there are some schedule like around 6:50am and 7am trains that are within 10 min from the next train. The 7am train is not packed usually 1/2 empty. Then at the peak time such as 7:30am they have a huge 25min gap for the next at 7:55am. Most people take the 730am and not the 755am. Because they should run another damn train around 7:45am and then 7:55am. The huge gap causes people to crowd up during the peak times.
You are oversimplifying things. Each individual train does not run in a vacuum. The schedule of one train is dependent on the schedule of all other trains running in the system. The tracks are shared by other NJT trains as well as Amtrak trains so there has to be spacing available. There also has to be a platform available at Penn for the train to arrive at, so you have to consider the departure time of the other trains leaving Penn. It is all much more complicated to coordinate than you perceive it to be.
To be honest, if anything they probably need to run less trains. They're obviously past capacity. I know changing the schedule by anything other than a minute here and there is obviously a big deal to an affected town, but their schedule as it is is impossible.
You are oversimplifying things. Each individual train does not run in a vacuum. The schedule of one train is dependent on the schedule of all other trains running in the system. The tracks are shared by other NJT trains as well as Amtrak trains so there has to be spacing available. There also has to be a platform available at Penn for the train to arrive at, so you have to consider the departure time of the other trains leaving Penn. It is all much more complicated to coordinate than you perceive it to be.
My point is they are scheduling trains that do not reflect the schedule that people use the system. They are being inefficient and inconsiderate. I wait for the trains all the time and I see under-utilized trains and over capacity trains at the same time slots.
There are Northeast coastline trains that are under capacity that has the double deckers. Yet there are NJCL trains just 2mins apart that are packed and using crappy undersized diesel trains.
They should give the schedule and line the trains that can handle the load and not give some lines over capacity trains.
The scheduling is the other problem where they often run 4-6 trains during peak than carry 7-8 trains behind it and is only half used.
The platform and train crowding could be due to various problems causing delays through the 110 year old "north river tunnels" or the portal bridges or a "frozen" switch somewhere on the line or a defect in a train car wheel causing rail traffic to stop, etc.
The whole system is in dire need of a major upgrading including new tunnels and the replacement of the portal bridges. The money just isn't available to do what's needed.
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