NEW YORK — Metro-North Railroad will launch “super express” trains next month between Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and Grand Central Terminal.
The trains will cut travel time to less than 90 minutes each way, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said today. The first “super-express” trains will run on Monday, Oct. 6.
“Delivering better, faster Metro-North service to Hudson Valley commuters will propel economic growth across our state and improve quality of life,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said during a ceremony today in Grand Central Terminal. “These new super-express trains will save commuters nearly 15 minutes of travel time every day, giving riders back over an hour a week of their precious time. This is just the start — work remains underway to deliver even more service improvements along the line, improving reliability and making trips up and down the Hudson Valley even faster.”
Metro-North is shortening five trips between Poughkeepsie and Grand Central to less than 90 minutes and one trip down to 95 minutes, delivering the fastest trips ever between the two cities.
The travel time for a non-express trip between Poughkeepsie and Grand Central can be up to 115 minutes, depending on the number of stops. The run time improvements cut travel times by as much as 7 minutes one way compared to the current super-express train schedules, and by as much as 20 minutes one way compared to non-express trains, providing commuters and visitors with a quicker and reliable ride into and out of Manhattan.
“Thanks to these schedule improvements, riders can get where they need to go faster, while continuing to enjoy the safe, reliable service they expect from Metro-North,” Metro-North Railroad President Justin Vonashek said. “These enhancements build on the railroad’s record-setting reliability with a systemwide on-time performance of 98% — and with more improvement work underway, this is only the beginning.”
The new Metro-North schedules also feature the return of the “Leaf Peeper” trains, providing extra service for customers planning to enjoy the fall foliage in the Hudson Valley, and increased service for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s.
Between Oct. 5 and Nov. 9, five additional trains will run between Grand Central, Beacon and Poughkeepsie on Saturdays and Sundays.
The addition of new Siemens Charger diesel-electric locomotives, which joined Metro-North’s fleet in passenger service this week, will help make travel on the Hudson Line, and throughout the network, faster and greener, the MTA said.
Caltrain did this 20 years ago with the Baby Bullet and vastly increased ridership.
Funny how “express” hasn’t meant express in a long time. Now we have “super-express” and “non-stop express”.
Via is starting true non-stop express trains between Montreal and Toronto at the end of the month. Amtrak has never seemed to offer true express trains for some reason.
With a top speed of 80mph through Dutchess and Putnam counties and 75, 70, and less through Westchester, there isn’t much time to squeeze from the schedule. Improved acceleration provides a little. Eliminating station stops saves more but has the effect of limiting ridership. Kudos to Metro-North for making the effort but 75 miles in “under 90 minutes” doesn’t impress much.
The MTA has come a long way since New York Central’s Pullman-Standard EMU clerestorey cars I miss so dearly.