New York Wiki

LIRR Huntington yard: benefits

A new yard with more tracks would mean better and faster service -
- nine trains every morning by 2012, for commuters who sometimes
endure waits of nearly 30 minutes between trains.

Previously: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

THE CURRENT NUMBERS

14: Number of peak a.m. trains on the LIRR's Huntington line each weekday.
14,150: Number of passengers serviced on the line each weekday morning.

THE FUTURE PICTURE?*

3: Number of a.m. peak trains that likely will be added each weekday if the yard is built by 2011.
9: Total number of additional a.m. weekday peak trains after completion of East Side Access in 2012.

BY COMPARISON
17: Number of tracks in the yard that services Babylon line.
36: Number of peak a.m. trains on the Babylon line each weekday.
26,270: Number of passengers served each weekday on peak a.m. trains.

*Future ridership projections depend on final location of rail yard.

SOURCE: Long Island Rail Road

LIRR Taking Yard Flak
AFter public hearings, LIRR plan riding on strong opposition

By Joie Tyrrell, Staff Writer

2004 January 11, 9:11 PM EST

The signs and petitions started to pop up throughout Huntington Village last fall,
on light posts, the counter of a local bookstore and throughout the shops of Main
Street.

"Stop the LIRR Yard," they read, arguing that a proposed 16-track railroad
storage yard would harm the community.

At the same time, the Long Island Rail Road was preparing for the first of four
public meetings on the proposed yard for the Port Jefferson line with color
brochures and detailed signs touting the service additions and benefits a train
yard would bring.

The pitch is simple, LIRR officials say. A new yard with more tracks would mean
better and faster service -- nine trains every morning by 2012, for commuters
who sometimes endure waits of nearly 30 minutes between trains.

Now, the first phase of the public comment period has ended and the railroad is
preparing to move ahead with the selection of a site from among a field of six in
Huntington and Smithtown. Railroad officials say the public comment period
achieved its goal, garnering much-needed input into the site selection. But
residents of both communities say the railroad should be prepared for a fight.

"It's going to be a huge challenge," said Beverly Dolinsky, executive director of
the Long Island Rail Road Commuter's Council, a transit riders' group.
"Overwhelmingly, people want service but they don't want a yard, and you can't
have one without the other."

There are six sites the railroad is considering for a yard: two in Huntington and
four in Smithtown. In Huntington, the sites are land next to the state armory and
a parcel west of Bread and Cheese Hollow Road south of Pulaski Road. In
Smithtown, potential locations are two sites in Kings Park near a sand mine; a
parcel at the Kings Park Psychiatric Center; and land next to St. Catherine of
Siena Medical Center.

The sites will be evaluated on the basis of a number of factors, including land-use
issues, noise considerations and impact on natural resources.

A new yard would mean electrifying the Port Jefferson line east of Huntington to
where the new yard is located.

The Federal Transit Administration will review the findings of the environmental
study and issue a decision on the site. A final environmental impact statement,
which will identify a preferred site, is scheduled to be finished by the end of next
year or early 2006. The railroad then needs approval from the Federal Transit
Administration before starting design work.

The railroad now stores equipment on a siding east of the Huntington Station with
a three-train capacity. Also, the railroad operates several morning rush-hour
trains to Huntington from its West Side Yard, about 37 miles away.

A 16-track yard would mean an additional three trains in the morning by the time
it is built in 2011. When the East Side Access, which will connect the LIRR to
Grand Central Terminal, is complete in 2012, it will mean six more trains,
bringing a total of at least nine more trains each morning. Currently, there are 14
trains each morning rush hour, some with nearly a half-hour gap in service.

"Huntington is very restricted as to what you can do," said LIRR president James
Dermody. "There is an overwhelming need."

Since the railroad falls under federal authority, it does not require village, county
or state approval. In an effort to get public input, the railroad hosted four
meetings in November in Huntington and Smithtown, attended by hundreds -- the
majority against the project. Politicians at the state, county and town level have
voiced objections as well.

"There were a lot of people who were very vocal shouting their opposition. They
were not there to participate in the process, just to say no, without really
learning about it," said Commuter's Council chairman James Govern, one of the
few speakers at a Kings Park hearing in favor of the proposal.

Civic groups have collected thousands of signatures against the project. Just
this last week, the Kings Park Civic Association, as well as other civic groups in
Smithtown, sent a letter to Gov. George Pataki detailing their opposition to the
Smithtown sites. They are worried about the environmental and economic
impacts a rail yard would have on the community.

"What we are doing now is we are amassing all the people," said Kings Park Civic
Association president Gregory Szurnicki.

Civic leaders as well as local politicians said they would be willing to go to court
to fight the yard. Four years ago, residents strongly opposed a yard in
Greenlawn. That site was eliminated due to an environmental impact study that
showed the proposed yard was in close proximity to homes.

The site in Huntington Station is also too close to homes, opponents said. "This
yard, this is really a stopgap," said Eileen Darwin, a Huntington resident who
helped form the Stop the LIRR Yard committee. She said the railroad should
approach the yard regionally, placing it closer to Hicksville where several lines
converge. "Every single person we have approached has been against this. I
don't know anybody who has said it should be here."

Next, the railroad will evaluate all the comments received. In total, the railroad
received 88 e-mails, 103 letters and had 1,646 people sign in at the meetings. A
total of 12,500 informational packets were sent from the railroad to town leaders,
civic groups and residents.

Dermody said the six sites could be limited to three or four by the end of this
year. "People can't say they weren't aware of the yard. They can't say the
railroad never told me," Dermody said.

But could overwhelming public opposition kill the project and jeopardize the
railroad's future plans, including a yard constructed east of Ronkonkoma near
Yaphank?

"You can't tell what public opposition is going to do for you," Dermody said. "We
are subject to public funding. We have to justify it for that arena.. . . We are
going to do the best job we can answering concerns."

Copyright © 2004, Newsday, Inc.

Posted by dc at January 19, 2004 01:07 AM