By late summer the MTA expects to complete the 1,500-foot connector linking the 21st St. Queensbridge station to the Queens Blvd. line. The tunnel is intended to allow an increase in Manhattan-Queens subway service.
"The only part of the MTAs 63rd St. tunnel plan that I take issue with is not having V-line service run 24 hours a day, seven days a week," she said. " To make this plan a total success, V-line service must be round-the-clock. The MTA has spent more than a decade developing a plan that would provide much needed relief for the residents of Queens. It needs to be enhanced and not changed."
As for the G train, Shulman said terminating service at Court Square will eliminate the need to intersperse the G with Queens local service. This, she asserted, "will enable the MTA to actually improve G line service by adding additional trains. G riders will still be able to commute to Queens by making a transfer at Court Square that requires walking a distance of only 350 feet."
Shulman pointed out that the 10,000 riders who use the G train to travel to Queens represent only one percent of the total daily ridership on the Queens Blvd. line. "It is not practical to make changes that would significantly reduce service to 99 percent of our boroughs riders in an effort to maintain the status quo for the one percent," she said.
The MTA drew complaints starting last December when it announced that Queens-bound G trains would end their run at Court Square station as part of a plan to relieve crowding on the E, F and R trains, which move 546,000 commuters daily. Criticism has been especially acute from community leaders in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, where the governor draws strong support.
On the same day the Queens Borough President and Deputy Borough President Peter Magnani gave their testimony, the New York Daily News reported officials revised plans to scale back G train service and, for the first time, install airport-style people movers at the Court Square station to ease transfers.
The revised proposal resulted from pressure by the governor and commuter groups upset by the proposed removal of 13 stops as part of the major service changes that include a new V line. Under the revised plan, approved by the MTAs Transit Committee last Thursday, G trains will end at Court Square from 5 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., but run their full route to Forest Hills on weekdays from 8:30 p.m. to 5 a.m. and all weekend. The trains now terminate service at Court Square on weekends and after 9 p.m. on weekdays.
With the modified plan, rush-hour and daytime riders will use the passage connecting the Court Square and 23rd St. and Ely Ave. stations to transfer to the E and V for missed stops. To facilitate this transfer for commuters, Transit plans to install two people movers along the 460-foot passageway. Due to of limited track capacity, the MTA cannot run G trains while operating V trains.
Other proposed Transit changes included free MetroCard transfers between the new F train stop at 63rd St. and Lexington Ave., and the 4, 5 and 6 lines at 59th St. and Lexington Ave. With no underground link between the two stations, transferring riders will need to walk outside to make their change. The new plan to lessen overcrowding and add the new V line goes before the full MTA board this week. If approved, it becomes effective Nov. 11.
Dan Andrews, spokesman for Shulman, said late Tuesday afternoon that the borough president does not oppose Transits revised plan for G line service.
Peter Magnani told the Transit Committee that Queens has waited three decades for promised benefits of the 63rd St Tunnel. "During that time, 900,000 daily commuters have endured overcrowded trains and severely insufficient service. The deficiencies of the E and F lines have affected the quality of life in our borough and not kept pace with our burgeoning economic growth."
The start of V-line service is the answer, he said. "It will provide direct express service into Manhattan, and help us turn the corner on decades of frustration and inadequacies." The V line will run between 2nd Ave. on the Lower East Side and 71st Ave. in Forest Hills and shortening the G line to Court Square.
Magnani warned that continuing the G train beyond Court Square to Queens Plaza station would reverse the benefits of the V line by lengthening the time ( headways) between trains. "It will substantially reduce the number of peak- hour trains that would otherwise serve our borough and our riders," he said.
