IND Rockaway Line

Extent and service

The north end of the Rockaway Line is a junction with the IND Fulton Street Line at Rockaway Boulevard. The line starts out as tracks F3 and F4 and descend from an elevated structure to the surface. Then the right-of-way widens to be four tracks wide. Trains in service going south then diverge from F3, and go onto F1. Trains coming from the Rockaways merge from track F2 onto track F4. South of this point, track F4 is out of service, and track F3 can only be used by work trains as it is de-energized. The line then continues as a four track line, and south of Howard Beach, the tracks merge into two tracks. The line then passes over Jamaica Bay just to the east of Cross Bay Boulevard, on its own private right-of-way. Then the line passes over the North Channel Swing Bridge, which is no longer able to be moved. The crossing across Jamaica Bay between Howard Beach and Broad Channel is the longest distance between any two stations in the system.

In 1997 to 1999, outer tracks were installed to the north of Broad Channel for between $5 million and $10 million. The track to the west of the original tracks, track F5, extends slightly less than two miles, or 10,300 feet (3,100 m), and is used for testing of equipment. The track to the east of the original tracks, track F6, is used for reversing trains on the Rockaway Park shuttle, and is approximately as long as a standard full length train. This track allows the shuttle to turn around significantly faster than it had been able to do before, when it was forced to relay at Howard Beach–JFK Airport or Euclid Avenue. South of the Broad Channel station is the Beach Channel Drawbridge, which does open regularly and can cause delays to service when it is open for marine traffic.

South of the drawbridge is Hammels Wye, a three-legged junction with the Rockaway Park branch, and the Far Rockaway branch. The tracks from each branch connect to the tracks north of the wye with flying junctions. The Rockaway Park Branch turns to the west, and the Far Rockaway Branch turns to the east. The third leg of the wye is a single track that connects the two branches together. This single track, track F6, is not currently used in revenue service. However, it was used as part of the Round Robin service that the A operated during late nights in the 1990s. It was also used for temporary H service after Hurricane Sandy.

The Rockaway Park Branch, tracks F3 and F4, goes west via an elevated structure over the Rockaway Freeway before terminating at Rockaway Park–Beach 116th Street. Directly to the north of the station is a seven-track storage yard named Rockaway Park Yard. This yard stores the trains for the Rockaway Park Shuttle. To the south of the station is a single storage track.

The Far Rockaway Branch, tracks F3A and F4A, goes east over the Rockaway Freeway as an elevated and terminates at a two track terminal at Far Rockaway Mott Avenue.

History

Most of the Rockaway Line dates back to the 1880s when it was operated as the New York, Woodhaven and Rockaway Railroad; the Far Rockaway station had been in operation since 1869 as part of the South Side Railroad of Long Island. In 1892, the line first saw service by the Long Island Rail Road from its Atlantic Branch. In the late 1890s, the Brooklyn Elevated Railway (later the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company) received permission to operate elevated trains from Brooklyn on the line for beach access. The city soon began eyeing the line as popularity soared. Additionally, the Ocean Electric Railway used part of the line as a connection between the Far Rockaway and Rockaway Beach Branches.

Plans for the New York City Subway to take over the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR)'s Rockaway branches were put forth as early as 1932.

The Long Island Rail Road's wooden trestle over Jamaica Bay often caught fire. A fire that started at 3:30 on a December night damaged 1,300 feet of the trestle. Service could not be resumed for several days because of a lack of available materials. Therefore, the railroad asked Green Bus Lines to provide service for passengers stranded at Broad Channel and The Raunt. Another took place at The Raunt on December 15, 1948 delaying trains between nine and nineteen minutes during the morning rush hour. 300 feet of the trestle was destroyed during a July 4, 1949 fire, and morning rush hour service was delayed the following day. The worst fire, the one that that sealed the fate of the line, took place on May 7, 1950. The fire burned all night and destroyed 1,800 feet of the trestle between The Raunt and Broad Channel stations, and the estimated cost to repair it was $1 million. As a result, the LIRR deemed the line useless, and instead of repairing it, the LIRR decided to abandon the line in favor of their "land route" to Far Rockaway via Valley Stream in Nassau County.

When the railroad made it clear that it was not planning to rebuild the line, the city bought the line on June 11, 1952 for $8.5 million. The LIRR needed the money for its big safety program, which cost $6 million. The New York City Board of Transportation, operators of the subway system, started preparing contracts for the reconstruction of the line right after the sale went through. In total, $47.5 million was spent to rebuilt the line and to convert it for subway use, something they were planning to do as far back as the late 1920s. As part of the construction to convert the line to subway use, two new steel swing bridges were built to cross the North and South Channels, and two artificial islands were built using sand from Jamaica Bay to provide a roadbed for the subway trestle.

Work was completed right before the 1956 summer season, but the power supply was inadequate. Because of a strike, the delivery of substation equipment was delayed. Trains operated slowly across Jamaica Bay in order to conserve power. The newer R10s were intended to operate over the line, but because they required more power than the Arnines, the Arnines operated on the line. The line was incorporated into the Independent Subway System (IND) and connected to the IND Fulton Street Line. On June 28, 1956, service on the line began between Euclid Avenue and Rockaway Park at 6:38 PM and between Euclid Avenue and Wavecrest at 6:48 PM. Once the slow order was removed, the travel time from Euclid Avenue to Rockaway Park decreased from 40 to 28 minutes, and the travel time from Euclid Avenue to Wavecrest decreased from 44 to 32 minutes.

In September 1956, the New York City Transit Authority announced that the Rockaway revenues were disappointing, as $15,000 was expected to be made every day during the summer, while only $7,000 was made. As a result there was a $750,000 deficit.

A new station at Far Rockaway–Mott Avenue opened on January 16, 1958, completing the Rockaway Line.

The line charged a double fare south of Howard Beach which entailed the deposit of two tokens for those entering along the line or one token on exit for those arriving from other parts of the system. Passengers traveling only within the double-fare zone would request a special "refund ticket", entitling them to a refund upon exiting the system, either in cash or a token. The unpopular double fare was abolished on September 1, 1975, though it coincided with a system-wide fare increase, as well as an increase in tolls on the Marine Parkway–Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge and Cross Bay Veterans Memorial Bridge to the Rockaways.

A significant service improvement on the Rockaway Line took effect in 1993, when direct late-night service between Far Rockaway (but not Rockaway Park) and Brooklyn and Manhattan began; previously, only shuttle service was provided during these hours, with a transfer at Euclid Avenue (the Rockaway Park branch remains a shuttle during non-rush hours, with a transfer at Broad Channel).

The segment of the line between Howard Beach and the Rockaway Peninsula suffered serious damage during Hurricane Sandy and was out of service for several months. On November 20, 2012, a free shuttle designated as H replaced the Rockaway portion of the A service between Far Rockaway–Mott Avenue and Beach 90th Street via the Hammels Wye. On May 30, 2013, full service was restored.

In late May 2016, the MTA announced that it would extend the Rockaway Park Shuttle from Broad Channel to Rockaway Boulevard during weekends from mid-June until at least Labor Day 2016. This extension would allow passengers on both Lefferts Boulevard and Far Rockaway-bound trains to transfer to the shuttle, and for shuttle passengers to transfer to more frequent A train service at Rockaway Boulevard. The trains were also lengthened to eight cars instead of the usual four. It is unknown if this extension will be implemented again in summer 2017.