HERE is a classic Amelia Opdyke “Oppy” Jones “Subway Sun” I found in one of the Transit Museum’s classic trainsets on the Brighton Line a few years ago encouraging people to give themselves more time and take the local during the summer months in the days before air-conditioned cars. “Taking the local” is still a foreign concept in most of the world’s transit systems except New York’s, as adding extra tracks for express service was pioneered in the NYC subways even in the early days of the IRT in the 1910s. To this day NYC remains one of the few major subways in the world with express service, though construction and rehabilitation severely cut down on it during weekends.
“Oppy”‘s advice wasn’t often followed and in fact led to the demise of some of NYC’s subway lines. In the 2000s, the new V train was conceived of as a local service to relieve the crowding of the B and D on the 6th Avenue line and the E and F on Queens Boulevard, and ran strictly local service between 2nd Avenue and Continental/71st Avenue in Forest Hills. The appeals didn’t work, and the V met its demise from low ridership in 2010.
I’ll take a less crowded local over a jam-packed express any day, but I seem to be in the minority and I was a frequent V rider.
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7/10/23