Patterson Grade Crossing Renewal
This weekend the MTA Metro-North Railroad will be conducting a grade crossing renewal on the Wassaic branch in Patterson. Here are the details:
The complete replacement of the State Route 311 at-grade crossing over the Metro-North train track in Patterson will require substitute bus service between Southeast and Wassaic from Friday night through early Monday morning, September 19, through September 22.
Metro-North Railroad Maintenance of Way employees will begin work Friday night after the 10:23 p.m. train leaves Southeast for Wassaic.
Crews will remove the thick rubber mats around the track, rip up the track, remove the ties, then dig out any accumulated mud and finally vacuum out the old ballast, the loose stone that secures the rails in place. After this complete excavation, another crew will begin Saturday morning to lay out 40 brand-new ties and attach brand-new, galvanized hardware. Then they will connect the new running rail to the ties. New ballast stone will be dropped and the track will be resurfaced to the correct specifications for a smooth, safe ride.
On Sunday, crews with cranes will lay new, prefabricated concrete slabs on either side of the track. These are more durable than the old rubber mats they replace.
Train service will resume for the Monday morning peak with the 5:10 a.m. departure from Wassaic. But midday service on Monday will be bused. Full, regular train service resumes Monday with the 5:07 p.m. from Southeast, due Wassaic 5:52 p.m.
Metro-North also will be doing other maintenance work to take advantage of the track outage, including tamping and surfacing various locations on the branch to stabilize the track structure and repair of insulated joints.
This weekend, customers should allow extra travel time, as bus times are about 10 minutes earlier than train times to ensure a good connection with trains at Southeast. There will be sufficient buses to carry the approximately 500 people who use the Wassaic Branch on Saturdays and 750 customers on Sundays.
xoxo Transit Blogger
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Subway Pervert Arrested
Well that was fast…. Early yesterday afternoon I blogged about the disgusting subway pervert who looked up the skirt of a woman he eventually threw down the stairs & assaulted.
Fast forward a few hours later & the disgusting pervert identified as 61 year old James Barnes of Brooklyn has been arrested. Ashley Edwards of Pix11 has more:
Police arrested a man they said sexually assaulted a woman, threw her down a flight of stairs, then brutally attacked her at a Brooklyn subway station.
Brooklyn man James Barnes, 61, has been arrested and charged with assault and sexual abuse.
Cops say the woman was walking up the stairs leaving the Dekalb Avenue ‘D’ and ‘M’ train station at 10 p.m. August 8 when the man put his head up her skirt.
When the victim tried to push the suspect away, he threw her down the stairs and began punching and kicking her before fleeing the scene.
The woman suffered bruises and wasn’t hospitalized.
Thankfully this worthless piece of trash is off the streets.
xoxo Transit Blogger
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Metro North To Upgrade Harlem River Bridge
Harlem River Bridge; photo courtesy of the MTA.
Just a short time ago, the MTA Metro-North Railroad announced it will be upgrading the Harlem River Bridge. Here are the details:
Starting September 15, the Harlem River Lift Bridge will not open for boats for six months while workers replace 60-year-old cables that lift the bridge and install all new electrical components designed to increase their resiliency to potential storm surge flooding.
The railroad bridge, located about 4 ½ miles north of Grand Central Terminal, connects the island of Manhattan to the Bronx mainland.
“This vital bridge is used by more than 280,000 Metro-North customers on 700 trains each weekday,” said Metro-North President Joseph Giulietti. “This project will improve the reliability, efficiency, and safety of the bridge and allow us to meet our obligation to keep the bridge’s moving parts moving.”
Although there are only 6 to 10 openings per year as commercial shipping on the Harlem River has steadily declined, Metro-North is obligated by Coast Guard regulations to keep the bridge operational. It is the railroad’s only moveable bridge in New York State. (The State of Connecticut owns five movable bridges on the New Haven Line.)
In addition to replacement of all the original cables that lift the two, 340-foot-long, three million pound spans, the project includes a new electrical control system and wiring and a new third rail power supply system. The new Facility House electrical components, damaged during Superstorm Sandy, will be installed to increase their resiliency to potential storm surge flooding, thanks to a $5 million federal Sandy Emergency Relief grant.
Outdated electro-mechanical controls will be replaced and computerized with the installation of a dual-redundant, programmable logic control system. The elevators from the track level up to the operator’s rooms at the counterweight level also will be rehabilitated. New multi-conductor, copper and fiber optic cables will be pulled through a micro-tunnel under the Harlem River that was bored under a prior Capital Program.
The entire $47 million project is being paid for by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s 2010-2014 Capital Program with help from federal grants of $24 million (including the $5 million Sandy grant).
The two-year project has been scheduled to take full advantage of the six-month Coast Guard outage and minimize impacts to Metro-North customers.
Most boats, including the Circle Line tours, can navigate underneath the unopened bridge, which provides vertical clearance of 25 feet at high tide. When opened, the bridge provides 135-foot clearance.
The bridge was built in the 1950’s by the New York Central Railroad and completed in 1954 to replace an earlier swing-style span. The bridge has parallel lift spans, each with two tracks. The spans operate independently. At either end of the bridge are steel towers that contain the machinery to hoist the spans.
In all, 128 main cables, each 2⅜ inches in diameter and 185 feet long, connect the ends of the bridge spans to their balancing counterweights high above in the lift towers. Spools of replacement cables, each weighing more than a ton, will be brought to the bridge on barges, lifted to the platform by crane, and hoisted into place by electric winch.
xoxo Transit Blogger
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Cops Looking For Subway Pervert
A picture of the man cops say put his head up the skirt & eventually assaulted a woman at the DeKalb Ave train station.
Cops are on the lookout for a subway pervert who put his head up the skirt of a woman who was walking up the stairs to exit the DeKalb Ave station. When she tried to push him away, he grabbed her & threw her down the stairs before punching & kicking her.
Ashley Edwards of Pix11 has more:
Police are looking for a man they said sexually assaulted a woman, threw her down a flight of stairs, then brutally attacked her at a Brooklyn subway station.
Cops say the woman was walking up the stairs leaving the Dekalb Avenue ‘D’ and ‘M’ train station at 10 p.m. August 8 when the man put his head up her skirt. When the victim tried to push the suspect away, he threw her down the stairs and began punching and kicking her before fleeing the scene.
The woman suffered bruises.
The suspect is described as approximately 60-years-old, 5’8″, and weighing about 160 lbs.
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS. Tips can also be submitted at http://www.nypdcrimestoppers.com, or by texting to 274637 (CRIMES), then entering TIP577.
I hope this piece of trash is caught soon as he has zero business being out on the streets.
xoxo Transit Blogger
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Woman Killed By MTA Bus In Queens
Late Wednesday night, a 55 year old woman was struck & killed by a Q47 bus at the intersection of Astoria Blvd & 80th St. Alison Fox of AMNY has more:
A 55-year-old woman was hit and killed by an MTA bus in Queens late Wednesday night, police said.
The woman, Melania Ward, was crossing the intersection of Astoria Boulevard and 80th Street about 10 p.m. when she was struck, police said. She was a few blocks from her home in the Ditmars-Steinway area.
The bus, the Q47, was rounding the corner and turning right onto 80th Street when the two collided, police said.
Click here for the complete story.
My condolences to the friends & family of the victim.
xoxo Transit Blogger
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