Amtrak just released its report a week and a half ago, saying that Penn Expansion, the project to condemn the Manhattan block south of Penn Station to add new tracks, is necessary for new capacity. I criticized the Regional Plan Association presentation made in August in advance of the report for its wanton ignorance of best practices, covering both the history of commuter rail through-running in Europe and the issue of dwell times at Penn Station. The report surprised me by making even more elementary mistakes on the reality of how through-running works here than the ones made in the RPA presentation. The question of dwell times is even more important, but the Effective Transit Alliance is about to release a report addressing it, with simulations made by other members; this post, in contrast, goes over what I saw in the report myself, which is large enough errors about how through-running works that of course the report sandbags that alternative, less out of malice and more out of not knowing how it works.
Note on Penn Expansion and through-running
In the regional discourse on Penn Station, it is usually held that the existing station definitely does not have the capacity to add 24 peak trains per hour from New Jersey once the Gateway tunnel opens, unless there is through-running; thus, at least one of through-running and Penn Expansion is required. This common belief is incorrect, and we will get into some dwell time simulations at ETA.
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